“Peiper must be stopped!”
Lieutenant General Courtney M. Hodges, commanding the U.S. First Army, looked up from his maps and saw chaos everywhere. All across the Ardennes Forest, American forces were reeling from a surprise German counterattack that struck on the morning of December 16, 1944. While some frontline units stubbornly held their ground, others simply disappeared annihilated by the Nazi juggernaut.
One marauding enemy column particularly worried General Hodges. This was Kampfgruppe Peiper, the spearhead of the German 1st SS Panzer Division. Named for its commander, SS Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper, this powerful force was headed for the crossroads city of Liege, first stop toward its ultimate objective of Antwerp and the Belgian coast.
“Peiper must be stopped!”
Lieutenant General Courtney M. Hodges, commanding the U.S. First Army, looked up from his maps and saw chaos everywhere. All across the Ardennes Forest, American forces were reeling from a surprise German counterattack that struck on the morning of December 16, 1944. While some frontline units stubbornly held their ground, others simply disappeared annihilated by the Nazi juggernaut.
One marauding enemy column particularly worried General Hodges. This was Kampfgruppe Peiper, the spearhead of the German 1st SS Panzer Division. Named for its commander, SS Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper, this powerful force was headed for the crossroads city of Liege, first stop toward its ultimate objective of Antwerp and the Belgian coast.
The True Story of a Nazi Officer s Bloody Blitz Through Belgium
While Joachim Peiper’s destruction can be measured by the casualties on both sides and the number of tanks and vehicles destroyed, there is no metric to measure the pain and misery inflicted, only anecdotal evidence.
Here s What You Need to Know: During the Battle of the Bulge, German SS Lt. Col. Joachim Peiper led the most powerful armored unit in the campaign’s deepest penetration but all for naught.
As the Belgian town of La Gleize burned to the ground around him, 29-year-old SS Lt. Col. Joachim Peiper remained calm in his headquarters, listening to reports and issuing orders. Outside, his outnumbered tanks, exchanged fire with American armor.
15 December 1944 was one of the coldest winters Europe had seen in nearly 20 years, one of many factors slowing the Allied armies in their drive across the continent. This temporary pause gave the German army time to complete their planning and preparation for a massive counter attack code named “Wacht am Rhein” or Watch on the Rhine, an operation that that was Hitler’s brainchild. His stated goal was to pierce the thinly held First Army, VIII Corps line between Monschau and Wasserbillig with Army Group B, commanded by Field Marshall Model. Hitler had ambitious goals for the offensive. He expected Army Group B to be through the Ardennes Forrest by the end of the first day. By the end of the second day, Army Group B would reach the Meuse between Liège and Dinant by the end of the third day and to seize Antwerp as well as the western bank of the Scheldt estuary by the fourth day.