Race for the Alps - Aug 24th - The Matrix Games version of West Front

On the morning of 23 August, Dahlquist dissolved Task Force Butler as a separate entity, but allowed Butler to remain in command of those forces in the battle square area. Butler planned to have the 141st Infantry, with the motorized battalion of the 143d attached (one of the original components of Task Force Butler), take control of the Rhone front from the Drome River south to the Roubion. Initially he tasked one battalion to secure Hill 300; another, with tanks and tank destroyers, to strike southwest from Sauzet to seize Montelimar; and the two remaining battalions to serve as a reserve near Marsanne, helping to secure Hill 300 as necessary. Small forces were to patrol the main supply route from Crest to Puy, guard both banks of the Drome, and secure Butler's southern flank on the Roubion. Butler also dispatched cavalry elements to the north and south in order to link up with 36th Division units on their way to Valence and Nyons. However, German activities and the late arrival of the 141st Infantry put most of these plans in abeyance.

Shortly after dawn on the 23d, the Germans again attempted to take the initiative. Above Montelimar elements of the panzer division's reconnaissance battalion, supported by a few tanks and self-propelled guns, infiltrated into Sauzet only to be thrown out by an American counterattack several hours later. About noontime, another small German armored column, repeating the maneuver of the previous day, struck across the Roubion River toward Puy St. Martin, but was also pushed back, this time by concentrated American artillery fire, Finally, Groupe Thieme entered the fray, moving from the Sauzet area toward the Hill 300 ridge, but again American forces resisted the pressure and held.

Uncertain of German strength and dispositions, the American counterattacks fared little better. About 1630 that afternoon Butler sent an infantry battalion, some service troops, and a few tanks southward through Sauzet to seize Montelimar. But the German defense was far too strong, and a counterattack halted the American drive at 1800 scarcely a mile short of the city. Thus neither side had accomplished a great deal during the 23d.

Since the German withdrawal through the Montelimar area had not yet begun in earnest, Butler had not made a strong effort to interdict Route N-7 physically. Some ammunition had come up during the night, and the artillery units had engaged several German convoys on the highway, destroying nearly one hundred vehicles. But the need to conserve

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shells for defensive fire and the uncertainty of resupply limited the effort. The Germans, for their part, had begun to sort out a potentially monumental traffic jam at Montelimar and had started some administrative and service organizations moving northward again. However, they had made little progress clearing the danger area, especially the all-important Hill 300. Both sides required more strength at Montelimar, and both expected stronger actions by their opponents on the following day.

Outside of the battle square, Dahlquist inexplicably had shown little urgency in moving the rest of his division to the Montelimar area on the 23d. In the north, the 143d Infantry did not leave Grenoble until 1730 and, although encountering no opposition, had stopped above Valence, more than twenty miles north of the Drome, that evening. In the south, the 142d Infantry had two infantry and one artillery battalions in the vicinity of Nyons--twenty-five miles southwest of Montelimar--by midafternoon, but made no effort to move up to the battle square. Perhaps Dahlquist felt that the coming battle would not be limited to the square, and was thus wary of pushing his entire division into an area that might become a German noose. The earlier German attacks on Butler's flank at Puy St. Martin supported this concern.

Dahlquist's plans for 24 August were conservative. He ordered the 143d to seize Valence and the 142d to extend its covering line from Nyons to within ten miles southeast of Montelimar. Only later, sometime during the night, did he order the remaining battalion of the 142d that had been left at Gap to move to Crest as soon as the 180th Infantry of the 45th Division relieved it. In the Montelimar Battle Square, Dahlquist wanted Butler to secure all the ground dominating the valley between Montelimar and the Drome River and, if possible, to capture the city itself. But without the direct support of the 143d and 142d regiments, Butler's ability to block the Rhone valley physically and to handle German counterattacks at the same time was becoming questionable.

Wiese was more realistic. Throughout the 23d, he repeatedly urged von Wietersheim to rush his panzer division up to Montelimar, and pressured Kniess to have the 198th Division follow as soon as possible. He recommended that the 198th relieve 11th Panzer Division outposts and roadblocks at least as far north as Nyons, and have a regiment at Montelimar by the morning of the 24th. Then Wiese wanted von Wietersheim to clear all American forces from the area using the entire 11th Panzer Division, the regiment of the 198th, and the 63d Luftwaffe Training Regiment, which was then assembling at Montelimar.

Wiese's subordinates had their own problems. At the time, Kniess was more concerned with having his corps across the Durance River that night, and made no provisions to deploy a regiment of the 198th up to Montelimar; von Wietersheim had to contend with crowded roads and shortages of fuel, and his armor arrived in the battle square area in dribs and drabs. Nevertheless, German strength in the Montelimar region on 24 August was enough to give Task Force Butler and the 36th Division considerable trouble.

Another American attack that morning by a battalion of the 141st Infantry from Sauzet toward Montelimar again ended in failure when German troops, striking from the west, first drove a wedge into the American flank, and then infiltrated a maze of small roads and tracks to threaten the unit's rear. That evening, as Harmony attempted to withdraw the battalion, a second series of infantry-armor counterattacks struck the unit's front and flanks, cutting the battalion off from Sauzet and dispersing many of the troops. American artillery broke up further German efforts, and the battalion managed to fight its way back to Sauzet, but, as German pressure renewed, the Americans again pulled out of the village and took positions on the southern slopes of Hill 430. The battalion lost about 35 men wounded and 15 missing, captured 20 Germans, and estimated killing 20.

Meanwhile, a few miles farther north, a second German attack had cleared several early morning American patrols from Route N-7, and then had slowly pushed scattered elements of the 141st Infantry off most of the Hill 300 ridgeline. By dark the American position had received a serious setback. Pleased, Wiese ordered von Wietersheim to finish the job on the following day with the rest of his units plus several battalions of the 198th Division, which the army commander had personally dispatched north.

Both Sides Reinforce
Behind the battlefield on the 24th, Dahlquist now directed the rest of his units into the battle square, still with less dispatch and more confusion than was called for. That morning, for example, he ordered the 2d Battalion, 142d Infantry (relieved of its defensive assignment at Gap), first to Crest, then to Nyons, and finally, as it entered Nyons at 1500, back to Crest. He then directed the rest of the 142d regiment, still in the Nyons area, to follow and take up positions in the battle square along the Roubion River guarding the American southern flank. Meanwhile, between 1300 and 1830, Dahlquist dispatched no less than four contradictory directives--three by radio, one by liaison officer--to the 143d Infantry still above Valence. The regiment started to receive them at 1600 in the wrong sequence. Not until 1900 did the regiment, reinforced by FFI units, get under way toward Valence only to be halted by German defenses on the outskirts of the town; and, as the American units reorganized for a second effort, another order arrived directing its immediate movement to Crest. Breaking contact, the 143d left Valence to the FFI and the Germans, but were unable to reach Crest and the battle square until early the following morning, 25 August.

By this time Dahlquist was becoming more concerned with defending his own positions than in attacking Montelimar or blocking the Rhone highways. Expecting larger German attacks on the 25th, he tried to organize his forces into a tight defensive posture, with the 141st and 142d regiments on line (the 141st on the high ground and the 142d along the Roubion) and the 143d and Task Force Butler, now reconstituted, in reserve. The only offensive action planned for the next day was to have elements of the 141st attempt to cut Route N-7 at La Coucourde, several miles farther north of the previous day's battles. Truscott, who had visited Dahlquist's forward command post near Marsanne that day, wanted a more offensive role for Butler, but had approved Dahlquist's plans, allowing the division commander to deploy his forces as he thought best.

The confusion in American command channels was far from over. About 2330 that night, 24 August, Dahlquist, concerned about protecting his flanks and rear, asked Truscott to send a regiment of the 45th Division to Crest early the next day. Although he had already instructed the 45th Division to move the 157th Infantry to Die, twenty miles east of Crest, Truscott refused the request, feeling that Dahlquist's strength in the battle area was adequate. A few hours later, perhaps feeling that the division commander's defensive concerns might lead him to abandon his main mission, Truscott reminded him that he still expected his division to block the main highway as soon as possible. His troops, Dahlquist radioed in reply, had been there during the day, and he assured Truscott that they were "physically on the road."10 However, although small groups of American soldiers may have reached the highway from time to time, the implication that they controlled any portion of N-7 was inaccurate; at best, Dahlquist's knowledge of his own troop dispositions may have been faulty.

On the German side, the fog of war had begun to dissipate a little. On the evening of the 24th a detailed copy of Dahlquist's operational plans for 25 August had fallen into their hands, giving the German commanders their first clear picture of the forces opposing them at Montelimar.11 As a result, Wiese now decided to move the entire 198th Infantry Division to the north and form a provisional corps under von Wietersheim, consisting of the 11th Panzer and 198th Divisions, the 63d Luftwaffe Training Regiment, the Luftwaffe 18th Flak Regiment (with guns ranging from 20-mm. to 88-mm. in caliber), a railroad artillery battalion (with five heavy pieces ranging from 270-mm. to 380-mm. in caliber), and several lesser units. With these forces he expected von Wietersheim to launch a major attack before noon on the 25th and sweep the American units away. At the same time, Wiese continued to urge Kniess to move his corps north as fast as he could. Having withdrawn the last of the LXXXV Corps across the Durance during the night of 23-24 August, and having executed another withdrawal the following night without pressure from the south, Kniess was about fifteen miles north of Avignon but still more than thirty-five miles south of Montelimar on the morning of the 25th. Success at Montelimar would be for naught if Kniess' units were destroyed in the south.