Four hours of fury The untold story of World War II's largest airborne operation and the final push into Nazi Germany

Fenelon, a former paratrooper, examines Operation Varsity, a little-known but massive operation near the end of WWII, in perhaps too fine detail. On March 24, 1945, more than 16,000 Allied paratroopers landed around the German city of Wesel over a four-hour stretch, protecting bridgeheads seized by ground troops, in "the culmination of Allied airborne experience earned the hard way over the past three years." Nearly 55,000 German troops, from battle-hardened SS veterans to old men and boys corralled into Volkssturm units, were dug in to defend their homeland, but the concentration of Allied firepower, air support, and a well-trained, fully supplied fighting force was overwhelming. Testimony from surviving veterans provides gripping detail, but the minutiae of the operation (recommended size of base camps, the number of weapons in a regiment) are meticulously noted, nearly to a fault, which can make for slow passages and a lack of clarity about the larger context. Readers interested in granular detail of military operations and individual combat accounts will appreciate this most. Agent: Jim Hornfischer, Hornfischer Literary. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Four Hours of Fury CHAPTER 1 "WHERE IN THE HELL IS EVERYBODY AT?" Northern France. Sunday, Christmas Eve, 1944. Three months before they dropped into Germany, the troopers of the 17th Airborne entered combat for the first time in a manner entirely different from how they'd been trained. Without much warning, they'd been rushed to the front to set up blocking positions along the Meuse River on Christmas Eve 1944. Platoons of paratroopers, not fully aware of what was going on, found themselves digging foxholes in the Meuse-Argonne Cemetery, the final resting place for thousands of Americans killed in the previous world war. The men dug in and waited for orders, each contemplating the odds of becoming a permanent European resident himself. They were as ready as they could be, but like all unseasoned troops, most had no idea what they were about to endure. Lynn Aas' platoon stopped to dig their defensive positions in a field littered with frozen American and German corpses. The cold, dead faces of the enemy reminded the twenty-three-year-old rifleman of his German and Ukrainian neighbors back in North Dakota. As he stood there in the snow, a nagging unease took hold of him . . . he had no desire to kill these people. But knowing the task ahead required resolve, he walked over to one of the bodies and forced himself to stare. In life, the young German had been tall and handsome. Feeling the need to build up his hate, Aas kicked the corpse. This is war, he thought. He is my enemy; I need to prove to myself that I can destroy him. In the coming days almost all of his fellow troopers would get an opportunity to ignite their hate too. On December 16, Hitler had launched a massive surprise assault to recapture Antwerp, Belgium, and divide British and American forces. The desperate gamble, what would later be referred to as the Battle of the Bulge, caught senior Allied commanders flat-footed, and they scrambled to repulse the enemy's advance as Wehrmacht troops streamed out of the dense Ardennes Forest, decimating green American troops all along the front. Chased by panzer tanks, entire battalions fled from their positions while Allied commanders desperately tried to stem the retreat. Chaos reigned for several days, and accurate information was in high demand but short supply; defenses appeared to be crumbling all along the front. Excerpted from Four Hours of Fury: The Untold Story of World War II's Largest Airborne Operation and the Final Push into Nazi Germany by James M. Fenelon All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.