Arden forest is a large massif on the mountain range of the same name, located in the territories of modern France, Belgium and Luxembourg. There are two versions of the origin of the name: there is a point of view that the toponym Ardenne (Ardennes) dates back to the Celtic word “black”, according to another version, the name of the forest comes from the adjective “high” of the same language.
general characteristics
Arden Forest is rich in natural resources. There are deposits of coal and iron ore. The plant world is mainly represented by birch, spruce and other conifers. He gave the name to one of the northeastern French departments, and today it has a large natural park for tourism. Arden Forest occupies a very advantageous strategic location, so it often became the scene of major European events.
In history and culture
The first mention of the Ardennes forest dates back to the 1st century BC. Julius Caesar in his famous "Notes on the Gallic War" does not bypass this name. In addition, the massif is mentioned in a number of famous literary works. For example, it was here that the noble knight Roland wandered, a hero of medieval poems and legends. The action of the famous Shakespearean comedy "How You Like It" takes place in this forest. In the Middle Ages, storytellers in their works made this massif a fabulous place, placing magical sources and objects in its wilderness and populating it with extraordinary creatures.
War
Arden Forest became the scene of one of the operations during the First World War. Here in August, in the first year of the outbreak of hostilities, a fierce battle of German and French forces took place. The main clashes unfolded in two places: in the Longwy region and by the River Semois. In the first section, the French forces were defeated and began to retreat south. After that, a little respite came between the battles. On the river, the French army, despite its superiority, was also defeated.
Operation 1944-1945
Then the arena of confrontation between the Allies and the Germans also became the Arden Forest. The war was already drawing to a close, but a decisive battle was still ahead, for which both sides gathered all their forces. In the summer of 1944, the Allies landed their troops in Normandy, thereby opening a Second Front on the European continent. This significantly complicated the position of the Germans in the west, as they were forced to divide their forces into two parts and weaken their positions in the eastern sector. The Anglo-American forces were preparing a major offensive, but the Germans expected to break through their fortifications.
The command became aware of their plans, and it took the next step: the most powerful and combat-ready units were deployed in the north and south, and in the center there was a weak defense in the hope of encircling and taking the enemy into a trap. Nevertheless, the Germans launched a rather serious offensive, their blow was palpable and delayed the advance of the Allies.
Offensive
The site of the main blow of the German army in mid-December in the western sector was the Arden Forest. The Second World War was nearing completion, but this operation showed that the Germans' positions were still strong enough. After all, they broke through the defenses and advanced quite far inland. They were given a tactical task: to capture the bridges over the river Meuse, as they opened the way to the territory of Belgium. The Germans decided to take this step, despite the fact that they lacked fuel, but they hoped to replenish it on French and Belgian lands. For ten days, German forces attacked the positions of the allies. They even managed to capture the city of Saint-Vit. However, they failed to take Bastogne. In order to accelerate the retaliatory strike, Churchill asked Stalin to speed up the movement of Soviet troops in the western sector.
Counterattack
The arena of the Allied retaliation was the same long-suffering Ardennes forest. Belgium, or rather, its capital, was the goal of the fascist movement, where they hoped to replenish their reserves and fuel. However, at the end of December and the beginning of January of the following year, the Allies launched a decisive counterattack. They succeeded in their plan for encircling the Germans and taking them into the ring. From the north and south they inflicted very sensitive blows on the enemy and took them into the environment. However, the enemy continued to resist and defend. The final turning point came after Soviet troops launched a large-scale offensive from the Baltic Sea to the Carpathian Mountains. This forced the German command to transfer the main, most combat-ready forces to the east, thereby weakening the position in the west. Then the allies inflicted a final defeat on the enemy, and, despite Hitler's order to continue the offensive, the remnants of the German troops began to retreat.
Value
Arden forest, the photo of which is presented in this article, became the site of one of the serious defeats of the Germans at the final stage of the war. They lost almost all of their aircraft involved in this operation, although before that they managed to inflict a number of significant attacks on the Allied airfields in the French and Belgian territories. The Nazis did not even fulfill their main technical task: they did not seize the bridges across the Meuse River. They also did not get access to fuel, which was the second most important goal of the German command.