The Hammelburg Raid (also known as Task Force Baum) has been one of the most controversial operations of World War II, and it cast a shadow over General George S. Patton’s otherwise illustrious career. While in command of the 3rd Army, Gen. Patton ordered the controversial and secret operation. The operation took place on March 26-28, 1945 with the official purpose of taking a small task force 60 miles behind enemy lines to liberate the prisoner of war camp OFLAG XIII-B near Hammelburg, Germany. But unofficially, its purpose was to free Patton's son-in-law, Lieutenant Colonel John Waters, who was taken prisoner at Kasserine Pass, Tunisia, in 1943. Initially, the operation was successful. They reached the camp and released the prisoners, but they were ambushed on the way back and taken prisoner. It resulted in nine dead, 32 wounded, and 16 missing in action. I will be discussing some of the principles of Mission Command and their effects on the outcome of the Task Force Baum.
THE BATTLE
By March 26, 1945, Patton’s 3rd Army arrived to the hills overlooking the towns of Aschaffenburg and Schweinheim. While there, Gen Patton received orders from Gen Bradley to start moving further north, and coincidentally, he received military intelligence that his son in law LTC John Waters was being held captive as a POW at the OFLAG XIII-B located in Hammelburg. It was at this time that he ordered the raid to liberate the POWs from the Hammelburg camp. Selected to organize the attack was LTC Creighton Abrams, commander of the Combatant Command B (CCB), 37th Armorer Regiment. He assigned LTC Harold Cohen to lead the attack, but due to a severe case of hemorrhoids, he had to be removed from the mission. After being removed, he recommended CPT ...
... middle of paper ...
...route called for them to cross the river at Gemund, but the bridge was heavily guarded. CPT Baum sent for a recon of the bridge; and while waiting, they were attacked. In a matter of seconds, they lost three tanks and several men were injured or missing (himself and LT Nutto were amongst the injured). This forced CPT Baum to order the task force north to find an alternate route. Heading north, they found a crossing point to cross the Sinn River at Burginissm. Once across, they headed east towards the town of Grafendorf. At Grafendorf, the task force found approximately 700 Russian laborers being guarded by 200 German soldiers. They liberated the Russians and transferred the German Soldiers to them. They crossed the Saale river and employed (captured) two locals to help them find and navigate to their objective—this was the final stretch to their destination.
The 7th Cavalry Regiment's destruction at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in June 1876 is the subject of over a century of debate. LTC George A. Custer failed to exercise four key responsibilities that were expected of him as the regiment’s commander. He failed to understand the problem and environment, visualize a feasible solution, clearly describe it to his subordinates, and effectively direct his forces. These four aspects of mission command are integral to the operations process and help Soldiers understand and execute their commander's intent. Custer's failure to properly fulfill his role in the operations process resulted in his death and a strategic defeat for the nation.
Brigade General Scales, Robert H. JR. Certain Victory. The U.S. Army in the Gulf War.
In order to receive a victory in the Battle of the Bulge, General Patton used Mission Command Analysis in order to understand how he can be successful for this mission. The first thing of understanding t...
A big challenge faced by those planning the operation, was that no one had the full picture. The command and control of units in Afghanistan were split into three separate entities; each had their own assets and intelligence sources. The U.S. ground forces under United States Central Command (CENTCOM) were lead by Lieutenant General (LG) Paul Mikolashek out of Kuwait. How...
In North Vietnam in 1970 several soldiers, sailors and airman were killed, beaten, starved and confined in solitary confinement causing severe mental issues in prisons in North Vietnam. Many of the American Prisoners were pilots for the Army and Air Force shot down during the heavy bombing raids ordered by President Johnson in 1964. 1 For nearly 2,000 days, or six plus years many of these Americans imprisoned in Son Tay about 23 miles west of Hanoi in North Vietnam. After several reports to the Pentagon from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the National security Agency (NSA), one of the greatest orchestrated prison rescue attempt was coordinated in a joint effort by the armed services. This operation exhibited extreme planning and attention to detail that forever changed the North Vietnamese treatment of American Prisoners of War (POWs).2
At dawn of 19th August 1942, six thousand and one hundred Allied soldiers, of whom roughly
Operation Acid Gambit was a successful joint personnel recovery mission executed on the 20th of December in 1989. The operation, largely considered a victory, was effective for several reasons. Joint recovery forces showcased excellent timing, obtained actionable intelligence, performed intense rehearsals, and integrated joint assets in extraordinary fashion. The operation was so successful that, Colonel James A. Ruffer, a major contributor to this effort, wrote, “Since WWII there had been not one rescue of an enemy held American prisoner, by U.S. forces, until Operation Just Cause.”1 In order to comprehend the full impact of this historic mission, and the monumental strides that the United States gained, the background of previous personnel recovery missions must first be understood. One specific instance entirely captures the precedent that existed prior to the accomplishments achieved in late 1989.
They had been trained to act instead of waiting to be told what to do; they knew that if the invasion was to succeed, their small units had to accomplish their individual missions. Among these leaders were men like CPT Sam Gibbons of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment. He gathered a group of 12 soldiers-from different commands-and liberated a tiny village-which turned out to be outside the division area of operations-before heading south toward his original objective, the Douve River bridges. CPT Gibbons set off with a dozen people he had never seen before and no demolition equipment to destroy a bridge nearly 15 kilometers away.
The Raid at Cabanatuan, also known as The Great Raid, is a rescue of American and allied prisoners of war and civilians from a Japanese camp in Pangatian, Cabanatuan City, Nueva Ecija on January 30, 1945. Remaining as the most successful rescue mission in U.S. military history, United States Army Rangers, Alamo Scouts, and Filipino guerrillas liberated more than 500 from the POW camp, during World War II. In this battle that Lieutenant Colonel Henry Mucci played the vital role as the leader of the 6th Ranger Battalion troops. Thus, this paper aims to discuss and define the characteristics of Lt Col Mucci as a leader which led to the success of this mission portraying several principles of mission command.
On the 17th of July 1943, the allied coalition had secured the southern beaches of Sicily during Operation HUSKY and began movement to Messina. During the campaign, Lieutenant General George S. Patton commanded the 7th Army was tasked to protect General Bernard Montgomery’s 8th Army assault up to Messina. The decision to have the US forces as the supporting effort was displeasing to Patton. The result of which was Patton’s decision to advance to the Sicilian Capital, Palermo. What would have resulted if Patton had followed the original plan to support Montgomery’s advance to Messina rather than advance west to Palermo? Given the Italian and German resistance the allies had faced in Sicily, Patton’s control of Palermo was irrelevant to the campaign’s plan to conquer Sicily. This made clearer by examining the initial allied plan for Sicily, what the German plan was in Sicily and if their only intent was to evacuate the island, and looking at the actual outcomes of Patton’s decision.
Operation Overload was ingeniously planned by Allied Generals Dwight D. Eisenhower and Bernard Montgomery. The plan involved a monumental land, air, and sea invasion that transcended any of its predecessors. Surprisingly a full invasion of Europe’s Nazi
Escape from Bataan is a personal account of Ross E. Hofmann. He tells his story of serving in the Supply Corps during World War II. The editor, David L. Snead, believes that this memoir “provides a very unique look at the experiences of a junior naval officer who survived the harrowing defense of the Philippines.” I agree with Dr. Snead that this memoir is accurate and believable. Hofmann proves his reliability by talking about Supply Corps training, service in the Philippines before the war, the experience of a naval ensign as American forces retreated and resisted the Japanese, and his escape from the Philippines.
Early in preparations for the 1944 invasion of Normandy, Marshall selected Bradley to command the 1st Army, which he later directed in the D-Day landings and Normandy campaign. When Patton was sent with the 3rd Army to assist in the breakout from France several weeks later, Bradley became the 12th Army Group commander, with Gen. Courtney Hodges's 1st and Patton's 3rd armies under his command. He led this force in a rapid movement across northern France and Belgium to the German frontier. Slowed by rugged terrain and supply shortages, Bradley's forces were hard hit in the Ardennes area in mid-December. When the German advance made it necessary for him to hand over command of the American forces north of the German penetration to British field marshal Bernard Montgomery, Bradley used Patton's troops to restore his lines in the south. His reinforced force in February pushed the Germans back across the Roer and led to a seizure of a bridge across the Rhine in early March. In April Bradley's Army Group, now consisting of the 1st, 3rd, 9th, and 15th armies, led a massive drive through central Germany to the Elbe, to link up with the Russians at Torgau on April 25th before pushing into Czechoslovakia at the end of the war.
On a fair June morning in 1944, General Eisenhower sat with his colleagues anxiously waiting for a battle report in a meeting room, smoking cigarette after cigarette. Supreme Commander of Operation Overlord, Eisenhower recently declared an “all-go,” commencing the largest amphibious invasion in history. Months and months of tedious planning have gone into this invasion; the future of the world depended on successfully breaking the Nazis’ iron grip on the European west coast. Earlier that morning, a young American private from the 29th Division, shaking in sheer nervousness, sat amongst his unit in their landing vehicle, awaiting the announcement, “thirty seconds”, meaning that his landing craft would be landing soon. His friends, comrades, and brothers around him were praying, vomiting, and anxiously awaiting the door to open.
What started out as a well planned kidnapping, the Battle of Mogadishu turned into a battle for the lives of many American Special forces. Most are more familiar with this battle from the book “Black Hawk Down” by Mark Bowden and the motion picture that followed with the same title. Let’s put the lack of operational, intelligence and command preparedness for conducting the actual mission aside for a minute and focus on the recovery of the American Aircrew and Special Forces members stranded in the middle of the city. Could the command have prevented the actions that followed the shoot down of Super 64? Were the soldiers properly trained for the sequence of events to follow? To determine this, I will first discuss the history and evolution of Personnel Recovery (PR). Secondly, I will outline the efforts to recover the crewmembers of the fallen UH-60’s and the confusion that ensued with the recovery team. Lastly, I will point out the lessons learned from the battle and how it has influenced PR into today’s military operations.