theirs is a war story that deserves to be told. from jerusalem, i'm oliver north. good night. tonight on "war stories". >> an overlooked battle in a dark and bloody forest. >> the growth was so thick and mysterious. >> the first gis to assault the third reich. >> translator: do whatever it takes to drive the americans out. >> did american generals blunder? >> the upper command really did not understand. >> it's hell in the huertgen forest. that's next on "war stories." this cold, dark and

forbidding place is a scene of one of the fiercest, bloodiest and least known battles of world war ii. welcome to "war stories." i'm oliver north, coming to you from the huertgen forest in germany. these densely wooded hills are quiet now, but from september of 1944 until february of 1945, they thundered with artillery, mortar, machine gun, and tank fire. american generals that hoped for a quick push into germany's industrial heartland, but battle hardened troops were determined to hold their ground. for five months, tens of thousands of american and german soldiers battled each other and harsh terrain and bitter cold that claimed combatants on both sides. with shells bursting in these trees above, well prepared and tenacious german defenders turned the american offensive into a nightmare. for every yard gained, this was

the deadliest campaign in the european theater. stay with us and meet the men, both american and german, who fought to the death in this dark and frightening forest. >> it's still a haunted place. >> you didn't know where you were within the forest. >> it's dark and rainy and snowy and cold. >> ruins of bunkers, still weapons to be found, mines, hand grenades. >> you don't see sun light down there on the ground and it's wet and damp and horrible. >> there's still traces of world war ii in the air. you can almost imagine being back there november 1944. >> 6 june 1944, the liberation

of europe begins. after ferocious fights on the normandy beaches the alleys were bogged down for weeks before breaking out. >> the military progress, the armored drive of the allies and paris is the goal of the swift advance. >> there was plenty of heavy fighting to get through normandy. >> after barely surviving the cliffs, new jersey native lieutenant limbal and the second ranger battalion had months of fierce combat ahead. >> a lot of fighting in that 2 1/2 months as patton and those guys led us across europe through france and belgium. >> as the allies broke out from the normandy lodgement and the americans were sweeping towards the east and germany. >> the german defeat. >> the germanys fell back in total disarray. >> retired colonel edward miller

spent 18 years studying the battle the author of the book "a dark and bloody ground". >> by and large they were very ill equipped, ragged, something that clearly the allies could look at with a little bit of optimism. ♪ >> on 29 august american troops of the 28th infantry division, the keystone boys of the pennsylvania national guard, marched down the streets of a liberated paris. the division commander, general norman cota and generals omar bradley and courtney hodges reviewed the parade. >> the proceed across france and approach to germany led people to think there might be a chance that the war could be ended by the end of 1944. >> fighting beside lieutenant lamel and the 2nd ranger battalion was a 23-year-old son of a wisconsin farmer. >> do you remember anybody saying, you know, this war is going to be over by christmas? >> there were rumors. there were a lot of rumors like that.

>> private sunby was hearing more than scuttle butt. by september, u.s. troops had reached the german border and supreme allied commander dwight eisenhower's chief of staff boldly announced to the press from paris militarily the war is over. back in the states, the army even stopped sending packages to the boys in europe. >> and so the period of august through mid-september 1944 was really a race. could eisenhower get his armies through the border defenses and across the ryan river before the germans could set their defense. >> in berlin the german furor raged. with the enemy at his gates hitler called up one of his most effective and iron fisted generals walter mowdell. >> he was a nazi. he was not a yes man. he was one of the few germany generals to argue to prove a point. >> douglas nash is a military

historian and expert on the german army. >> model was blunt, gruff, profa profane. he would be ruthless and brought to the western front august 18th, 1944, to exert magic on the crumbling germany effort. >> known as hitler's fire man. >> and the fierce fire man wasted no time. >> the general has been handpicked by hitler for this job. what's his mission? >> he had one significant mission, that was to stop the allies. >> from crossing the rhine and entering the german industrial heart loonds. >> located across germany's western border, it was the manufacturing center of the nazi war machine. >> it was one of the key of germany's war making capability. >> and needed to be defended at all costs. so much so that hitler sent

joseph gurgles to confer with general model and construct factories. the footage shows how the propaganda whipped these workers into a frenzy. [ speaking foreign language ] >> there was the idea on the american side, particularly eisenhower's supreme commander he had to make the decision on exactly how his armies would enter germany. >> with patton's armor tied up further south generals eisenhower and bradley gave courtney hodges the mission to break into hitler's third reich. >> courtney hodges looked like a rum. ed small town banker. opposite of the patton type personality. >> between the rur valley and hodges army was 70 square miles of heavily wooded terrain the

germans called the hurtgenwald. he was ordered to drive straight through the forest to the valley. >> this put the first army on a collision course with the huertgen forest. >> one of the participants likened it to the forest out of hansel and gretel. almost a prime evil feel to it. >> just in a big pool of replacements. >> joining the battle hardened troops that fought from normandy were thousands of green replacements like 20-year-old dale wiley. he joined the 47th regiment of the 9th infantry division, the old reliables. along with the third armored division he and his fellow men were among the first americans into the forest. >> we got on a truck, went up to a point. we started hearing guns. there was a lieutenant colonel who met us and told us in a nice

speech, everybody's not going to die. it's not as bad as you might think. that was totally inaccurate. >> it was worse than what you could imagine? >> yes. >> american generals hope for a quick move to berlin, but the ♪ mr. daniels. mr. daniels. look at this. what's this? clicks are off the charts. yeah. yoshi, we're back. yes, sir! ♪ more shipping! more shipping! ♪ [ beeping ] ♪

[ beeping ] hard it can be...how ...to breathe with copd? it can feel like this. copd includes chronic bronchitis and emphysema. spiriva is a once-daily inhaled... ...copd maintenance treatment... ...that helps open my airways for a full 24 hours. you know, spiriva helps me breathe easier. spiriva handihaler tiotropium bromide inhalation powder does not replace rescue inhalers for sudden symptoms. tell your doctor if you have kidney problems, glaucoma, trouble urinating, or an enlarged prostate. these may worsen with spiriva. discuss all medicines you take, even eye drops. stop taking spiriva and seek immediate medical help if your breathing suddenly worsens, your throat or tongue swells,... you can get hives, vision changes or eye pain, or problems passing urine. other side effects include dry mouth and constipation. nothing can reverse copd. spiriva helps me breathe better. sfx: blowing sound. does breathing with copd... ...weigh you down? don't wait ask your doctor about

spiriva handihaler.

when the german commanders saw the american forces come into the huertgen forest it was almost like a miracle because it was the last thing they expected the americans to do. >> in fact, the german high command called it miracle of the west. field marshal model knew here, like nowhere else on the border, they could hold its positions. the americans were walking into a nightmare in the forest. >> the germans constructed concrete obstacles the americans

called dragon's teeth. >> the siegfried line was constructed in the late 1930s. the idea was to set up a series of strong points and reinforced pillboxes. >> the americans called it the siegfried line. what did you call it? >> we called it the west wall because it was the wall against the west. >> some six decades after the war, berlin native klaus schultz retraced his steps. in 1944 he was a 17-year-old serving with the 353rd infantry division on the german side of the siegfried line. in september of 1944, what german troops were defending this position? >> this position was defended by the 89th infantry division. they had 11 bunkers over here, one or two tank gun bunkers and troop quarters was in the position for mg-42s and six firing points for two machine guns. >> we were the first there.

we were the most advanced into germany of any unit and then we discovered we're on top of the siegfried line and we went in. it was unbelievable structure. >> there was a secondary belt a few miles behind that one so that although we were able to go through the first one fairly quickly in some spots, the second line had been completely occupied by german forces. initially it seemed like it was going to be a cakewalk but it didn't turn out to be that way. >> september 1944, general hojs orders two regiments to the ninth id to penetrate the second siegfried belt. dale wiley attacked with the 47th infantry regiment. >> the combat really was fire fights. your squad or your platoon would be moving up and suddenly you would get fire from the germans. >> in the forests we had our foxholes. the trees were narrow trees out

there, so we just stayed at the fringe of the forest. >> does it make any sense to you, as a german soldier, that they would come through here? >> it doesn't make any sense because it's -- this is a wooded area. this is not infantry country. >> the huertgen forest has been compared to a jungle because the growth was so thick, so mysterious, because of the nature of the battlefield, because of the way ar little herry shells went off in tree tops. >> you could hear them coming in and they would hit the top of the trees. you never knew what was going to come down. >> the artillery shells were few so they would detonate when they came in contact with any object, ground, tree top or a branch, enough to send a cascade red hot metal fragments down upon any soldier who happened to be unlucky enough to be directly underneath that. >> if you hugged a tree when it was coming, it would probably hit the top of the tree and fall off to the side rather than

coming down the trunk. >> field marshal model issued an order to the 11 die victims of his army group b, hold the forest or die. >> to increase their defensive capability heavy use of mines, blowing trees to block paths. some anti-tank ditches. >> in effect the defense is controlling the whole battle. >> the germans set the pace of the battle and the germans controlled the pace. >> model has worked his magic. the forests were impen trable. despite no gains, they were determined to break through to hitler's factories in the ruhr valley. on 6th october the 9th id ordered to renew the attack against german troops holding the village of schmidt. >> general hodges 7th corps tried in the first week between 6 and 16 october to break through the forest. >> some days no distance at all. other days, i guess the most you

would advance would probably be maybe a hundred yards. very rarely did you go more than that. >> a soldier had been killed or wounded especially in a night attack would probably never be found by his comrades. >> there was a demoralizing effect because of the conditions. i had three hot meals in 73 days. two showers. you became very dirty, very filthy. >> you tank. >> the young german soldiers didn't feel comfortable in this type of forest and this type of weather. your enemies were the actual enemy, the weather, and the terrain. >> the upper command really did not understand what the soldier was going through. >> after ten days, 3,000 plus casualties in three miles of advance about 1,000 casualties

per mile we weren't through the forest. you can see the battle developing into almost a slow slogging stalemate. >> by the end of october american gis and german soldiers were killing each other at a ghastly rate in the miserable forest. the americans called it the meat grinder. despite horrific losses, eisenhower and hodges wouldn't or couldn't give up. >> as a staff officer said later in the campaign it seemed like we had a tiger by the tail and we couldn't let go of it. >> locked in a fierce forest fight the americans are reinforced by the 28th division, a pennsylvania national guard a pennsylvania national guard unit when the means keeping seven billion ctransactions flowing.g, and when weather hits,

it's data mayhem. but airlines running hp end-to-end solutions are always calm during a storm. so if your business deals with the unexpected, hp big data and cloud solutions make sure you always know what's coming - and are ready for it. make it matter. i research. i dig. and dig some (trader more. search. because, for me, the challenge of the search... is almost as exciting as the thrill of the find. (announcer) at scottrade, we share your passion for trading. that's why we rebuilt scottrade elite from the ground up - including a proprietary momentum indicator that makes researching sectors and industries even easier. because at scottrade, our passion is to power yours.

. by the end of october general hodges' first army broke through the german border and forest north of the huertgen forest elements of the 1st infantry division captured aachen. >> the first german city to be captured by the allies they raise the stars and stripes. >> but in the forest the bloody stalemate continued. undeterred eisenhower and hodges decided to reinforce failure. >> the 28th division entered the forest area in late october. >> the american generals sent in the keystones boys, the same soldiers who barely two months earlier had marched triumphantly through the streets of paris. >> the division entered the huertgen, they saw the evidence of the preceding battles, september and october, shredded tree, blocked fire breaks, torn up personnel equipment, helmets littering the ground. >> when we moved into the area we saw the 9th infantry division soldiers coming out. >> joining with the 28th id in

october ray flag of the 707 tank battalion was on the continent only two months. he would get to see combat when he and his fellow soldiers moved into the huertgen, replacing the 9th id. >> they were a desolate looking group, saddest human beings i saw in my life. they were slouched and uniforms dirty and i couldn't imagine people of the american army looking that dejected. i had no idea what could cause such a thing. >> but general cota commanding general of the 28th id had to have known when hodges gave him the battle plan to take control of schmidt and other key towns, he was less than enthusiastic. >> when he saw the plan he didn't think he had a gambler's chance of succeeding. >> 2 november, three regiments of the 28th id attack into the forest. 112th was tasked with the mission of taking schmidt. >> schmidt itself sat across the

kall river gorge from the initial jump off positions of the 28th division. >> that night the 112th took control of the village. the commanders of old reliables was cautiously optimistic. but field marshal model would ensure the success was short lived. >> one of those coincidences of military history that occurs only maybe once 100 years. >> that was a command post exercise a few miles away attended by every senior german commander from model down. >> with the sole purpose of gaining what would be a proper response should the americans conduct an attack through huertgen and the town of schmidt. >> and as the attack jumped off the germans were exercising a map scenario. >> they used real reports coming in from the battle and were able to conduct it like a war game, except this time it was real. >> model wasted no time, sent the 116th panzer division. led an anti-tank company.

>> we were told to move to the huertgen forest to the village of schmidt and do whatever it takes to drive the americans out. >> the battalion commanders involved knew they had to have armored support that night. they were exposed on three sides to german counter attacks. the only armored unit available to reinforce that was a company 707. ray flag was a platoon leader. >> my company commander ordered me to move out. >> under heavy german fire ray's tank platoon narrowed down a trail. war stories return to the scene in the kall river gorge. what all comes down this forest path? >> well, initially only myself. and then so i started down the trail and i suppose i had gone 100, 150 yards when my tank struck a mine and it blew the track off and that blocked the

trail. >> artillery hit that area. one of his nco's were killed. tanks were damaged. the tanks would go a matter of a few meters on this slippery, muddy slope. >> what's this track look like at that point? >> it's a mess. >> fog, mist, rain. artillery fire. they couldn't see anything. they didn't know how bad the trail was. >> we were being outgunned and outshot. >> and what are you thinking? >> what the hell am i doing here? >> ray flag's platoon of sherman tanks has to fight their way down this narrow forest trail and things go downhill from there. stay with us. . with centurylink as your technology partner, our visionary cloud infrastructure, and dedicated support, free you to focus on what matters. centurylink. your link to what's next. an unprecedented program arting busithat partners businesses

with universities across the state. for better access to talent, cutting edge research, and state of the art facilities. and you pay no taxes for ten years. from biotech in brooklyn, to next gen energy in binghamton, to manufacturing in buffalo... startup-ny has new businesses popping up across the state. see how startup-ny can help your business grow at startup.ny.gov

>> deep inside the for bidding forest a horrific battle was raging. 4 november, ray and the 707 battalion continued their desperate mission, reinforcing

the 112th infantry holding the village of schmidt. >> general cota had given our people orders to push those tanks off the side of the road and down in the gully. >> but eventually we got a total of eight tanks and seven tank destroyers. >> what he didn't know at the time and what no one knew was that the americans were in the process of getting hit so hard at schmidt they were losing the town. >> translator: we were ordered to advance in the direction of schmidt. >> irwin pressman's guns were blazing as the 116th panzer division stormed into the town. >> the tanks that you had weren't designed for this kind of terrain either, were they? >> translator: it's difficult to maneuver a tank and terrain like this. one is usually tied to a fixed position. >> model's panzers were able to bludgeon the americans.

>> translator: we knew the amer sherman tank was excellent machinery but we learned quickly its weak spots and aimed our fire right there. >> the germans targeted the rear and belly of the u.s. tanks and had the advantage of key terrain. >> this is known as the germans as the birdberg. german observers had a clear picture of almost every move that the 112th and the tankers were making. >> and so any move that we or the infantry made, was perfectly visible to them. at one time there was as many as 30 rounds of artillery landed in one minute. it was quite intense. >> fighting for every inch, ray and his soldiers struggled to get to schmidt 800 yards from the village disaster struck. >> the germans simply threw everything they had at the forces in schmidt. it was simply overwhelming. >> as the german counterattacks

drove the americans out of schmidt they fell back on a village and fell on to ray flag's tanks. >> for two long days under heavy attack ray and the gis tried to hold their ground in kommerscheidt. >> i talked to cota on the radio and he said you know who i am. i said yes, sir, i know who you are. >> he said i want you to hold at all costs. that's what we tried to do. general cota decided that he was going to form a task force that would recapture schmidt. he had as many as 300 infantry men. >> 300 infantry troops, one tank, and one tank to spare. >> to take schmidt. >> against -- >> as far as i know, there were two german infantry divisions and one german panzer division. >> how could that happen, that those kinds of orders would be given, given the circumstances? >> i wish i had an answer to

that. >> well, i made my run. >> following ray and wearing his texas a&m class ring, lieutenant leonard ran into the open to draw the enemy out. >> he operated exposed and he was a driving force behind the defense and its ability to hold against the germans. >> at that time i saw lieutenant leonard bloody arm, i'm not sure if there was much arm left there. >> still trying to get his guns,

his tank destroyers. >> that was the last time i saw him. >> lieutenant leonard and others perished in the forest. 60 years later something that he loved would make its way home. more on that later. >> it would have been suicide simply to hold on. general cota gave the order for the withdraw to take place on the 8th of november. had they not done so almost every man there probably would have wound up as a prisoner or dead. >> it came by radio we had permission to withdraw and we were ordered to destroy any usable weapons or vehicles that we had. there's all kinds of debris on the forest floor and it's dark and rainy and snowy and cold. we were to place our hand on the shoulder of the person in front of us and follow him. we arrived to the friendly lines. >> you're back to where you were when the whole thing started.

>> zero, yes. >> the division itself suffered over 6,000 casualties in those six days it was engaged in the battle for schmidt. >> did your soldiers believe that they would be able to keep the americans from entering germany? >> translator: we not only believed it but we actually did it. >> despite their nearly 3,000 casualties, the germans came up with a bleak nickname for ray flag and the pennsylvania keystone boys using the divisions red patch. >> sort of looks like a bucket or a pale. they called it the glbloody bucket. they knew how much destruction and damage had been brought upon that division. even today, the germans and veterans of the 28th division still call it the bloody bucket. >> lieutenant leonard's bavry on the battlefield would be recognized in his citation for the medal of armor and the army sends in the 2nd ranger sends in the 2nd ranger battalion to taaaaaa

your customers, our financing. your aspirations, our analytics. your goals, our technology. introducing synchrony financial, bringing new meaning to the word partnership. banking. loyalty. analytics. synchrony financial. enagage with us. "hello. you can go ahead and "have a nice flight."re." ♪ music plays ♪ music plays traveling can feel like one big mystery. you're never quite sure what is coming your way.

but when you've got an entire company who knows that the fewest cancellations and the most on-time flights are nothing if we can't get your things there, too. it's no wonder more people choose delta than any other airline.

the criminal looks old, bent, stooped shoulders and failing. sick physically, sick mentally. >> november 1944 with the allies closing in from the east and west, adolf hitler was facing his downfall. delusional and paranoid ignored his general's advice to negotiate a surrender. >> hitler ordered them to stay and fight and die where they stood. >> at huertgen, casualties mounted on both sides. almost 50,000 from combat and the worst weather conditions in decades. >> took the shoes off and i had no idea really what it was. i had heard the term. but the bottom of my feet were black. it was terrible. >> in early november generals eisenhower and bradley visited the battered troops in the forest. ike was in denial when he sent this top secret letter to george

marshal. morale is surprisingly high and the men have succeeded in making themselves comfortable. there are no signs of exhaustion and the sick rate is not nearly as high as we would have right to expect. >> it was horrifying what we saw there. >> 24-year-old lieutenant and the second rangers saw things differently than ike. >> i felt so sorry for the american soldiers i saw. they were bedraggled yet they went about doing their duty as they always do. >> but the condition of their troops wasn't the only thing lost on the american commanders. from the outset of the forest campaign, generals eisenhower, bradley and hodges failed to identify a key objective, critical for the drive into germany. >> this is the schwammenauel dam and reservoir where it controlled the level of the river which would dix cate when the americans could get across the river and enter the plain toward the ride. >> the americans initially did not realize the significance of

these dams and what would happen if they were to be destroyed. >> the germans through this dam could conceivably flood the ruhr behind the americans as they crossed. >> to take the dams the americans had to capture castle hill the commanding terrain that allowed the germans to unleash the deadly artillery barrage on ray flag and the 28th i.d. >> we have behind us the observation bunker on castle hill. whenever you see movement down there and you order your fire down there. they are precisely on the point. >> only when those observers were gone and the artillery threat was eliminated could the americans safely and successfully control the ridges that overlooked the dams. >> unfortunately the 8th infantry division had practically spent itself in the attacks in the other areas during the first week of december so that by the 6th of

december they no longer had the power to go that last 500 meters. >> but that didn't stop leonard and the rest of the 2nd rangers. >> we were told that 5,000 or 6,000 guys had failed just the week before. but that didn't bother us. >> the 2nd ranger battalion as reserve moved up late on the night of the 6th of december. after daybreak, around 8:00, the rangers were ready to go. >> so we're off in the charge. >> the rangers wisely chose a predawn assault as it crossed a field that was about 200, 300 meters wide in spots. >> here we are on the assault, across a flat, icy, snowy, plateau type of land to get at the base of this hill going up almost straight. >> the bullets hit the ground right in front of it. never got us, but it was right in the ground in front of us. >> we slowed down a bit by the

machine guns there in the base of the hill. sig will tell you in his own words how he rose to the occasion and wiped out a machine gun mess that was holding us up. >> the machine gunner was firing right straight at us. we were returning the fire. we went up to the house and the germans started coming out the front door. all of them surrendered. >> just the two companies of screaming rangers storming uphill. >> hard to climb because of slipperiness, ice and snow, and thick vines and thick growth. >> some of the german attackers fell within arm's length of the rangers in the foxholes. that's how close the fighting was. >> climbing over trees, falling down, shot at, artillery going off over their heads unprotected, no modern day body armor grappling and struggling for possession of this hill. >> by nightfall 7 december 12 hours after the attack began the

2nd rangers held castle hill. >> i think hill 400 was worse than v day. december 7th, 1944, was my longest day ever. >> as the rangers fight to keep castle hill, german field marshal ♪ over 12,000 financial advisors. so, how are things? good, good. nearly $800 billion dollars in assets under care. let me just put this away. how did edward jones get so big? could you teach our kids that trick? by not acting that way. ok, last quarter... it's how edward jones makes sense of investing. ♪

. 7 december 1945 in subzero temperatures five officers and 86 men of the 2nd ranger battalion dug in to defend their tenuous position atop castle hill. the german command field marshal model wanted the hill back at all costs. >> he said i'll give the

knight's cross to whoever cap retake that hill. model knew how significant that was. >> there were four attacks because model threw in every unit he could. >> it go the worse and worse because what the germans would do was smother you with artillery barrages. they attacked several times trying to take it backp we held out and we had a lot of casualties. >> just about everything. you had to be very, very lucky not to get a direct hit. >> the american rangers only fewer than 100 defended and held the hill under repeated counter attacks. >> i knew we were understrengthened, we had a disadvantage and i'm so proud of my guys because they did it, but i got wounded and they finally took me off the hill that night about 9:00 p.m. >> in the fighting the rangers

sustained over 133 casualties and then the german casualties were enormous, in excess of several hundred. >> at that point, were the americans finally in a position after three months of constant fighting in the huertgen forest to control one of the last pieces of key terrain before th. >> we had orders to attack on the 13th of december. and our ultimate objective was the dam. >> retired lieutenant general frank grew up an army brat and entered west point in 1939. >> i decided to go to the outfit my father was in, artillery man in the 78th division. >> captain cam led the 303rd battalion of the 78th i.d. general hodges ordered the division to take the dams and continue the attack into hitler's industrial ruhr river valley. >> we decided to go around rather than go across those

terrain compartments and in doing that, we in our first couple days, battled bolstered. >> bolstered by the success in the huertgen hitler thought he could defeat the allies. >> american troops in action on the western front. >> ike ordered patton into the bulge and by late january, the allies had restored their lines and could once again focus on smashing through the huertgenwald. >> the eyes of the allied command from eisenhower down to the platoon leader were on this dam. >> when the offensive resumes how do you get the word? >> i think about the 29th of january, we would clear the south side of our say leent to the ruhr river so we could turn north and go up and get the big dams. >> little did cam know he would see his father on the battlefield. >> it was a heavy snowstorm.

we'd taken all the germans whites from the houses and make ourselves invisible in the snow. in the meantime we had an enormous amount of. those are my father's. a stick of enemy mortar started coming in. i just jumped in the ditch to protect myself. well someone i hadn't known was there next to me and he jumped in the ditch ahead of me. i landed on top of him. when we got up, it was my father. i said you're supposed to be back with the artillery. he said i'm up here checking to see how my artillery is doing. some newsman asked him how he liked firing artillery over his son and he said i don't like firing my artillery over anybody's son. >> true to his habits hitler

forbayed withdrawing one foot. he would not allow the evacuation of a single bunker so the german commanders from field marshal model on down their hands were tied. >> but after suffering 14,000 casualties during the bulge the huertgen was a mere shadow of its former strength. 9 february soldiers of the 309th infantry regiment including reconnaissance elements from frank cam's company attacked german positions defending the dam. >> i received orders to provide a reconnaissance patrol to go down and examine the dam, go in it, once we got it, and see whether they had any explosives in it. >> the engineers with the rifle man supporting them slid down the face of the dam a couple hundred feet into an opening to go inside to look at the machinery. >> in the meantime the germans had blown the stocks that control the valves, about 20 to 30 feet in die yam ster, started

pouring out of the dam. >> hit lore ordered the dam to be completely blown up. >> if the germans had actually blown the whole dam so all the water flowed down right away, the water flow would have held us up for a day or two. the way the germans did it held us up two weeks and once we got that dam, then we knew we could cross into the plain and get to the rhine river. >> there was nothing there to stop the americans. >> 56 years after lieutenant leonard made the ultimate sacrifice at huertgen, a beloved ring he wore made its yo, bro, you on woo-woo? are you kidding me? everybody's on woo-woo! [elevator bell rings] woo-woo?

lock and load, people! we're going all in on woo-woo! mark! comp us up a profile page! susie! write us some posts! i want sponsored woos. i want targeted woos. we need an ethnically ambiguous woo-woo mascot. dude. are you still on woo-woo? naaaahh, man, my mom's on woo-woo. ♪ [ female announcer ] we love our smartphones. and now telcos using hp big data solutions are feeling the love, too. by offering things like on-the-spot data upgrades -- an idea that reduced overcharge complaints by 98%. no matter how fast your business needs to adapt, if hp big data solutions can keep wireless customers smiling, imagine what they can do for yours. make it matter.

imagine what they can do for yours. an unprecedented program arting busithat partners businesses with universities across the state. for better access to talent, cutting edge research, and state of the art facilities. and you pay no taxes for ten years. from biotech in brooklyn, to next gen energy in binghamton, to manufacturing in buffalo... startup-ny has new businesses popping up across the state. see how startup-ny can help your business grow at startup.ny.gov

after fighting five brutal months field marshal model realized the end was at happened. >> he discharged his army and then he took his own life. >> decades later the men who fought there still have questions. >> what was accomplished?

>> the destruction of a lot of men, equipment, that's it. >> the forest still holds the memory of 24,000 american and 28,000 german casualties. >> general hodges apologized after the war for the losses that were there. >> the huertgen continues to give up ghosts from the past. german army captain volker shared his story with us. >> my father-in-law found this ring in 1946 when he helped digging out the bury of some american soldiers, but he never sold it. >> the captain was shown the ring. >> and i looked at the ring on the front side it was a name of a school, never heard about that. texas a&m college and i looked

inside the ring and there was a name. leonard. >> in 2000, years after lieutenant leonard was awarded the medal of honor, the captain brought his class ring home to texas. >> it was just the day before veterans day and we went to texas a&m and i had a big celebration. >> i have come a long way to honor the memory of a brave son of this country. >> on behalf of my family, nephews, my wife, my children, grandchildren, and loved ones, we thank you dearly. >> big celebration. it was just amazing. >> there have been so many men that went forth voluntarily and risked their lives that we could live free. >> the objectives and strategic importance of the huertgen campaign will long be debated the extraordinary courage and perseverance of the men who

fought in this unforgiving forest is without question. theirs is a war story that deserves to be told. i'm oliver north. good night.