The Battle of Hurtgen Forest: The Untold Story of a Disastrous Campaign.

Orion Books, New York, 1989., 1989 Uncorrected Proof, with publisher's letter to reviewer laid in. Scarce. Green wraps, 8 1/2 x 5 1/2 inches, 289 pp., source notes. Fine. "'The Green Hell.the Death Factory.' These names were used to describe a fifty-square mile woods called Hurtgen Forest, located on the Belgian-German border. One of the worst disasters in U.S. military history occured here in World War II-- a campaign so mismanaged that the U.S. Army tried to cover it up. Whiting, a noted military historian and veteran, provides information on the campaign that was previously known only to a privileged few. 30,000 American soldiers were killed or wounded during the period from September, 1944, to February, 1945. Graphic battle scenes and the well-researched text bring the tragedy of Hurtgen Forest alive. Among the details: --Thousands of cases of combat fatigue, frozen hands and feet, and trenchfoot; --Thousands of cases of self-inflicted woulds by soldiers desperate to escape the carnage; --The bare excuse for the campaign, to capture two dams beyond the forest, wasn't even posited until four months into the battle; --With one exception (a divisional general), no one in the top commands ever protested the needless waste of lives; --Private Eddie Slovik, the only U.S. soldier executed for desertion between 1865 and 1953, was fleeing the hell in Hurtgen Forest." (3214048). F. Soft cover.