Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt (United States Army in World War II)

This volume pictures the difficulties of small unit commanders and soldiers in executing missions assigned by higher headquarters. Such missions are based at best on educated guesses as to the enemy situation and probable reaction. Success, failure, confusion, outstanding behavior, as pictured here, illustrate battle as it did, and often can, take place. The viewpoint of the participants at the time is hard to re-create in spite of what is known of the circumstances that surrounded the engagement. What now seems to be obvious was then obscure. The participants were continually faced with questions which can be reduced in number only by thorough training: What do I do next? Where shall I fire? Who is now in charge? Shall I fire? Will firing expose my position? Shall I wait for orders? To us who comfortably read accounts of the engagement the answers may seem evident. We must remember that confusion, like fog, envelops the whole battlefield, including the enemy. Initiative, any clear-cut aggressive action, tends to dispel it. In battle the terrain is the board on which the game is played. The chessmen are the small units of infantry, of armor, and the various supporting weapons each with different capabilities, all designed for the coordinated action which makes for victory. No one piece is capable of carrying the entire burden. Each must help the other. Above all, the human mind must comprehend which, for the instant, has the leading role. There is no time out in battle. Teams must be prepared to function in spite of shortages in both personnel and equipment. They must be practiced and drilled in getting and retaining the order necessary to overcome the confusion forever present on the battlefield. This is the outstanding lesson of these pages. If heeded they will have most beneficial effect on our Army. We, the victors in this war, can ill afford not to examine our training methods continually. Do we drill as we would fight? Do we instill in the soldier discipline and a knowledge of how to get order out of battle confusion? If not, victory will cost too much.