Operation Greif: The German Wolves In Sheeps Clothing | Time Travels

Early in the morning of December 16th, 1944, a shock German attack drove through the quiet front lines of the Ardennes Forest

The Americans were unprepared and complacent. German tanks roared through and a deep bulge in the American line was created

Now the US troops fought a desperate battle in the bitter, icy cold to halt the German army until replacements could arrive

It was a desperate struggle. But amid the chaos and bloodshed, something unusual was happening

Small groups of American soldiers were being stopped in their jeeps and detained

because they were behaving unusually. Cursory questioning revealed that these Americans were actually German troops in disguise

Hitler had ordered a secret unit to be put together that would pretend to be American troops behind enemy lines

capturing crucial bridges and roads and causing carnage. This was a crack troop of German soldiers

who were under the command of one of Nazi Germany's most infamous tacticians

Otto Skorzeny. Where did these men come from? And what happened to them

Well, hello time travellers. I'm your friend Mike Brady and this is the true story of Operation Greif

the doomed Nazi spy mission that failed to win the Battle of the Bulge

One, zero, liftoff! By the end of 1944, the Allies had landed in France

and swept the German army out of the country they'd occupied for four long years

It was a disastrous retreat for the Germans. They were caught on all sides in the infamous Falaise pocket

and whole units of crack SS troops were wiped out by British and American tanks and aircraft

So brutal was the fighting that U.S. General Dwight Eisenhower visited the aftermath

and he recalled that the battlefield at Falaise was unquestionably one of the greatest killing fields of any of the war areas

48 hours after the closing of the gap, I was conducted through it on foot

to encounter scenes that could be described only by Dante. It was literally possible to walk for hundreds of yards at a time

stepping on nothing but dead and decaying flesh. The German army, what remained of it, pulled out quickly in bedraggled units and headed

for Belgium and Germany in a hurry. Now for any other power, it would have been the end of the war, unquestionably

Everybody expected the Allied troops to be home by Christmas. But then, the Germans pulled off an organisational miracle, gathering together their supplies

and fresh recruits and reforming them into fighting units again. By the time the Allies had caught up, they were faced with a refreshed, well-equipped enemy that even had new advanced tank types deployed

Nobody had expected it, and the war would have to drag on. Although the Allies had a strong foothold in Europe, the situation on the European continent was far from secure

One of the main problems was that supplies could only be landed for the Allies at the Normandy beaches

The further they pushed inland and away from the landing point, the more thin their supply lines stretched

A strong determined push from the enemy could break through and cut the Allies off recapturing France and ending the Allied liberation for good

Hitler intended to do just this and secretly planned with his generals in the lead-up to Christmas 1944 for a major attack

SS and army units, some with the latest intimidating Tiger II tanks, would barge through and cut the Americans off

It had to remain a complete surprise for it to ever work

Most of the German senior officers whose units would actually be involved in the attack didn't even know about it until the day it started

But a conventional assault wouldn't be enough to sway the attack in his favour

Hitler knew he'd need to cause confusion and disorganisation among his enemy

and it would require bending of the rules of war and he had just the man to do it

In October 1944, Hitler summoned SS officer and legendary tactician Otto Skorzeny

and gave him what he said was the most important assignment of your life

The plan called for something bizarre and radical. Skorzeny would find any SS or German army man who could speak English

train them as commandos, and then send them deep behind enemy lines to sabotage

and cause chaos and confusion. This flew in direct violation of the 1907 Hague Convention

which governed many of the rules of war. But if Hitler could get the advantage he needed, then he just didn't care

The men wouldn't just wear American uniforms, either. German Panther tanks would be disguised as American M10 tank destroyers and sent in, too

It was partly a classic ruse de guerre, an act of military deception

but engaging the enemy in combat while wearing their uniforms was considered a war crime

The rules of war also dictated that any soldier captured behind enemy lines

wearing the uniform of their enemy could be classified as a spy and immediately executed

Skorzeny and Hitler both knew it was a risk they'd have to take in order to get any possible advantage over the enemy

And Operation Grief, or Griffin, was born. Skorzeny went to work. He sent out orders to commanders of prisoner of war camps

holding American prisoners to strip them of their uniforms. Now, this was in the middle of winter, and it was bitterly cold

Many of the POW camp commanders simply refused, saying that it violated the Geneva Convention

But despite protests, the required number of uniforms was finally assembled, and now men were needed to fill them

A ragtag bunch of German troops with any basic English understanding was hastily assembled, pulled from literally every branch of the German armed forces

The commando training was intense. As well as close-quarter combat and demolition training

the commando spent at least two hours every day practicing English, watching American movies and newsreels to pick up slang and affect an American accent

For the plan to work at all, absolute confidentiality was required. This was taken incredibly seriously

One German soldier was even executed, riding home with what was considered too much information

Now amazingly, the Allies got word about the so-called top secret plan, but they ignored it

They thought it was so absurd that it could only be false information intended to trick them The German troops were even trained in American cultural norms that might otherwise give them away They learned to tap their cigarette packs against their

helmets like the American troops did. They learned how to salute, how to give orders

and they even ate American rations. But the secrecy around Operation Greif was so extreme

that they didn't even know what they were training for. Meanwhile, a whole fleet of

captured Allied vehicles was needed to pull off the assault. The German Army Command West was

tasked with finding as many as 15 British and American tanks, 100 Jeeps, 120 trucks and many

more. But there was an issue. Skorzeny needed more than 3,500 men to pull off Operation Grief

but he only got 400 or so English speakers. Skorzeny complained that they could never

certainly dupe an American, not even a deaf one. Not only that, but in the haste

only 50 Allied vehicles could even be found and only two were American's German tanks

Scorzeny filled in the ranks with crack German troops, got them into training

but finding the tanks would be a harder task. In the end, it was decided that the Panther tank

could have steel plates welded onto it to disguise it as the American M10 Wolverine tank destroyer

And at least 10 Panthers were hastily converted as the deployment date loomed near

Scorzeny was not impressed. Of the vehicles, he said that, quote, very young American troops

seeing them from very far away at night, might be fooled. Nevertheless, he had his orders and Operation Grief was a go

On December 16th 1944, German tanks and troops stormed through the Ardennes forest and the

major German push was afoot. It caught the American troops completely off guard and a vicious battle was underway to

preserve the Allied foothold in Belgium. While the intense fighting was going on, Skorzeny's fake Americans slipped through the cracks and

and went behind the lines to complete their mission. At first, the unit had some success

One commando team even managed to convince a US Army unit to withdraw from their position at Poteau

and another team mixed roadsides around and sent an American reinforcement battalion off the wrong way down a highway

But then their luck ran out. On the second day of the battle, American military police stopped a jeep carrying four soldiers near a bridge

and demanded their passes. The four men spoke English with American accents

and were wearing American uniforms, but they were unable to produce the proper paperwork

The suspicious MPs then searched the vehicle and discovered concealed German weapons

explosives and swastika emblems. Under interrogation, one of the commandos of Operation Grief

claimed that they had been dispatched with orders to penetrate Paris and capture General Eisenhower

and other high-ranking officers. With word now escaping of German soldiers in disguise

Operation Grief seemed doomed and it would have unintended consequences. But there had also been an issue with the disguised Panther tanks as well

They had been delayed by two days, missing their jumping-off point entirely

But the ruse was already up, so instead of rolling behind enemy lines, Skorzeny decided to deploy his Panthers like a normal panzer tank unit

The tanks rolled out to attempt a capture of the central town of Malmedy

but they were fought back by determined American resistance, and a few of the disguised tanks were even knocked out

even Skorzeny himself was wounded. If Operation Grief had failed to capture any bridges or major roads it certainly succeeded in its mission to confuse the Americans It provoked a complete overreaction from the American troops bordering on paranoia

Security was tightened up beyond the pale. General Eisenhower even complained that he almost found

himself a prisoner and roadblocks were set up on nearly every road. American soldiers were instructed

to question drivers of any vehicles on things only Americans would know. Things like baseball

teams, movie stars, and towns. They would ask questions like, what is Sinatra's first name

or who is the president's dog? And this worked fine, except for the fact that allied British

soldiers were also operating in the area. And when confronted by questions about World Series

baseball, they were stumped. Then reconnaissance officer and future actor David Niven was stopped

by a guard who asked who won the World Series in 1940. Niven scratched his head and simply said

back, I haven't the faintest idea. Brigadier General Bruce Clark was once arrested for a

half hour after he gave a wrong answer about the Chicago Cubs and the overexcited guard exclaimed

only a crowd would make a mistake like that. The hysteria would have tragic consequences though. Four US soldiers were actually killed

and dozens more would be wounded in cases of mistaken identity. The Allies were not impressed

by this ruse of war and they did not take it lightly. American soldiers were instructed

above all, don't let them take off their American uniforms. And when 16 of the prisoners were

sentenced to death, they appealed to General Bradley. He refused. The most were executed

by firing squads still wearing their American uniforms. The would-be grief commandos were never really a threat apart from the panic that they caused

Regardless, wartime and post-war accounts as well as popular histories have played up these

reputedly notorious teams of false flag agents. Although Operation Grief did succeed in so

chaos among the Americans, it failed to meet its ultimate goal. The Americans put up an

unexpectedly fierce resistance, and the commandos were never able to destroy any bridges or

communication lines. After the war in 1947, the Allies' Dachau trials were supposed to

make an example of the infamous Skorzeny and his officers for even leading Operation Grief

but the defense brought in Allied officers who had to admit that they had been running

similar special missions. Grief was classed as a legitimate ruse of war and Skorzeny and all of

the defendants were acquitted. If the Battle of the Bulge had succeeded, the German army could

have smashed through the Allied line and pushed the Americans and British back out of Europe

But would that have been enough to sway the war in favour of the Germans? Could the Second World

War have continued into the late 1940s or even the early 1950s? Well, time travellers, that's an

Interesting question, and it's a good story for another day