Hello to all
; bumping up.....no new info maybe, but good maps............................
The offensive battles against Cassino.
At the beginning of 1944 the battle front in the Italian theater of war ran roughly along the Rapido and Garigliano rivers. The German defensive positions on the eastern slopes of Monte Cairo and Monti Aurunci were expanded into the so-called “Gustav Line”. Further west, a second defensive front, the “Hitler Line,” was emerging (sketch 1).
At the end of 1943, General Alexander took command of the 15th Allied Army Group in Italy. The 8th Army deployed in the northern sector was under the command of General Leese, the 5th Army fighting in the south was under the command of General Clark. In the first days of January, the VI American Corps, which belonged to the 5th Army, was replaced by General Juin's French Expeditionary Corps, which was mainly composed of Algerian and Moroccan mountain troops. On January 21/22, the VI US Corps landed in the Anzio-Nettuno area and held a bridgehead there against severe German pressure. The structure of the forces on both sides and the course of the fighting in the bridgehead until mid-February can be seen in sketch 2.
The Allied plan called for the following operations at the beginning of January:
1. attack by the French Expeditionary Force over Monte Cairo, to cover the attack of the 5th Army on the right flank on the mountains north of the Liri valley.
2. Frontal thrust of the 2nd Army Corps through the Liri valley.
3. Advance of the 10th Army Corps over the Aurunci Mountains towards Pontecorvo in order to encompass the Hitler line from the south.
In this way, the 5th Army was supposed to tie up the German reserves on the Cassino and Garigliano fronts so that the Germans could not free up any forces in order to fight the VI Army Corps troops landing at Anzio-Nettuno.
The VI. AK was tasked with taking Rome and enabling the destruction of the German forces in the Cassino-Frosinone area.
According to the German plan, the Adriatic sector had to behave defensively, as did the Garigliano and Cassino fronts, while overtaking landings were to be intercepted and eliminated by a push against the sea.
Source: Die Angriffsschlachten gegen Cassino. Schuler, Ernst. ASMZ Allgemeine schweizerische Militärzeitschrift. Band (Jahr): 117 (1951). Heft 5
Cheers. Raúl M
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Serás lo que debas ser o no serás nada. General José de San Martín.