Band of Brothers question (AIR)

When the 101st Airborne division was surrounded at Bastogne, it is shown in the mini series that the town was being bombed heavily by mid December 1944. My question is: who was bombarding the town? The Luftwaffe? The weakened and shor of bombers Luftwaffe of 1944? And if so, why did the Allies allow it? Or were the Allies the ones who were accidentaly bombing the town?

 

I'll bite of sorts.....thought it was artillery used by the Volkgrenadier divisions in the area. True US heavy bombers did blast German elements out side of the US protective ring at Bastogne...

 

Yes, Erich is correct. It was German artillery. Don't know which unit though.

 

I've certainly read somewhere that Bastogne was 'repeatedly bombed at night by the Luftwaffe' but just now don't have time to delve further....

 

Ahhh, well, I am not going to dispute that the Luftwaffe indeed did bomb Bastogne at night. But I would imagine that the attempts were few and far between. Only assumption on my part. As Bastogne was actually hard hit by heavy fire I suggest that the artillery fire was by far the more intense and effective of the two.

[ 16. June 2003, 05:23 PM: Message edited by: Stevin Oudshoorn ]

 

Here it is.. from Charles B MacDonald's history of the Bulge : -

'Inside Bastogne, around eight thirty on Christmas Eve, men heard the approaching drone of a swarm of big planes....the bombing that followed was a new and terrifying experience.

In two runs over Bastogne, German bombers - most of them Ju88s - dropped approximately two tons of bombs, low in terms of what American bombers usually delivered, but enough to do heavy damage to a town the size of Bastogne...one bomb hit the Command post of CCB's team Cherry, killing four officers'. ( p526/527 ).

 

Alright fine fellows who will be the first to pose the possible answer ? !

There may have been several NSGr units active using the Ju 87D-5 to attack known US positions within the Bastogne borders but am not sure. The Kampfgeschwader is one of my weaker points. Will do some checking but am sure it is already on some dedicated Ardenne web-site ?

~E

 

Thank you very much! Then I suposse those were Ju-88s bombing Bastogne, since there were clear aircraft silhouttes there. Do you remember which scene? The one in which the pretty Belgian nurse gets killed when a bomb hits the hospital...

And another question: when they were at Bastogne awaiting for air-dropped supplies, two P-47s machine-gunned the 'Easy' company men... I didn't quite understand that...

 

I will look further into the data but on Christmas eve night the Luftwaffe carried out two heavy bombing raids on Bastogne and the surrounding area's for the impending German attack

~E

 

Because of Bastogne's strategic advantage to either side, especially the Germans who could use its 7-road junction to move their armour, it was going to be one-hell-of-a-fight to win it.
Thus, Hitler saw that whatever depleted Luftwaffe bomber units could do, he would make them do. Dornier, Junkers and I believe a handful of Heinkels participated in bombing Bastogne from the 21st December 1944 until at least 25th December 1944.

 

Ill help ya Herr General Friedrich


In the mini series, which i have on DVD, it is actually HE-111's you see bombing Bastogne. Although i believe that in real life they were probably Junkers 88's

As for the P47 'strafing the easy company men'
he wasnt strafing them, he was marking them to stay back.


Either that or the USAAF was getting warmed up to deal with Canadians in Afghanistan (Thought you'd like that Brad )

 

Anyways, I remember reading on the attack, just remembered what book it was in now, that the air attack was an extreme failure by the Luftwaffe, only a few bombs hit the city, and the nurse that dies in the BoB was the only one that really died in the air raid, although others were wounded.

[ 24. June 2003, 12:00 PM: Message edited by: Brad T. ]

 

Sad story.