History Of The Twelfth Infantry Regiment In World War Ii

“The 22nd is very much a part of my life and had it not been for your journal I would have had no idea of its destiny and its ending. I am very grateful to you for this experience.”—John Cheever Scores of combat incidents and fascinating insights are to be found in “A Soldier’s Journal.” Rothbart provides unusual details of the 4th Division’s, and especially the 22nd Regiment’s, achievements and obstacles in the Allied advance from Normandy to Germany; D-Day Normandy, the breakthrough at St. Lo, the liberation of Paris, the German counterattack in the Ardennes and the Battle of the Bulge, and the bloody Hurtgen Forest battle.—The Trenton Times (NJ) “Rothbart’s meticulously- kept journal is an ‘I was there’ record of World War II. It is a valuable piece of American history.”—The Huntsville Times (AL) “From the day he was drafted in 1942...Rothbart did what many people plan but rarely follow up. He kept a journal, tightly pencilled entries in little notebooks that somehow caught history roaring by, and in remarkably readable style.”—Pittsburgh Tribune Review (PA) “Compelling reading . . . made more so by the many ‘slice of life’ portraits. . . of his time in the U.S. Army.”—John Gresham, bestselling co-author (with Tom Clancy) of Submarine and Special Forces.

The 4th Infantry Division has always been there in AmericaÕs modern wars. On 14 September 1918 the men of the ÒIvyÓ Division stood up in their trenches and prepared to attack. It would be one of the first times that American troops would operate autonomously, aside from Anglo-Franco command. They would go over the top on uneven ground to be blown to pieces by German artillery and fall in their hundreds to the spitting of German machine guns, yet nevertheless win the day. In World War II on D-Day they scrambled ashore across the sands of Utah beach and remained fighting in Europe until Hitler was dead and Germany had surrendered. From the Normandy campaign to the hell of the HŸrtgen Forest and the Battle of the Bulge, no other American division suffered more casualties in the European theater than the 4th, and no other division accomplished as much. In Vietnam they would execute precarious Òsearch and destroyÓ missions in dense jungles against a determined and resourceful enemy. They experienced a series of major engagements that would entail 33 consecutive days of vicious, close-quarters combat in the battle of Dak To in 1967. For their actions in Indochina they would receive no less than 11 Medals of Honor. They fought in Iraq to topple Saddam Hussein, and in May 2009, at the height of Operation Enduring Freedom, the 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team deployed to Afghanistan for a 12-month combat mission. They operated in the birthplace of the Taliban along the Arghandab River Valley, west of Kandahar City, a place often ominously referred to as "The Heart of Darkness." The 2nd Battalion 12th Infantry Regiment saw heavy combat throughout. Through firsthand interviews with veterans, across the decades, and the expert analysis of the authors, the role of one of AmericaÕs mainstay divisions in its modern conflicts is in these pages illuminated.