Operation Northwind (1944)

Operation Nordwind
Part of the Western Front of World War II
Date 31 December 1944 – 25 January 1945 (1944-12-31 – 1945-01-25) Location Alsace and Lorraine, France and Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany Result German operational failure
Belligerents
United States France	Germany
Commanders and leaders
Jacob L. Devers Alexander Patch Edward H. Brooks Jean d.L. de Tassigny	Johannes Blaskowitz Hans von Obstfelder Heinrich Himmler Siegfried Rasp
Units involved
Seventh Army show VI Corps 42nd Infantry Division 45th Infantry Division 70th Infantry Division 79th Infantry Division show XV Corps 103rd Infantry Division 44th Infantry Division 100th Infantry Division 63rd Infantry Division show XXI Corps 36th Infantry Division 12th Armored Division 14th Armored Division First Army show I Corps 1st Infantry Division 2nd Armored Division 3rd Algerian Division show II Corps 1st Armored Division 1st Colonial Division 3rd Moroccan Division 4th Moroccan Division 5th Armored Division 10th Infantry Division	show 1st Army 25th Panzergrenadier Division 21st Panzer Division 6th SS Mountain Division show XIII SS Corps 19th Volksgrenadier Division 36th Volksgrenadier Division 17th SS Panzergrenadier Division show XC Corps 257th Volksgrenadier Division show LXXXIX Corps 361st Volksgrenadier Division 245th Infantry Division 256th Volksgrenadier Division show 19th Army 10th SS Panzer Division show LXIV Corps 189th Infantry Division 198th Infantry Division 708th Volksgrenadier Division show LXIII Corps 159th Infantry Division 716th Infantry Division 269th Infantry Division show XIV SS Corps 10th SS Panzer Division
Strength
230,000 men[1]	Unknown
Casualties and losses
United States: 11,609[2][3] killed and wounded  France: 7,000[4] killed and wounded	23,000 killed, wounded, or captured[5]

Operation Northwind (German: Unternehmen Nordwind) was the last major German offensive of World War II on the Western Front. It began on 31 December 1944 in Rhineland-Palatinate, Alsace and Lorraine in southwestern Germany and northeastern France, and ended on 25 January 1945. The German offensive was an operational failure, with its main objectives not achieved.

Objectives[]

By 21 December 1944, the German momentum during the Battle of the Bulge had begun to dissipate and it was evident the operation was on the brink of failure; it was believed an attack against the United States Seventh Army further south, which had extended its lines and taken on a defensive posture to cover the area vacated by the United States Third Army (which turned north to assist at the site of the German breakthrough), could relieve pressure on German forces in the Ardennes.^[6] In a briefing at his military command complex at Adlerhorst, Adolf Hitler declared in his speech to his division commanders on 28 December 1944 (three days prior to the launch of Operation Nordwind): "This attack has a very clear objective, namely the destruction of the enemy forces. There is not a matter of prestige involved here. It is a matter of destroying and exterminating the enemy forces wherever we find them."^[3]:499

The goal of the offensive was to break through the lines of the U.S. Seventh Army and French 1st Army in the Upper Vosges mountains and the Alsatian Plain, and destroy them, as well as the seizure of Strasbourg, which Himmler had promised would be captured by 30 January. This would leave the way open for Operation Dentist (Unternehmen Zahnarzt), a planned major thrust into the rear of the U.S. Third Army which would lead to the destruction of that army.^[3]:494

Offensive[]

On 31 December 1944, German Army Group G—commanded by Generaloberst Johannes Blaskowitz—and Army Group Oberrhein ("Upper Rhein")—commanded by Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler—launched a major offensive against the thinly stretched, 110-kilometre-long (68 mi) front line held by the U.S. 7th Army. Operation Nordwind soon had the understrengthed U.S. 7th Army in dire straits. The 7th Army—at the orders of U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower—had sent troops, equipment, and supplies north to reinforce the American armies in the Ardennes involved in the Battle of the Bulge.

On the same day that the German Army launched Operation Nordwind, the Luftwaffe (German Air Force) committed almost 1,000 aircraft in support. This attempt to cripple the Allied air forces based in northwestern Europe was known as Operation Bodenplatte, which failed without having achieved any of its key objectives.

The initial Nordwind attack was conducted by three corps of the German 1st Army of Army Group G, and by 9 January, the XXXIX (39th) Panzer Corps was heavily engaged as well. By 15 January at least 17 German divisions (including units in the Colmar Pocket) from Army Group G and Army Group Oberrhein, including the 6th SS Mountain, 17th SS Panzergrenadier, 21st Panzer, and 25th Panzergrenadier Divisions were engaged in the fighting. Another smaller attack was made against the French positions south of Strasbourg, but it was finally stopped. The U.S. VI Corps—which bore the brunt of the German attacks—was fighting on three sides by 15 January.

The 125th Regiment of the 21st Panzer Division under Colonel Hans von Luck aimed to sever the American supply line to Strasbourg, by cutting across the eastern foothills of the Vosges at the northwest base of a natural salient in a bend of the River Rhine. Here the Maginot Line ran east–west, and now "showed what a superb fortification it was". On January 7 Luck approached the line south of Wissembourg at the villages of Rittershoffen and Hatten. Heavy American fire came from the 79th Infantry Division, the 14th Armoured Division, plus elements of the 42nd Infantry Division. On January 10 Luck reached the villages. Two weeks of heavy fighting followed, Germans and Americans each occupying parts of the villages while civilians sheltered in cellars. Luck later said that the fighting around Rittershoffen had been "one of the hardest and most costly battles that ever raged".^[7]

Eisenhower, fearing the outright destruction of the U.S. 7th Army, had rushed already battered divisions hurriedly relieved from the Ardennes, southeast over 100 km (62 mi), to reinforce the 7th Army. But their arrival was delayed, and on 21 January with supplies and ammunition short, Seventh Army ordered the much-depleted 79th and 14th Divisions to retreat from Rittershoffen and fall back on new positions on the south bank of the Moder River.

On 25 January the German offensive was halted, after the US 222nd Infantry Regiment stopped their advance near Haguenau, and earning the Presidential Unit Citation in the process. This was the same day that the reinforcements began to arrive from the Ardennes. Strasbourg was saved but the Colmar Pocket was a danger which still had to be eliminated.

See also[]

• Battle of the Bulge
• Operation Spring Awakening

References[]

Notes[]

Bibliography[]

• Bonn, Keith E. When the Odds Were Even: The Vosges Mountains Campaign, October 1944 – January 1945. Novato, CA: Presidio, 2006.
• Engler, Richard. The Final Crisis: Combat in Northern Alsace, January 1945. Aberjona Press. 1999. ISBN 9780966638912
• Nordwind & the US 44th Division *Battle History of the 44th I.D.
• Whiting, Charles (1992). The Other Battle of the Bulge: Operation Northwind. Avon Books. ISBN 0380716283. OCLC 211992045.
• Citino, Robert (2017), The Wehrmacht's Last Stand: The German Campaigns of 1944–1945, University Press of Kansas, ISBN 9780700624942

External links[]

• Cirillo, Roger. The Ardennes-Alsace. The U.S. Army Campaigns of World War II. United States Army Center of Military History. CMH Pub 72–26.
• The NORDWIND Offensive (January 1945) on the website of the 100th Infantry Division Association contains a list of German primary sources on the operation.