William Hood Simpson, far left, first row, is seen with top military personnel. Seated are Simpson, Patton, Spaatz, Eisenhower, Bradley, Hodges and Gerow. Standing are Stearley, Vandenberg, Smith, Weyland and Nugent. Ca. 1945. Army. (OWI)
Exact Date Shot Unknown. Wikipedia.
By Phil Kohn. Dedicated to the memory of his father, GM3 Walter Kohn, U.S. Navy Armed Guard, USNR, and all men and women who have answered the country’s call in time of need. Phil can be contacted at ww2remembered@yahoo.com.
On December 1, 1944, the U.S. Ninth Army, commanded by Brig. Gen. William Hood Simpson, captures Linnich, Germany, about 19 miles northeast of Aachen. Regular mail deliveries resume in the southern part of the Netherlands. Six communist members of the Greek Provisional Government in Athens resign.
The 11th (East Africa) Division of the British Fourteenth Army, pursuing the Japanese who are retreating from Imphal and Kohima, India, arrives at the Chindwin River, in Burma, on December 2. In France, the U.S. Seventh Army advances to the Rhine River after the Germans withdraw across it to Kehl, Germany, located directly across from Strasbourg, France. Progress halts, though, as the Germans destroy all three bridges in the vicinity.
In Athens, fighting breaks out on December 3 between the leftist National Liberation Front and government forces, which are backed by the British. An attempt by British troops and Greek police to break up a massive demonstration and to disarm the leftists results in the deaths of 28 people and the wounding of over 100 others, triggering a general strike throughout Greece. In England, with the threat of a German invasion extremely diminished, the British Home Guard — the volunteer civilian militia assigned to defend Britain against an assault — is ordered to stand down. King George VI declares: “You have fulfilled your charge.”
The Greek government declares martial law in Athens on December 4 as fighting continues between communist and anti-communist forces. With food supplies becoming increasingly scarce in the northern, Nazi-occupied region of the Netherlands, German occupation authorities reduce the bread ration for civilians to two pounds per week per person.
The Allies take control of Ravenna, Italy, on December 5. The Soviets attack with two armies from northeast of Budapest, Hungary, and make a 60-mile advance in eight days. British Army tanks become involved in the fighting between communists and anti-communists in Greece. British warships shell communist positions in Piraeus.
The Japanese on December 6 capture Tushan, China, south of the Nationalist capital of Chungking. In Greece, fighting between government forces, supported by British troops, and communist rebels continues. The British commander says there is evidence that a number of former German soldiers are being employed by the communists. In the Netherlands, the Germans begin removing electric-powered trains and their associated wiring and shipping them to Germany to replace equipment destroyed in Allied bombings. In the Philippines, 400 Japanese paratroops are dropped on Leyte to coordinate with Japanese infantry attacking the Allies from the west.
In Hungary, the Red Army reaches Lake Balaton, about 80 miles southwest of Budapest, on December 7. Gen. Nicolae Rǎdescu, Chief of the General Staff of the Romanian Army, becomes prime minister of Romania and forms a new government with strong anti-communist leanings. U.S. forces on Leyte, the Philippines, counterattack and stop the coordinated Japanese paratroop-infantry offensive.
On December 8, a 72-day “softening up” bombardment of the island of Iwo Jima begins, conducted jointly by the U.S. Army Air Forces and the U.S. Navy, using planes, three heavy cruisers and a destroyer escort. In Europe, the Red Army begins an offensive aimed at encircling Budapest, Hungary.
The Red Army reaches the Danube north of Budapest on December 9. The U.S. 8th Air Force bombs Stuttgart, Germany, during daylight hours. In Great Britain, the government relaxes blackout regulations for private homes. The U.S. government says it will reinstate the drafting of men between the ages of 26 and 37 for military service.
The U.S. Army’s 77th Infantry Division captures Ormoc, on Leyte Island, the Philippines, on December 10. In Moscow, representatives of the French and Soviet governments sign a 20-year treaty of alliance and mutual assistance. In Burma, British and Indian forces capture Indaw, 78 miles north of Mandalay, along with two Japanese airfields.
Soviet troops are within five miles of Budapest, Hungary, on December 11. Over 2,000 U.S. Army Air Force bombers from the 8th and 15th Air Forces attack various rail targets in Germany as well as an oil plant and several ammunition depots near Vienna, Austria. The Germans gas the last patients at the Hartheim Euthanasia Centre, in Alkoven, Austria, near Linz. (It is estimated that some 300,000 mentally and physically handicapped patients were gassed or otherwise murdered under the Nazis’ “Aktion T4” euthanasia program to eliminate “incurables” since its beginning in May 1940.)
In Burma, a new British offensive begins on December 12 with an advance toward Aykab, near the Bay of Bengal. In Greece, the communists, having suffered recent heavy losses, ask for a cease-fire. The government demands that the rebels surrender their weapons. In eastern France, the U.S. Third Army captures a German V-rocket factory at Wittring.
On December 13, the Battle of Mindoro, in the central Philippines, begins. A kamikaze strikes the American light cruiser USS Nashville off Negros Island, the Philippines, killing 133 sailors and wounding 190. In Greece, the communists continue their offensive, with heavy fighting in Athens. Communist attacks are made on several British bases in and around the Greek capital, but they are beaten off.
A Japanese prison ship on December 14 is mistakenly sunk by U.S. planes off the Philippines. Less than half of the Allied POWs survive, only to be recaptured. In Washington, D.C., Congress passes, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs into law, an act authorizing the creation of the ranks of General of the Army and Fleet Admiral, both to be indicated by five stars. This is done so that the highest-level American officers will hold a rank equivalent to that of Field Marshal. Over the next week, George C. Marshall, Douglas MacArthur, Dwight D. Eisenhower and Henry “Hap” Arnold are promoted to the rank in the Army, while William D. Leahy, Ernest J. King and Chester Nimitz are made Fleet Admirals. (Subsequent to the war, William F. Halsey will be promoted to Fleet Admiral and Omar N. Bradley will become the last General of the Army.) In the Philippines, units of the Japanese Fourteenth Area Army perpetrate a massacre on Palawan Island. To prevent captured soldiers from being liberated by the approaching Allies, 150 POWs are herded into air-raid shelter trenches, doused with gasoline and set afire. Those who try to escape are machine-gunned, clubbed or stabbed. Eleven prisoners survive and escape to Allied lines, aided by Filipino guides and guerrillas.
