Talk:Battle of the Bulge/Archive 1

message: The article says that the general's reply 'NUTS!' was not understood by Germans and non-American allies alike. So would somebody please, for the sake of this 'non-American ally', explain in the article what this reply meant? branko
"NUTS" is American slang for "crazy" or mentally ill.  "You're going to do WHAT?!?!?  That's NUTS."  An insane asylum was known as the "nuthouse."  It is also simultaneously a slang word for the human testicles or "the balls," implying manhood or a lack thereof.  ("That guy's got nuts the size of grapefruit.")  There are therefore several possible implications:
1) The Germans were insane to ask for the Americans to surrender.
2) The Americans knew they were insane to NOT surrender, but refused anyway.
3) The Americans had the courage ("the balls") to not surrender.
4) If the Germans wanted to attack, they lacked "the balls" to do so.
A multiplicity of meanings communicated with a single word, some of them arguably obscene.
clarka
It should be noted that "Nuts" is also used as an exclamatory remark, like "Fuck" or "Shit" except less obscene.  This is the sense in which I always interpreted the remark.
:Likewise. But I'm now convinced that the good General had quite a specific meaning in mind, and it wasn't insanity. Explanations 3 and 4 are close, but no cigar. Suppose he had been English and had said "Bollocks!" That's what he meant. (My fellow Americans: Say the word but leave out the ock.) I'll bet that a study of contemporary American slang would show that "Nuts" had not only the same literal meaning but the same sense as an exclamation. 209.204.172.194 22:59, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree, and the Bollocks article gives a very good synonym for this usage: "Rubbish!"  I'm going to add this to the footnote, since I think it's closer in meaning to "Nuts!"; I'll leave the "Go to Hell!" bit too, since "Rubbish!" might not be much clearer to non-native English speakers. -- jhf 18:19, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

text: The 'crazy' theory just doesn't stand up. I've heard 'Nuts' used to mean 'go to hell' in very similar contexts. Also there are reports that what McAuliffe actually said was still one word, but with the same meaning and considerably less polite. Hard to think of a less polite word that meant crazy; very easy to think of ones that meant 'Go to Hell'. I'm chaining the interpretation back. DJ Clayworth 13:19, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

text: I had always assumed it was simply derived from the then-common slang phrase "nuts to you," a nicer way of saying "go to hell".  Shadoks 12:16, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text:  It probably meant precisely that. See HWO Kinnard's reminiscence: Gave the message to Colonel Harper, who ... gave it to the German Armistice party. The Germans were allowed to take off their blindfold and read the message, and they were puzzled by it. And they were trying to translate nuts. And they said, "Nuets, Nuets, Nuts... Vas Is Das?" They didn't get it at all. And Colonel Harper said, "If you don't understand it, it means go to hell!"
In the book I read "nuts" is clearly along the same lines as "crap, dang, dammit". The man who said it originally, when told Germans were offering surrender questioned whether the Germans were offering too surrender, when told it was the other way around he responded "nuts". And then Colonel Harper added his own definition to the reply.
It would seem to me that Colonel Harper, who had been given the message by McAuliffe, was more than competent to interpret the message. We should make it clear that the interpretation is the one he gave. DJ Clayworth 16:18, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nuts! 

message: According to Laws of war, some German soldiers wore American uniforms, therefore not having right to legal protection, so they were killed even after they surrendered. Could somebody explain it here? -- Error 01:58 Apr 17, 2003 (UTC)
I am attempting to research this, but haven't found any obvious references to a specific incident yet.  I was able to determine that a specific S.S. unit was tasked with capturing a pair of key bridges behind Allied lines.  They actually did operate behind American lines in jeeps wearing American uniforms, sowing confusion.  This unit may have been involved in the Malmedy massacre.  Near the end of the battle they were used in a spoiling attack and mostly wiped out.
I think I remember an incident from the movie titled "Battle of the Bulge" which may or may not have been historically accurate.  In the movie, an S.S. unit seized a checkpoint behind Allied lines and massacred Americans passing through, dumping their bodies behind the checkpoint.  The ruse was discovered and some of the S.S. attempted to surrender but were shot.  Could someone who has seen the movie more recently do better?  Better yet, can anyone trace down actual historical examples of Allied forces in World War II engaging in reprisal? clarka
The German troops disguised as americans were led by Otto Skorzeny (who also commanded the unit that rescued Mussolini) see http://www.donhollway.com/writing/skorzeny/skorzeny.html Mintguy 21:57, 13 Aug 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Laws of War, Uniforms 

message: A couple of problems with the page:
* The text mentions two competing plans, says "one called for...", but never explicitly completes the contrast. (Presumably the first was the idea of pinching out Hodges and the second was the plan actually implemented? If so, it needs to be made specific.)
* Could someone please clarify the relation between Wacht am Rhine and Herbstnebel? (Here and in the list of military operations page too, please.)
B.Bryant 16:09, 16 Nov 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  Couple of problems 

message: This article needs help... I would work on it, but I have mucho English and AP Biology homework to do... no offense to the writers, I'm just saying. I'll work on it tomorrow, most likely. ugen64 02:41, Dec 16, 2003 (UTC)
Branko, why did you add "completely incomprehensible"? The reply was totally understandable to the Americans and British; Germans and French probably had more trouble with it. Should we add an explanation of what it meant? DJ Clayworth 14:44, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)
thread_title:  This article needs help 

message: I've took the numbers, which differ from source to source, from RAF's History site since it seems to be the most complete and authoritive source. GeneralPatton 15:52, 30 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Operation Bodenplatte

message: This is one of the best examples of Wikipedia?  The German troops who fought in the battle of the bulge were mostly new recruits, and hardly the well trained troops that were fighting earlier on.  With the exception of the SS Panzer divisions, it was mostly a last ditch gamble.  The best troops were all fighting in the east.  The German troops involved in this battle were about 10% of the total available.  No one on wikipedia knows this???
:That's a valid point, but I think you are misinterpriting what the article says. When it says "cream", I think it means the "large part of" (preponderence) instead of "the best of" so I have changed the wording accordingly. →Raul654 03:04, Oct 2, 2004 (UTC)
::: I think it was me who used 'cream' to begin with, and I still would if no one objected. Yes, the units involved included a loot of noobs, including some that probably should never have been drafted to begin with. But at the end of six months of strategic setbacks on all fronts, and while needing to shore up a ~750 miles of eastern fron that was temporarily stable only because the Soviets had paused to catch their breath after the summer's grand-scale overrun, the German army managed to 'skim' their defenses and factory outputs to assemble and refit a large offensive force that included their most elite mechanized formations, a number of other mechanized formations, elite Luftwaffe infantry, commandos, parachutists, massive concentrations of artillery and rocket batteries, etc. Yes, there were other elite units still operating elsewhere, but not in this kind of concentration. In context I think it's quite fair to refer to it as the 'cream' of the German army.
::: Change 'cream' to something else if you wish, but please not to 'preponderence', which is very misleading. — B.Bryant 20:29, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cream of the German Army? 

message: I have removed:
:Eisenhower later retracted his earlier order, and placed the American armies back under the command of Omar Bradley. Never again would American troops be put under British command.
It is snide and it is not even a Point of View it just wrong.
# Eisenhower never retracted his order. The order stood until new orders were issued which in the case of the U.S._Ninth_Army remain under British operational command until April 4 when, after acting as the northern pincer of the Rhur encirclement they passed back to the operational command of the American 12th Army Group. In that time they also fought in many engagements including Operation Grenade in which the co-operated with Canadian troops.
#There were other American  units under British operational command after this date for example in the supreme allied commanders of both the AFHQ (Italy) and SEAC<-ALFSEA were British commanded.
BTW the section title is a quote taken from a cartoon which appeared in the NYT in 1945. Philip Baird Shearer 17:27, 22 Oct 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: The snide comments about Gen. Montgomery in the Allies prevail section (which I do not the above text came from) should be removed; they are definitely not NPOV.  I think it will require some rewriting, and probably some research. - jhf 14:37, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  We could never have done it without allies like Britain and Texas 

message: I was under the impression that Operation Market Garden was launched instead of an assault on Antwerp, rather than as a means of capturing the port (as is stated in the article). I could be wrong - I am frequently wrong - but could somebody check this? - Ashley Pomeroy 09:33, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: This issue appears to have recent been fixed; you're all wonderful and I love you so. -Ashley Pomeroy 22:44, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Antwerp 

message: :Operation Stösser
:Originally slated for the early hours of December 16, because of bad weather and fuel shortages Operation Stösser was delayed for a day with the new drop-time being set at 0300 hrs on December 17, their drop-zone was 11 km north of Malmedy and their target was the "Baraque Michel" crossroads. Von der Heydte and his men were to take it and hold it for approximately twenty-four hours until being relieved by the 12th SS Panzer Division "Hitler Jugend", thereby hampering the Allied flow of reinforcements and supplies into the area.
The first sentence of the first paragraph should actually introduce and moderately summarize "Operation Stosser".  Ideally, it lightly prepares the reader for interpretation of details that follow.  Here instead, the reader must plunge into a monstrous sentence, a string of words stating some factual aside about "Operation Stosser", whatever the heck that is.  What was the operation's purpose, how did it relate to the entire battle?  The reader does not know.  The sentence itself is almost incomprehensible, and poorly explains the operation's delay.  The grammar is fine, but the style makes the meaning almost unintelligible. User:Xmnemonic
Err, did you miss "Two major special operations were planned for the offensive; by October it was decided that Otto Skorzeny, the German commando who had rescued Benito Mussolini, was to lead a task force of English-speaking German soldiers in Operation Greif. These soldiers were to be dressed in American and British uniforms and wear dog-tags taken from corpses and POWs. Their job was to go behind American lines and change sign-posts, misdirect traffic, generally cause disruption and to seize bridges across the Meuse River between Liège and Namur. By late November another ambitious special operation was added, Colonel Friedrich August von der Heydte was to lead a Fallschirmjäger (paratrooper) Kampfgruppe in Operation Stösser a nighttime paratroop drop behind the Allied lines aimed at capturing a vital road junction near Malmedy." in the "Planning" section? GeneralPatton 21:07, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Die Ardennenoffensive, codename Wacht am Rhein is also used. GeneralPatton 22:02, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  welcome to fourth grade english 

message: From the extensive reading I've done, the main military significance of the Ardennes Offensive from the German point of view was that it seriously depleted remaining German military strength, especially in equipment such as tanks and fuel. This, at a time when every possible resource was needed to stave off the Soviet offensive that the Germans expected early in 1945, following the first Soviet incursion into East Prussia in October 1944, which was repulsed. 
The Soviet offensive began on Jan. 13, and the heavily outnumbered German defenders fell back quickly. Red Army spearheads reached the Baltic coast in East Prussia on Jan. 26, cutting off flight from Königsberg, the provincial capital (now Kaliningrad, Russia). Many German military figures asserted that Hitler had squandered resources on the Ardennes Offensive, helping the Soviets overrun eastern Germany, which was subjected to vengeful pillaging by many Red Army soldiers, resulting in many thousands of civilian deaths.
User:sca  1dec04
:The articles you should look at are Operation Bagration, Army Group Centre and Battle of Berlin as no article has yet been written about that specific offensive which you mention. The resources committed by the Germans to the Battle of the Bulge (600 tanks, 1,900 guns), would have made very little difference in the East. The Soviets outnumbered the Germans on average by 9:1 in troops, 9 or 10:1 in artillery and 10:1 in tanks and self-propelled artillery. At the start of the Battle of Berlin The Three Soviet Fronts had altogether 2.5 million men...; 6,250 tanks; 7,500 aircraft; 41,600 artillery pieces and mortars; 3,255 truck-mounted Katyushas rockets, (nicknamed 'Stalin Organs'); and 95,383 motor vehicles, many manufactured in the USA.
:Given that Hitler refused to let the troops west of the Rhine retreat and lost about 290,000 in the Battle of the Rhinelands it is difficult to argue that those he squandered in the Battle of the Bulge made any significat diffrence to the war on the Eastern Front (particularly as he put Himmler(!) in charge of the counter-attack mounted by Army Group Vistula against the Soviet January offensive ). If Hitler had pulled those Rhineland troops west of the Rhine behind the Rhine and used the resources of the Bulge in defence of that obstical, it might have been the Soviets who waited on the Elbe (or in Denmark and on the Rhine) for the Americans and British to arrive rather than the other way around. I doubt that the troops, 600 tanks and 1,600, artillery pieces of the Bulge would have slowed the Soviets down by more than a couple of weeks at most. It would not have stopped the "vengeful pillaging by many Red Army soldiers" and could easily have lead to more civilian deaths not less.Philip Baird Shearer 18:58, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: German troops lost to the defence of the Eastern Front

message: Same stuff is being repeated over and over again, causing the entire section to feel a bit bloated, it could well use a cleanup to streamline it back again. GeneralPatton 22:09, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Background section needs a cleanup

message: Sorry for messing with things where I am not an expert, but anyway you have to agree that now this section answers some questions better than before. Mikkalai 20:02, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: No problem, I?m just trying to avoid having things repeat themselves over and over again and keep the into from getting cluttered. GeneralPatton 18:30, 11 Jan 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Battle of the Bulge#Allies prevail]]

message: "500,000 men, 400 tanks, 400 guns (Dec 16 - start of the Battle)"  -- What were 500,000 men doing with only 400 guns?  Does the wikireader need to be a savant? —the preceding unsigned comment is by 71.39.78.68 (talk • contribs) 11:41, December 23, 2005
:Quoting from the Gun article:
::The term gun is often used as a synonym to firearm, but in its more technical usage refers only to artillery that fires projectiles at a high velocity along a flat trajectory, such as field guns, tank guns and anti-tank guns, and naval guns.
:--rogerd 16:48, 23 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Guns are really what?

message: Im finding conflicting info on what was written on that paper. Namely, the spelling 'nutz' rather then 'nuts' and and if there is a  exclamation point or not. I did add some about the meaning though, as the use of nuts to mean crazy is much more common then to mean balls (which is tends to be used nearly as much nuts as balls to mean testiciles).Muchenhaeser 07:18, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Never heard "nutz" as a spelling of this. I would expect, him being a General, that he could actually spell! After all he wasn't naming a hip-hop album or a washing powder. Sure, if you take the word out of context 'crazy' is the most common usage. However, as a single word, in response to a disagreeable suggestion, I don't think it holds water. The two possible interpretation of the word 'nuts' when it takes its 'crazy' meaning is as an adjective (you are nuts) or a plural (you are a lot of nuts). Neither of these seem to fit, as there is no reason not to use the whole phrase. I think what clinches it for me though is the hints you find in several soures that the reply the messenger was initially told to send was also one word, but not fit to be printed here; and that the official reply had to be toned down. It's easy to think of a one-word obscene equivalent of the 'testicles' meaning and not so easy for the 'crazy' meaning. DJ Clayworth 21:04, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

text: I searched for sources that quoted NUTZ as the spelling and found only one, and not a good one (in some blog article some guy had written). NUTS is used universally in reputable sources, Unless someone comes up with a reliable source for NUTZ I suggest we leave it out. DJ Clayworth 16:32, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

text: This is an interesting account, by the way. Not suggesting it as a reliable source, but probably gives a flavour. . DJ Clayworth 16:35, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

text: Accordint to this source  there is a Rue Nuts in Bastogne (not Nutz). DJ Clayworth 16:42, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

text: I would suspect that if the men of the 101st had been schooled in Counter-Strike, then they might have said "Nutz u n00bz!" but since the "z" replacements (mis-spellings) hadn't yet been thought of, "Nuts" is far more likely. --Habap 21:27, 19 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: NUTS! NUTZ! NUTZ NUTS

message: Hi, I've never edited a page on wikipedia before but this article appears to have been vandalized:
The breakout<B>YOU RMOM</B>the Red Ball Express had been set up, but by the time it reached the Belgian border it had burned five gallons of fuel for every one it delivered. Although the German forces continued to stream rearward, by early October the supply situation was so poor that the Allied armies were unable to make much headway. The general was <B>monkey, afraid of clowns. He jumped off a cliff. Two feet tall. joe</B>
The October 5th version (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Battle_of_the_Bulge&oldid=24846157) appears to be the last without the vandalism.  I'm gonna go ahead and revert it, it seems from the guides I've read that that is the correct course of action, just don't want to step on anyone's toes.
--Tibs 23:59, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  vandalism 

message: This website: is practically word for word with your article.  Looks like they simply copied and pasted. Although at the bottom of the page they do say Wikipedia is the source, this is still pretty close to plagerism.
:Wikipedia is published under the GNU Free Documentation License, which essentially means that anyone is free to plaguerise us if they acknowledge the source. DJ Clayworth 14:39, 21 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Looks like someone is copying your work 

message: By no means am I an expert on World War II, but under Ardennes Offensive on the right hand hand side it says World War 10, the date, place and result are all jokes. Also, the commanders and strength appear to be jokes as well. I don't know the real information, so I cannot fix it. Just wanted someone to be aware.
:The best thing to do in a case like this is see who make all these changes. If the jokes and the figure changes were all made by one person just undo that person's changes. DJ Clayworth 14:27, 21 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  vandalism again