Operation Lumberjack was a

military operation A military operation is the coordinated military actions of a state, or a non-state actor, in response to a developing situation. These actions are designed as a military plan to resolve the situation in the state or actor's favor. Operations may ...

with the goal of capturing the west bank of the

Rhine River ), Surselva, Graubünden, Switzerland , source1_coordinates= , source1_elevation = , source2 = Rein Posteriur/Hinterrhein , source2_location = Paradies Glacier, Graubünden, Switzerland , source2_coordinates= , sourc ...

and seizing key German cities, near the end of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. The

First United States Army First Army is the oldest and longest-established field army of the United States Army. It served as a theater army, having seen service in both World War I and World War II, and supplied the US army with soldiers and equipment during the Korea ...

launched the operation in March 1945 to capture strategic cities in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

and to give the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

a foothold along the Rhine. One unexpected outcome was the capture of the

Ludendorff bridge The Ludendorff Bridge (sometimes referred to as the Bridge at Remagen) was in early March 1945 a critical remaining bridge across the river Rhine in Germany when it was captured during the Battle of Remagen by United States Army forces durin ...

, a strategic railroad bridge across the Rhine, in the

Battle of Remagen The Battle of Remagen was an 18-day battle during the Allied invasion of Germany in World War II from 7 to 25 March 1945 when American forces unexpectedly captured the Ludendorff Bridge over the Rhine intact. They were able to hold it against ...

. Despite German attempts to destroy the bridge, Allied forces captured it intact and were able to use it for ten days to establish a

bridgehead In military strategy, a bridgehead (or bridge-head) is the strategically important area of ground around the end of a bridge or other place of possible crossing over a body of water which at time of conflict is sought to be defended or taken over ...

on the far side, before it finally collapsed at 3:00 PM on 17 March 1945 after ten days of aircraft bombing, direct artillery hits, near misses, and demolition attempts.

Background

The Germans had repeatedly frustrated Allied efforts to cross the Rhine. With the

21st Army Group The 21st Army Group was a British headquarters formation formed during the Second World War. It controlled two field armies and other supporting units, consisting primarily of the British Second Army and the First Canadian Army. Established in ...

firmly established along the Rhine, U.S. General of the Army

Omar Bradley Omar Nelson Bradley (February 12, 1893April 8, 1981) was a senior Officer (armed forces), officer of the United States Army during and after World War II, rising to the rank of General of the Army (United States), General of the Army. Bradley ...

12th Army Group The Twelfth United States Army Group was the largest and most powerful United States Army formation ever to take to the field, commanding four field armies at its peak in 1945: First United States Army, Third United States Army, Ninth United Stat ...

prepared to execute Operation Lumberjack. Bradley's plan called for the U.S. First Army to attack southeastward toward the juncture of the

Ahr Ahr () is a river in Germany, a left tributary of the Rhine. Its source is at an elevation of approximately above sea level in Blankenheim in the Eifel, in the cellar of a timber-frame house near the castle of Blankenheim. After it crosses fro ...

and Rhine Rivers and then swing south to meet

Lieutenant General Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a three-star military rank (NATO code OF-8) used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the ...

George Patton George Smith Patton Jr. (November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945) was a general in the United States Army who commanded the Seventh United States Army in the Mediterranean Theater of World War II, and the Third United States Army in France ...

, whose U. S. Third Army would simultaneously drive northeastward through the

Eifel The Eifel (; lb, Äifel, ) is a low mountain range in western Germany and eastern Belgium. It occupies parts of southwestern North Rhine-Westphalia, northwestern Rhineland-Palatinate and the southern area of the German-speaking Community of ...

. If successful, Lumberjack would capture Cologne, secure the

Koblenz Koblenz (; Moselle Franconian language, Moselle Franconian: ''Kowelenz''), spelled Coblenz before 1926, is a German city on the banks of the Rhine and the Moselle, a multi-nation tributary. Koblenz was established as a Roman Empire, Roman mili ...

sector, and bring the 12th Army Group to the Rhine in the entire area north of the

Moselle River The Moselle ( , ; german: Mosel ; lb, Musel ) is a river A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becom ...

. The 12th Army Group also hoped to capture a large number of Germans. Following Lumberjack, the Allies had planned for a pause along the Rhine while Montgomery's 21st Army Group began

Operation Plunder Operation Plunder was a military operation to cross the Rhine on the night of 23 March 1945, launched by the 21st Army Group under Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery. The crossing of the river was at Rees, Wesel, and south of the river Li ...

, a large, carefully planned movement across the Rhine near Düsseldorf and the Dutch border. Montgomery would then capture the Ruhr, the industrial heartland of Germany.

Allied forces

During the operation, the U.S. First Army controlled * III Corps (Major General

John Millikin Major General John Millikin (January 7, 1888 – November 6, 1970) was a senior United States Army officer who served in both World War I and World War II. During the latter, Millikin commanded III Corps in General George S. Patton's U.S. Third ...

), ** 9th Armored Division, ** 1st Infantry Division, ** 9th Infantry Division, ** 78th Infantry Division *

V Corps 5th Corps, Fifth Corps, or V Corps may refer to: France * 5th Army Corps (France) * V Cavalry Corps (Grande Armée), a cavalry unit of the Imperial French Army during the Napoleonic Wars * V Corps (Grande Armée), a unit of the Imperial French Ar ...

(Major General Clarence R. Huebner), ** 2nd Infantry Division, ** 28th Infantry Division, ** 69th Infantry Division, ** 106th Infantry Division ** 7th Armored Division (not committed to the operation and transferred to the III Corps by March 7). *

VII Corps 7th Corps, Seventh Corps, or VII Corps may refer to: * VII Corps (Grande Armée), a corps of the Imperial French army during the Napoleonic Wars * VII Corps (German Empire), a unit of the Imperial German Army prior to and during World War I * VII ...

(Major General

J. Lawton Collins General (United States), General Joseph Lawton Collins (May 1, 1896 – September 12, 1987) was a senior United States Army officer. During World War II, he served in both the Asiatic-Pacific Theater, Pacific and European Theater of Operations, U ...

), ** 3rd Armored Division ** 8th Infantry Division, **

99th Infantry Division The 99th Infantry Division was formed in 1942 and deployed overseas in 1944. The "Checkerboard" or "Battle Babies" division landed at the French port of Le Havre and proceeded northeast to Belgium. During the heavy fighting in the Battle of the ...

, ** 104th Infantry Division. During Operation Lumberjack, the U.S. Army's 9th Armored Division was tasked with mopping up elements of the German Army trapped on the west bank of the Rhine and to prevent a counterattack against the Ninth Army's flank. They were to secure the region between Mosel and the Duren-Cologne and to destroy the German army's capability to fight in that area. The First Army was to seize the entire region west of the Rhine. After capturing Cologne, the First Army was to wheel southeast and join up with Patton's Third Army. Patton was supposed to capture the Eifel Mountains and then the Mosel Valley, trapping the remainder of the German Seventh Army in the Eifel area.

German forces

From north to south, the attacking U.S. forces were confronted by * German ''Fifteenth Army'' (General der Infanterie

Gustav-Adolf von Zangen __NOTOC__ Gustav Adolf Karl Friedrich Ernst von Zangen (7 November 1892 – 1 May 1964) was a German general in the Wehrmacht during World War II and a commander of the 15th Army in the Netherlands in 1944 during World War II. He was a recipie ...

), ** LXXXI Corps (

Friedrich Köchling __NOTOC__ Friedrich Köchling (22 June 1893 – 6 June 1970) was a German general in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II who held commands at the division and corps levels. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron ...

, from March 10

Ernst-Günther Baade Ernst-Günther Baade (20 August 1897 – 8 May 1945) was a German general during World War II. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords of Nazi Germany. Baade was wounded in action and died from his i ...

) ***

9th Panzer Division The 9th Panzer Division was a panzer division of the German Army during World War II. It came into existence after 4th Light Division was reorganized in January 1940. The division was headquartered in Vienna, in the German military district Weh ...

*** 11th Panzer Division *** 363rd Infantry Division *** 59th Infantry Division ***Divisionsstab 476 ** LVIII Panzer Corps ( Walter Krüger) *** 353rd Infantry Division *** 12th Infantry Division *** 3rd Panzergrenadier Division * German ''Fifth Panzer Army'' (General der Panzertruppe

Hasso von Manteuffel Freiherr Hasso Eccard von Manteuffel (14 January 1897 – 24 September 1978) was a German baron born to the Prussian noble von Manteuffel family and was a general during World War II who commanded the 5th Panzer Army. He was a recipient of th ...

, from March 9 Generaloberst

Josef Harpe Josef Harpe (21 September 1887 – 14 March 1968) was a German general during World War II who commanded the 9th Army. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords of Nazi Germany. Harpe served on the ...

) ** LXXIV Corps (

Carl Püchler __NOTOC__ Carl Püchler (13 May 1894 – 5 February 1949) was a German general during World War II. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross of Nazi Germany. Awards and decorations * Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on 20 Dec ...

) *** 85th Infantry Division ***

272nd Infantry Division 7 (seven) is the natural number following 6 and preceding 8. It is the only prime number preceding a cube. As an early prime number in the series of positive integers, the number seven has greatly symbolic associations in religion, mythology, s ...

*** 3rd Airborne Division ** LXVII Corps ( Otto Hitzfeld) *** 89th Infantry Division *** 277th Infantry Division ** LXVI Corps (

Walther Lucht __NOTOC__ Walter Lucht (26 February 1882 – 18 March 1949) was a German general in the Wehrmacht during World War II who held commands at division, corps and army levels. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves ...

) *** 5th Airborne Division. Over 75,000 German troops were on the western banks of the bridge. Their only escape route was across the Ludendorff bridge. Written permission was required to destroy the bridge because on 14–15 October 1944, an American bomb had struck the Mulheim Bridge in Cologne and hit the chamber containing the demolition charges, prematurely destroying the bridge. Hitler was angered by this incident and ordered those "responsible" for the destruction of the Mulheim Bridge to be court-martialed. He also ordered that demolition explosives should not be laid in place until the very last moment, when the Allies were within of the bridge. The bridges should only be demolished following an order in writing from the officer in charge, and only as a last resort and at the last possible moment. This order left officers responsible for destroying bridges nervous about both the consequences if they blew up the bridge too soon and if they failed to blow it up at all.

Battle

Bradley launched Lumberjack on 1 March. In the north, the First Army rapidly exploited bridgeheads over the Erft River, entering

Euskirchen Euskirchen (; Ripuarian: ''Öskerche'') is a town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, capital of the district Euskirchen. While Euskirchen resembles a modern shopping town, it also has a history dating back over 700 years, having been granted to ...

on 4 March and

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...

on the fifth. Cologne was in U.S. Army control by the seventh. The First Army then pushed towards the Ahr River valley, the likely point of retreat for what was left of the German Army's LXVI and LXVII Korps. The U.S. Third Army met some resistance along the

Siegfried Line The Siegfried Line, known in German as the ''Westwall'', was a German defensive line built during the 1930s (started 1936) opposite the French Maginot Line. It stretched more than ; from Kleve on the border with the Netherlands, along the west ...

and the Prüm and Kyll Rivers. On 4 March at Bitburg, the 5th Infantry Division cut through the German lines. Taking advantage of the breach, the Fourth Armored Division struck out on a drive to the Rhine in less than five days. While losing only 100 casualties, they cost the Germans 5,700 killed and wounded. The Fourth Armored barely missed the chance to capture a bridge at

Urmitz Urmitz () is a municipality in the district of Mayen-Koblenz in Rhineland-Palatinate, western Germany. In the 4th millennium BC it contained one of the largest fortified settlements of the time. This archaeological site has since been destroyed ...

. While moving towards the Ahr, the U.S. 9th Armored Division on the right flank of the First Army had moved swiftly towards the Rhine. The closer the division got to the Rhine, the more quickly it advanced. The speed of their movement towards the Rhine surprised the Germans. About upstream from Bonn, they unexpectedly found the Ludendorff railroad bridge still standing.

Battle of Remagen

During Operation Lumberjack, on 7 March 1945, when troops of the

U.S. Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cl ...

's 9th Armored Division

Combat Command A combat command was a combined-arms military organization of comparable size to a brigade or regiment employed by armored forces of the United States Army from 1942 until 1963. The structure of combat commands was task-organized and so the force ...

B, 9th Armored Engineer Battalion reached the river, they were very surprised to see that the

railroad bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...

was still standing. It was one of the two damaged but usable bridges over the

Rhine ), Surselva, Graubünden, Switzerland , source1_coordinates= , source1_elevation = , source2 = Rein Posteriur/Hinterrhein , source2_location = Paradies Glacier, Graubünden, Switzerland , source2_coordinates= , so ...

(the other being the

Wesel Railway Bridge The Wesel Railway Bridge was a bridge on the Haltern–Venlo railway, built as part of the Hamburg–Venlo railway by the Cologne-Minden Railway Company, and opened on 1 March 1874. The long railway bridge at Wesel was the last Rhine bridge remai ...

). U.S. forces were able to capture the bridge. The Rhine was the last natural line of defense that the Germans hoped could be used to substantially resist the Western Allied advance. Up to then, crossings had been limited to small infantry reconnaissance patrols by boat. When word that the bridge was still standing reached General William Hoge, commander of Combat Command B, he ordered the 27th Armored Infantry Battalion to advance into Remagen with support from the 14th Tank Battalion. After German demolition charges failed to destroy the bridge, the U.S. troops captured the bridge and in the next ten days 25,000 troops comprising six divisions established a wide beachhead on the eastern side of the Rhine.

Impact on war plans

The capture of the bridge convinced the Allied high command in Western Europe that they could envelop the German industrial area of the

Ruhr The Ruhr ( ; german: Ruhrgebiet , also ''Ruhrpott'' ), also referred to as the Ruhr area, sometimes Ruhr district, Ruhr region, or Ruhr valley, is a polycentric urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. With a population density of 2,800/km ...

as opposed to focusing primarily on General

Bernard Montgomery Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery, 1st Viscount Montgomery of Alamein, (; 17 November 1887 – 24 March 1976), nicknamed "Monty", was a senior British Army officer who served in the First World War, the Irish War of Independence and t ...

's plan,

, which would bring the

British 21st Army Group The 21st Army Group was a British headquarters formation formed during the Second World War. It controlled two field armies and other supporting units, consisting primarily of the British Second Army and the First Canadian Army. Established in ...

across the Rhine into northern Germany. The unexpected availability of the first major crossing of the Rhine, Germany's last major natural barrier and line of defense, caused Allied high commander

Dwight Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; ; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was an American military officer and statesman who served as the 34th president of the United States from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, ...

to alter his plans to end the war. The ability to quickly establish a

on the eastern side of the Rhine and to get forces into Germany allowed the U.S. forces to envelop the German industrial area of the

. The Allies were able to get six divisions across the Rhine before the

Ludendorff Bridge The Ludendorff Bridge (sometimes referred to as the Bridge at Remagen) was in early March 1945 a critical remaining bridge across the river Rhine in Germany when it was captured during the Battle of Remagen by United States Army forces durin ...

collapsed ten days after it was captured on 17 March. Twenty-five soldiers were killed or went missing and three died later from injuries; 63 others were injured. Before it collapsed, five U.S. divisions had already used it and two adjacent tactical bridges to cross into Germany, creating a well-established bridgehead almost long, extending from Bonn in the north almost to Koblenz in the south, and deep. The bridge was not rebuilt after the war. However, the bridge towers remain and in 1980 a peace museum was opened to the public.''Peace Museum Bridge at Remagen''
Website of the museum. Retrieved July 21, 2013.

Aftermath

Operation Lumberjack succeeded in clearing the Rhine north of Mosel of effective German forces. The Allies destroyed four corps of the German 15th and 7th Armies. The capture of the bridge at Remagen was an unexpected bonus that advanced the timetable for crossing the Rhine. Patton and Bradley were able to move up their scheduled crossings of the Rhine. General

Albert Kesselring Albert Kesselring (30 November 1885 – 16 July 1960) was a German '' Generalfeldmarschall'' of the Luftwaffe during World War II who was subsequently convicted of war crimes. In a military career that spanned both world wars, Kesselring beca ...

described the battle as the "Crime of Remagen. It broke the front along the Rhine."

Hermann Göring Hermann Wilhelm Göring (or Goering; ; 12 January 1893 – 15 October 1946) was a German politician, military leader and convicted war criminal. He was one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party, which ruled Germany from 1933 to 1 ...

said that the capture of the bridge "made a long defense impossible." Major General Carl Wagener, chief of staff to Field Marshall Walter Model, said that capturing the bridge signaled the end of the war for the Germans:

In popular culture

The battle was depicted in the novel ''The Bridge at Remagen'' by

Ken Hechler Kenneth William Hechler (September 20, 1914 – December 10, 2016) was an American politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he represented West Virginia's 4th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1959 to 197 ...

, which was later adapted into the film of the same name.

References

Other sources

* Charles MacDonald, ''The Last Offensive'', Washington: GPO, 1973. * Georg Tessin, ''Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS 1939 - 1945'', Volume 2, Osnabrück:Biblio Verlag, 1973. * Georg Tessin, ''Verbände und Truppen der deutschen Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS 1939 - 1945'', Volume 4, Osnabrück:Biblio Verlag, 1975.

External links

The Rhineland Campaign

MacDonald's ''The Last Offensive'' online at www.ibiblio.org
* Map of Operation Lumberjack

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lumberjack Military operations of World War II involving Germany Western European Campaign (1944–1945) Battles and operations of World War II involving the United States March 1945 events