What Patton Did in Three Days That the German Command Called Impossible

#military history #wwii #ww2history What Patton Did in Three Days That the German Command Called Impossible The twenty-second of December, nineteen forty-four. A road running south out of Bastogne, in the Belgian Ardennes. Four German soldiers walking down it under a white flag, and one of them carrying a typed sheet of paper. In this video: On 22 December 1944 a German corps commander sent a note into Bastogne telling the encircled Americans that no relief was coming. Four days later a Sherman came up the road from the south. This is the story of why he was wrong. The famous version says Patton promised to attack in 48 hours and did it. The record says Eisenhower refused that timing, called it reckless, and ordered the 22nd himself. The attack went in three days later, exactly as ordered. The real answer is not a general's nerve. It is Colonel Oscar Koch, who read the map correctly on 9 December when the entire theater had decided the Ardennes was quiet, and two staff officers who wrote three plans for an emergency that had not happened yet. Cent, Nickel, Dime. Three code words on a scrap of paper meant an entire army could change direction with one phone call, because all the arguing had been done in advance. The Third Army swapped its chief of staff three weeks before the hardest job it would ever do, and it cost them nothing. That is what it looks like when the competence lives in the institution instead of in one man. Get the the staff work behind the Third Army's turn to Bastogne Quick Facts PDF: [link to site] Explore more American Ingenuity: The Systems That Won: [playlist link] Like and subscribe for more history. Tell us what to cover next below. #WW2 #BattleOfTheBulge #Bastogne #Patton #ThirdArmy #Ardennes #WorldWarII #MilitaryHistory #4thArmored #101stAirborne