Schematic plan · World War II (European Theater)

Battle of Our River Center

16 December 1944
Luxembourg
Victory for Germany

A schematic plan, generated from the statistics of the CAA Database of Battles: the armies' size and width, the hours of fighting, the plan of attack and the outcome are as recorded; the ground and the positions are not.

Germany (Ger Xlvii Pnz Corps, 43,800 men under Gen Luettwitz) attacked USA (US 11oth Inf (-)(+), 28th Id, 5,340 men under Col Fuller) in Luxembourg. The CAA Database of Battles records 48 hours of fighting on a front of 12 km, a frontal attack, river crossing against hasty defense and prepared defense, and that Germany won. Losses: Germany 900 (2%), USA 3,300 (62%).

This plan is generated from those figures. It shows the shape of the battle the database describes: the size and width of the armies, the plan of attack and the outcome. It does not show where the units actually stood.

The armies

Germany

Gen Luettwitz

Unit	Arm	Men
Germany left wing	Infantry	9,088
Germany centre	Infantry	12,117
Germany right wing	Infantry	9,088
Germany reserve	Infantry	7,573
Germany artillery (325 guns)	Artillery	4,875
Germany armour (212 tanks)	Armour	1,060
Gen Luettwitz	Commander	—
In this plan		43,801

USA

Col Fuller

Unit	Arm	Men
USA left wing	Infantry	1,086
USA centre	Infantry	1,448
USA right wing	Infantry	1,086
USA reserve	Infantry	905
USA artillery (30 guns)	Artillery	450
USA armour (73 tanks)	Armour	365
Col Fuller	Commander	—
In this plan		5,340

What the sources report

	Germany	USA
Strength, this plan	43,800	5,340
Losses, this plan	900	3,300

In the CAA Database of Battles

CDB90 no. 624, “Our River Center”, compiled for the US Army to study what decides battles. These are the figures a what-if engine can be calibrated against.

Fighting: 48 hours
Winner: the attacker
Terrain: Rugged, Heavily wooded
Weather: Dry, Cold, Winter, Temperate
Defender’s posture: Hasty defense, Prepared defense
Front width: 12 km (attacker), 12 km (defender)

Force	Strength	Losses	Horse	Guns	Plan and outcome
Germanyattacker	43,800	900	0	325	Frontal attack; River crossing; Penetration
USAdefender	5,340	3,300	0	30	Defensive plan; Withdrew with heavy losses

Attacker’s advantages momentum +1 · intelligence +2 · initiative +1 · surprise +3

CDB90 (US Army Concepts Analysis Agency, 1990), tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold; data under ODC-BY 1.0.

Notes

On this reconstruction

Generated automatically from the statistics in CDB90. Frontages, depths, distances, the order of events and the terrain are schematic: they follow the recorded strengths, front widths, hours of fighting, tactical plan and outcome, not maps or accounts of the battle. The sources give no hours; the timing is conjectural.

Sources

US Army Concepts Analysis Agency; tidy edition by Jeffrey B. Arnold, CAA Database of Battles (CDB90), no. 624 · ODC-BY-1.0Strengths, losses, front widths, hours of fighting, tactics and outcome.

Facts gathered from Wikidata (CC0), Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Wikimedia Commons (licence per file); the plan and its text are timeastra’s own.