Early on the morning of November 14th, 1944, as winter tightened its grip on Western Germany, according to later German recollections, one artillery officer recalled standing inside a concrete observation post, convinced it was among the safest positions on the line. The pencil in his hand trembled as he pressed his eye against the cold metal of the scissor periscope.

Through the narrow viewing slit, he expected to see a familiar scene. Bare trees, the misty Mirthth River Valley, and defensive positions still holding firm. Instead, he saw nothing of the battlefield. There was only a smoking crater where a German observation bunker had stood less than half an hour earlier, just 20 minutes earlier.

 That bunker had been in place since September 1944. 32 soldiers from the 915th Grenadier Regiment of the Seventh Army had lived and worked inside it. They trusted its reinforced concrete walls, nearly 3 ft thick. German engineers believed the bunker’s thick concrete walls could survive heavy artillery fire under normal conditions based on pre-war testing.

 Yet on that freezing morning, when the smoke cleared, no survivors were found, and the bunker had been crushed so completely that only fragments of equipment remained. No signs of life, only an empty silence that felt unnatural. Bea’s hands shook, but not from the cold seeping through the concrete. What truly disturbed him was the collapse of everything he had learned at the artillery school in Utbog.

 The shell that destroyed the bunker had not come from the front. It had come from beyond the Mirthth River Valley, past the distant tree line, from a distance that German doctrine had long considered impractical for accurate bunker destruction. The weapon behind this impossible strike was the American M1 155 mm gun known to US troops by a simple almost casual name, the long tom.

By the autumn of 1944, Vber and thousands of German defenders along the Ziggfrieded line were facing a harsh truth. American artillery had crossed a line the Vermacht believed could not be crossed. Hardened fortifications, once thought untouchable, were being destroyed systematically from more than 14 miles away.

 With a level of effectiveness that came from mass fire, careful calculation, and rapid correction rather than from single perfect shots, the long could fire over 25,700 yd, more than 14 miles, with precision that seemed almost unreal. And this was not a lucky shot. across Hitler’s west wall. By late 1944, several hundred long tom guns were deployed across the Western Front, supplied with ammunition on a scale the German defenders could no longer match and linked into a fire control system so advanced that it turned American artillery into an invisible, methodical

killing machine. But the story of how these guns came to terrorize Nazi Germany’s strongest defenses and how they changed artillery warfare forever does not begin on the battlefield. It begins 6 years earlier in the quiet administrative offices of the United States Army Ordinance Department. Beginning in the late 1930s, Army planners outlined ambitious requirements for a new heavy gun.

 And over the following years, these goals were refined into a design capable of firing a 95lb shell beyond 25,000 yd. It had to move with mechanized forces, survive massive recoil forces, and still be simple enough for large scale production. Weight limits were strict, but performance demands were extreme. At Waterfleet Arsenal in New York, engineers chose a practical approach.

They would build the most powerful mobile gun possible and then design the transport system around it. The result was the M1 155 mm gun, soon nicknamed the Long tom. Its barrel alone was 23 ft long and weighed 6,400 lb. In firing position, the entire weapon weighed over 30,000 lb and required a two-piece transport system.

Even with training, assembly often took more than an hour. Once in position, the long tom could fire one round every 2 minutes in sustained fire or faster for short periods. Its maximum range reached 25,715 yd, nearly 14 1/2 m. Just as important, it was accurate, allowing American artillery to strike specific targets far beyond visual range.

 Production began slowly in 1941 as the army expanded. By 1942, output increased sharply. Waterfly at Arsenal produced hundreds of guns with additional units built by private contractors. Each LongTM cost about $38,000, similar to a medium tank, but its battlefield value would soon justify the expense.

 The gun first entered combat during Operation Torch in North Africa. Early results were disappointing. Inexperienced crews struggled with fire control and German counterb fire exposed American weaknesses. By March 1943, German assessments, including those associated with General Hans Jurgen Fon Arnim’s command in Tunisia, described American artillery as numerous but not yet wellcoordinated.

That judgment would not last. Lessons from Tunisia drove rapid reform. Training intensified, fire direction improved, and doctrine evolved. By the invasion of Sicily in July 1943, long tom battalions had become part of a coordinated fire network, turning a once awkward weapon into one of the most precise and feared artillery systems of the war.

The Italian campaign demonstrated what American artillery could achieve when properly coordinated. As the fifth army pushed north through some of the most difficult terrain in Europe, long-tom batteries played a major role in weakening German defensive positions along the Barbara line, the broader winterline system, and the Gustav line, working together with infantry, air power, and other allied forces.

 Each of these defensive systems had been carefully prepared by German engineers who understood their business. Yet they fell one after another to American firepower applied with mathematical precision. At Monte Casino, where German paratroopers had transformed an ancient monastery into what they believed was an impregnable fortress.

 Long tom batteries positioned in the Mouro area were able to strike many German positions around Monte Casino. Even though full coverage required artillery from multiple locations, the guns were placed miles behind the front lines, often beyond effective German counter fire. Yet forward observers from Allied units, including New Zealand forces, worked with American artillery to direct accurate fire against German bunkers.

The defenders responded with furious counterbatter fire, but German counterbatter fire was intense, but it rarely succeeded in silencing the American guns for all the good it did them. A captured German artillery officer later told his interrogators that facing American guns he could not reach had a deep psychological impact on his men.

We could hear them firing from very far away, he said, his voice carrying what his interrogators described as a note of wonder mixed with bitterness. A distant thunder. Then the shells would arrive, very heavy shells, and our concrete positions would crack. We tried to locate their batteries, but they were too distant.

 In many cases, our 150 mm guns were unable to reach the American batteries. we could do nothing but endure. The technical sophistication of American fire control bewildered German artillerists trained in the traditional methods of direct observation and mass batteries firing together. The American system used a completely different philosophy, one that seemed almost like science fiction to men schooled in more conventional methods.

Forward observers, often positioned with frontline infantry or flying in light aircraft that seemed absurdly fragile, would identify targets and radio coordinates to a fire direction center. The FDC, staffed by soldiers trained in trigonometry and ballistics calculations, would compute firing solutions using graphical firing tables, meteorological data, and information about each gun’s individual characteristics.

Multiple batteries could be coordinated to place shells on a single target simultaneously, even when firing from different positions, miles apart. This time on target technique could drop dozens of shells on a German position within seconds, giving defenders no warning and no time to take cover. Men who had survived years of combat on the Eastern front reported that they had never experienced anything quite like it.

The long tom’s accuracy at extreme range came from multiple factors working together in harmony. The barrel’s length provided exceptional velocity and a flat trajectory that reduced the effects of wind and air density variations. The long tom achieved its extended range through a long barrel, powerful propellant charges, and improved shell shapes, which together reduced drag and maintained accuracy at extreme distances.

 Each gun was individually calibrated with its unique ballistic characteristics recorded in detailed firing tables that traveled with the weapon. Ammunition lots were tested and their performance characteristics documented so that gunners knew exactly how each batch of shells would perform. Meteorological sections measured temperature, humidity, barometric pressure, and wind conditions at multiple altitudes, feeding this data to the fire direction centers.

 The result was accuracy that German observers found impossible to credit until they witnessed it personally, and sometimes not even then. Lit Hans Miller, a forward observer for the 356th Infantry Division, kept a detailed diary throughout the Italian campaign. His entry for April 19th, 1944 described watching an American fire mission with what reads like barely controlled disbelief.

At 0815 hours, he wrote in the precise style of a trained observer. A single American heavy shell struck the company command post in the farmhouse. A direct hit. The building collapsed completely. At 0817, another shell struck the mortar position behind the ridge, killing four men and destroying two mortars.

 At 0819, a third shell landed directly on the machine gun nest covering the road. Each shot was perfect, as if the Americans could see exactly where we were, but their guns were far beyond our visual range. It is impossible, yet it happened. The ammunition available to long tom crews provided versatility that German artillery lacked.

 The standard high explosive shell designated M1 contained a powerful explosive charge and was designed to destroy field fortifications, troops, and equipment through blast and fragmentation rather than deep concrete penetration. The M107 high explosive shell could be fitted with a proximity fuse, a closely guarded innovation that allowed the shell to detonate above the ground for maximum effect against exposed troops.

That detonated the shell above ground for maximum fragmentation effect against troops in the open. The M19 smoke shell could blanket entire areas in minutes, blinding enemy observers and concealing American movements. Most terrifying to German defenders was the M110 concrete piercing shell was designed to penetrate reinforced structures such as bunkers and fortified positions using a hardened nose and delayed fuse to detonate inside lighter concrete defenses.

 detonating inside the structure to maximize casualties and destruction. It was this shell most likely that had obliterated observation post number seven before Hedman Vber’s horrified eyes that November morning. American ammunition production matched the gun’s technical sophistication. By 1944, American factories were producing 155 mm shells at a rate exceeding 200,000 rounds per month.

 The logistic system delivered this ammunition to forward positions with remarkable efficiency. During major offensives, long-tom battalions could receive several hundred rounds per day, reflecting a logistical system that, while not unlimited, was far more reliable than that available to most German artillery units. German artillerists, accustomed to severe ammunition shortages that sometimes left them rationed to just a handful of shells per day, could barely comprehend this abundance.

The Normandy invasion in June 1944 brought long toms to France in significant numbers. In the weeks following the Normandy landings, American forces brought increasing numbers of 155 mm long tom battalions ashore to support the expanding beach head with more arriving throughout the summer.

 The bokeage terrain of Normandy made observation and fire adjustment difficult which reduced the ability of heavy artillery to fully exploit its long range. Forward observation was difficult in the close country and the close quarters fighting reduced the advantage of extreme range. But as allied forces broke out from the beach head in late July, the long toms came into their own.

 Operation Cobra demonstrated how American artillery, including long-tom batteries, could help shape the battlefield when combined with air power and ground forces in ways that had previously been impossible. The 91st Infantry Division’s advance toward Kotans received support from heavy artillery battalions equipped with long tom guns supported the advance of American infantry units toward Kotans.

German forces of the 17th SS Panza Grenadier Division had fortified the approaches to the town, believing that American heavy artillery had not yet been deployed far enough or positioned effectively to strike their defenses. The long toms proved them wrong in the most devastating way possible. Firing from positions near Santine, over 12 mi from the front, they systematically destroyed German strong points identified by forward observers operating from light Piper aircraft flying along the edges of the battlefield. Halptom Fura Otto Bower,

commanding a company of the 17th SS survived the bombardment and later told Allied interrogators about an experience that clearly still haunted him. We thought ourselves safe. he said, his voice carrying what the interrogation report described as a hollow quality. Our artillery observers reported no American heavy guns in range. Then the shells began falling.

Very heavy shells, perfectly accurate. They hit the bunker, the mortar position, the assault gun park. In 20 minutes, our defensive position was destroyed. We did not even know where to return fire. The race across France in August and September 1944 saw long-tom battalions moving rapidly behind the advancing infantry.

 The challenge was no longer firepower, but logistics. When heavily engaged, a long-tom battalion could consume several tons of ammunition per day, placing great strain on supply lines, plus fuel for the prime movers and generators. The famous Red Ball Express truck convoys prioritized artillery ammunition, but supply lines stretched dangerously thin as Allied forces approached the German border.

 By September, many long battalions were rationed to just 25 rounds per gun per day, a sharp reduction from the far more generous ammunition expenditure permitted during July and August. But this ammunition shortage would end spectacularly when Allied supply lines caught up with the front in October 1944. Just as American forces prepared to assault the Ziggfrieded line, the German West Wall constructed between 1936 and 1940 was one of the largest and most complex fortification systems of the 20th century. It stretched nearly

400 m from the Netherlands to Switzerland, consisting of over 18,000 bunkers, pillboxes, and fortified positions. Engineers of Organization Todd designed these fortifications to resist prolonged bombardment by standard field artillery and mediumcur weapons. The standard type 10 bunker had reinforced concrete walls about 3 ft thick and was intended to resist near misses and indirect fire from heavy artillery rather than direct hits from the largest calibers.

 Command bunkers had walls 8 ft thick. The Germans believed these fortifications would delay any Allied offensive for months, buying time for new weapons and potentially splitting the Allied coalition. They had not reckoned with the scale of American artillery support. By October 1944, the United States first and 9inth armies deployed large numbers of 155 mm guns along the German border, supported by a logistical system capable of sustaining heavy artillery fire for extended periods and sophisticated fire control. What followed was a hard-fought

battle in which American artillery played a decisive role by systematically reducing German fortified positions under intense combat conditions. Every German bunker identified by aerial reconnaissance or forward observers became a target for precision destruction. The long toms would fire from positions miles behind the front, beyond German artillery range, dropping shells with methodical accuracy until the targets ceased to exist.

 It was industrial warfare at its most efficient and most terrifying. The destruction of Ziefrid line fortifications around Arkin in October 1944 provides precise documentation of the long tom’s effectiveness. The first infantry division’s assault on the city received support from the the 935th, 955th, and 957th field artillery battalions, which together operated multiple 155 mm artillery units, including both guns and howitzers.

The German 116th Panza Division and 346th Infantry Division defended Arkan with approximately 250 fortified positions. The American approach was methodical to the point of being almost bureaucratic. Aerial photographs identified every bunker. Each assigned a number and precise coordinates. Forward observer teams confirmed occupancy using binoculars and periscope observation.

The same tools that Hedman Vber would later use to watch observation post 7 disappear. The fire direction centers computed firing solutions for each target, accounting for range, elevation, meteorological conditions and the individual characteristics of each gun. Beginning October 7th, 1944, the long toms began their work.

 One by one, the German bunkers disappeared. The pattern was consistent. four to eight rounds per target, adjusted fire based on forward observer corrections, then fire for effect until the position was confirmed destroyed. Oust Ghart Vilk, commanding the Ark and garrison, radioed to 7th Army headquarters on October 13th with a message that captured the desperation of his situation.

 Enemy artillery of unimaginable power, destroying fortifications systematically, he reported. West Wall positions rated impervious to artillery fire, collapsing from precision bombardment beyond our artillery range. Request immediate air support against enemy heavy guns. No air support came. The Luftwaffer no longer controlled German skies and Allied fighter bombers made any daylight movement suicidal.

 The systematic destruction continued. The statistics from the Arkan siege tell the story of what happens when industrial capacity meets military necessity. Between October 7th and October 21st, American artillery fired thousands of rounds during the Arkan operation, neutralizing or severely damaging the majority of identified German bunkers and strong points. 27 were damaged beyond use.

 Only five survived intact, and their garrisons surrendered immediately when American infantry approached, having watched their neighboring positions obliterated one by one. As the battle progressed, American gunners improved their methods, often requiring fewer rounds to neutralize fortified positions, a number that reflected the learning curve as American gunners refined their techniques.

 As the siege progressed, they became more efficient, needing fewer rounds to achieve the same results. The psychological impact on German defenders exceeded even the staggering physical destruction. Soldiers who had believed themselves safe in reinforced concrete bunkers. Many defenders came to believe that even well-built fortifications offered limited protection against sustained and accurate American artillery fire.

 The west wall had consumed enormous resources and cost roughly 3 to 3 1/2 billion Reichkes marks. and it had also tied down huge amounts of labor and materials and was being systematically erased by guns firing from beyond visual range. German soldiers began abandoning bunkers before American infantry even attacked, preferring to take their chances in field positions rather than wait for the inevitable shell that would enume them in collapsed concrete.

Officers who tried to order men into fortified positions found themselves ignored or in some cases faced open refusal and discipline problems because fear had begun to overpower orders. German reports and later accounts described a growing fear of bunkers, and some units became reluctant to re-enter fortified positions after repeated heavy bombardments, making for sobering reading.

Reports from all sectors indicate troops refusing to occupy fortified positions. He wrote multiple instances of soldiers feigning illness or deserting rather than enter bunkers targeted by American heavy artillery. Officers assurances of bunker safety no longer believed after repeated instances of complete destruction.

 The psychological dominance of American artillery is becoming more dangerous than its physical effects. The philosophical impact was perhaps even more profound than the tactical one. The vear had been trained in a military tradition stretching back to Frederick the Great, emphasizing maneuver, concentrated force at the decisive point, and the moral superiority of the German soldier.

 American artillery grinding away at German positions with mechanical efficiency from distances that precluded any response negated this entire tradition. The Americans did not seek glorious battle. They sought systematic destruction of enemy forces using overwhelming material advantage. And it worked. The battle of Herkin Forest stretched from September into mid December 1944, and the fighting intensified again in November as American units pushed deeper into the woods, which would test the long Tom’s capabilities in the most difficult terrain. imaginable.

The dense forest with trees sometimes reducing visibility to 20 yards seemed to nullify the advantages of long range precision artillery. German commanders often hoped the thick canopy would limit Allied observation and reduce the accuracy of fire even though it could not stop heavy shells once the target was found from the devastating fires that had shattered the Sief Freed line fortifications.

They were partially correct. The thick canopy prevented aerial observation and forward observers on the ground struggled to identify targets in the dense undergrowth. But American ingenuity adapted quickly. The solution came from an unexpected source, the artillery liaison aircraft, primarily the L4 Grasshopper and L5 Sentinel.

 These were tiny fabriccovered planes that could operate from rough fields just behind the front lines. Flying at altitudes between 1,000 and 3,000 ft, often under intense anti-aircraft fire, observers who were themselves artillery officers could circle above the forest canopy and spot German positions invisible from the ground.

 Artillery liaison aircraft like the L4 Grasshopper and the L5 Sentinel helped observers look over the canopy and they sometimes directed fire onto targets that ground teams could not see. Detail a cat and mouse game played out above the treetops. Morrison would orbit over suspected German positions, sometimes for hours, waiting for any sign of activity.

 A wisp of smoke from a cooking fire. Movement on a trail. The distinctive shape of a bunker entrance camouflaged under branches. Any indication would prompt a call to the fire direction center. Within minutes, 155 mm shells would crash through the forest canopy. The Germans adapted by constructing bunkers deeper into hillsides with entrances facing away from likely observation routes.

They moved only at night, maintained strict fire discipline, and dispersed their positions to avoid presenting concentrated targets. But American artillery adapted faster. The proximity fused shells which detonated above ground proved devastating in the forest environment. When a shell burst in the treetops, fragments could rain downward across a wide area and men could be hit even in foxholes because the danger came from above.

 German soldiers discovered that the forest that limited observation also trapped them in killing zones when American shells arrived. Unrahitzier Ernst Becka of the second battalion 314th infantry regiment survived 3 weeks in Herkan forest before his capture on December 8th. His interrogation report describes an experience that seems to have marked him deeply.

The forest became a prison, he said, speaking slowly, as if choosing each word with care. We could not see the Americans, but their aircraft saw us. Every movement brought shells. The heavy shells, the 155 mm, would explode in the trees above us. The fragments came down like steel rain. Men died in their foxholes from fragments falling vertically.

 We could not dig deep enough to protect ourselves. The American artillery made the forest uninhabitable. The ammunition expenditure in Herkin forest exceeded anything seen previously in the European theater. Artillery expenditure in the Herkin forest reached extraordinary levels, especially during the heavy fighting in November and early December, and the constant firing created major wear on equipment, while it also placed huge pressure on supply convoys.

 Each gun barrel rated for approximately 1,000 rounds before replacement wore out and required changing. The logistics effort to sustain this fire was staggering with ammunition convoys running continuously. The German 7th Army defending Herkan Forest could not match this expenditure. By December 1944, German artillery units in the west faced severe ammunition shortages.

 The daily allocation for a German heavy artillery battalion rarely exceeded 50 rounds, and even this pittance could not always be guaranteed. Obust Rudolfph Fryer Fongdorf, Chief of Staff of the Seventh Army, later wrote about facing this overwhelming material superiority. The material superiority of American artillery was absolute, he noted in his postwar memoir.

 They could fire 100 shells for everyone we fired. Their heavy guns were beyond our range. Their aerial observation made concealment nearly impossible. The combination was crushing. The unexpected German offensive in the Ardan beginning December 16th, 1944 would provide the ultimate test of American artilleries flexibility.

The attack achieved a high degree of tactical surprise and forced several American units to withdraw along an 80m front while others resisted under intense pressure and threatened to split the Allied armies. For the first four days, German forces advanced rapidly through fog and snow that grounded Allied aircraft and limited artillery observation.

But even in this chaos, the long toms proved their worth. The defense of Bastonia, where the 101st Airborne Division and elements of the 10th Armored Division held against overwhelming German forces, depended critically on artillery support. Several American field artillery units, including 155 mm howitzer battalions and armored artillery elements, provided heavy fire support to the defenders of Bastonia during the siege.

 From positions near Bastonia, American artillery could strike German assembly areas, supply routes, and artillery positions within much of the surrounding battlefield and artillery positions throughout the salient. General Odin Hinrich Von Lutvitz commanding the 47th Panza Corps attacking Bastonia had planned to neutralize American artillery through rapid maneuver and surprise.

 His afteraction report written in captivity admits the failure with what seems like grudging respect. We expected to overrun the American artillery in the first day’s advance, he wrote. Instead, their heavy guns were displaced to new positions beyond our reach and continued firing. The 155 mm guns caused severe casualties in our assembly areas and interrupted our supply routes.

 Our own artillery could not locate them, let alone suppress them. The weather cleared on December 23rd, allowing massive aerial resupply of Bastonia and restoration of forward observation. The long tom batteries intensified their fire. After the weather cleared, improved air reconnaissance and forward observation helped American artillery engage German positions more effectively across the battlefield.

 The time on target technique proved devastating. German batteries that revealed their positions by firing suddenly found themselves under coordinated bombardment from multiple American battalions with dozens of shells arriving simultaneously. Major General Troy Middleton, commanding 8th Corps, later wrote about the artillery’s decisive role with the directness of a man who had watched it save his command.

 Major General Troy Middleton later emphasized that artillery played a decisive role in the defense of Bastonia while infantry units maintained the perimeter under extreme conditions. The infantry held the perimeter, but artillery broke every German attack. The 155 mm guns reached out and touched German forces throughout the salient.

 They destroyed supply columns, shattered assembly areas, and counterfired German artillery from beyond their maximum range. Without those long toms, Bastonia would have fallen. The statistics from the Arden’s offensive demonstrate Longtom’s contribution to stopping the German attack. Between December 16th, 1944 and January 25th, 1945, American long-tom battalions in the Arden.

During the Arden’s fighting, American heavy artillery fired tens of thousands of rounds, inflicting significant losses on German forces, particularly in rear areas and artillery units, with particularly severe losses among artillery crews and rear area units. The psychological effect was perhaps more significant.

 German soldiers who had begun the offensive with high morale, believing in one final chance for victory, discovered that even in their moment of surprise and initiative, American artillery became a dominant factor on the battlefield, shaping German movements and limiting their ability to exploit early successes. The crossing of the Rine in March 1945 marked one of the last and most significant largecale uses of long tom artillery in Europe.

 Operation Plunder Field Marshall Montgomery’s carefully planned setpiece crossing involved one of the largest and most carefully coordinated artillery preparations of the Western European campaign. The British 21st Army Group assembled over 3,000 guns, including a significant number of American heavy artillery pieces provided by the US 9th Army.

German forces defending the East Bank, including elements of the First Parachute Army, attempted to turn the Rine into an impossible barrier with elaborate fortifications determined to make the Rine an impossible barrier. On the evening of March 23rd, 1945, a massive artillery preparation began with thousands of guns firing in carefully coordinated phases before the crossing in carefully coordinated waves.

 The long toms engaged identified bunkers and strong points along the east bank, firing from positions west of the Rine at ranges exceeding 12 mi. German defenders, veterans of years of combat on the eastern and western fronts, had never experienced bombardment on this scale. After the war, German commanders, including Albert Kessle Ring, acknowledged that the scale and coordination of Allied artillery during the Rine crossing were unlike anything they had previously faced, he said, speaking with what his interrogators described as a kind of

weary amazement. The precision fire from American heavy guns destroyed our prepared positions before the assault even began. We had no answer to artillery superiority of that magnitude. The assault crossing launched after dark on March 23rd met lighter resistance than Allied planners had feared. Although fighting continued in pockets along the river, the long toms had destroyed or neutralized most German positions within range of the crossing sites.

 The few bunkers that survived found themselves targeted by direct fire from tanks and tank destroyers once Allied forces established bridge heads. By dawn on March 24th, British and American forces held a continuous lodgement across the Rine and the Long Toms were already displacing forward to support the exploitation. The rapid advance into Germany in April 1945 saw long tom battalions moving almost daily trying to keep pace with armored spearheads racing toward the Elbow River.

 The challenge was no longer enemy resistance but logistics. When heavily engaged, long-tom battalions consumed enormous quantities of ammunition each day, placing heavy demands on fuel and transport, plus fuel for the massive Diamond T and M5 Prime movers that towed the guns. The supply lines stretched hundreds of miles, but American logistics kept the ammunition flowing.

 The siege of Nuremberg in the war’s final weeks demonstrated the long tom’s capability against urban fortifications. The 45th Infantry Division’s assault on the medieval city received support from American heavy artillery units, including batteries equipped with long tom guns. Rather than level the entire city with aerial bombardment, American commanders chose surgical artillery strikes against specific strong points.

 Heavy artillery, including long tom guns, played an important role in breaking fortified positions, working alongside infantry and armor during the assault. Forward observers identified firing ports and bunker entrances, and the big guns placed shells exactly where needed. One by one, the defensive positions crumbled.

 The civilian population sheltering in cellars and basement suffered relatively light casualties compared to the devastation of strategic bombing. German officers captured during the fighting later admitted that American artillery superiority made prolonged defense impossible once their ammunition ran out. He said simply they could destroy any position we occupied with precision fire from beyond visual range. Our own artillery was gone.

 Our ammunition exhausted, we faced a choice between annihilation and surrender. I chose to save my men’s lives. Germany’s surrender on May 8th, 1945 ended long-term combat employment in Europe. The final statistics compiled by the US, the Army Ordinance Department tells the story of how the long tom became an important part of a broader system that transformed artillery warfare by combining long range mobility and centralized fire control.

 During the final year of the war in Europe, American 155 mm gun units fired hundreds of thousands of rounds, and these fires played a major role in neutralizing German fortified positions and inflicting heavy losses on defending forces. More significantly, the psychological impact broke the will of defenders who discovered that no fortification could protect them from American artillery.

 The technical lessons learned from long-term employment influenced postwar artillery development worldwide. After the war, many nations, including the Soviet Union, expanded their long range artillery programs, drawing on wartime experience and shared lessons about mobility, range, and centralized fire control.

 The emphasis on mobility, range, and precision fire control became standard for Cold War artillery. The fire direction center concept perfected with the long toms remains fundamental to modern artillery operations. But the human cost paid by German soldiers who faced this weapon deserves acknowledgement. Thousands of young men conscripted into service they did not choose died in collapsed bunkers and shattered strong points.

 The long tom killed efficiently and from great distance, giving its victims little warning and less chance of survival. A bunker struck by a direct hit from a 95lb shell often suffered catastrophic damage. And in many cases, the occupants were killed or buried by collapsing concrete. The concrete that was supposed to protect became a tomb, crushing occupants under tons of collapsed material.

 The survivors carried psychological scars that lasted lifetimes. Postwar studies of German veterans documented long-term psychological effects among soldiers who endured heavy bombardment in enclosed positions, including anxiety, heightened sensitivity to noise, and recurring nightmares. A complex of symptoms, including acute anxiety when in enclosed spaces, hypervigilance to vibrations and distant sounds, and recurring nightmares of being buried alive.

 His research suggested that soldiers who experienced long-tom bombardment while in bunkers suffered higher rates of long-term psychological trauma than those wounded in open combat. American veterans of the long tom battalions also carried burdens, though of a different character. They had operated weapons of tremendous destructive power, killing enemies they never saw at distances that made the act almost abstract.

Some struggled with the impersonal nature of artillery warfare. Many American artillery veterans later reflected on the emotional distance created by long range fire, noting that they inflicted destruction on enemies they never saw, his voice carrying a reflective quality that suggested he had thought about these questions for many years.

“We were good at our jobs,” he said. We could put a shell through a specific window from 12 mi away, but we never saw what happened when it hit. We never saw the men we killed. Sometimes I wonder if that made it easier or harder. In the 1990s, as the last World War II veterans entered old age, oral history projects recorded their memories.

 In many oral history interviews, German veterans who had faced American heavy artillery often described the same fear. An enemy who could strike from far beyond sight and make strong defenses fail. The fear of an enemy who could kill from far beyond sight and the shock of seeing strong defenses fail. Paul Schmidt, a former grenadier who survived the defense of Arkin, later explained this feeling.

 We were told the West Wall was impregnable, he said. We trusted concrete and steel, but American artillery taught us that this belief was false. Shells fell with a level of accuracy we had never experienced before, and even thick concrete could no longer guarantee safety. This shock was not only tactical, but deeply philosophical. German soldiers were trained to believe in maneuver, discipline, and the strength of prepared positions.

 The long tom destroyed that belief. With a maximum range of roughly 14 mi, the long tom threatened positions that German soldiers had once believed were safely beyond reach. Frontline bunkers were hit, reserves were targeted, and supply routes and command posts vanished under accurate fire. Every German soldier within that range lived under constant threat from a weapon he could not see or reach.

 While not designed as psychological warfare, the effect on German morale was undeniable. Experience showed that destroying a single bunker with accurate fire often weakened enemy morale more effectively than large but poorly aimed bombardments than large but inaccurate barriages. The long tom also revealed a deeper truth. The United States could produce hundreds of heavy guns, millions of shells, and train large numbers of skilled crews, then deliver them to the battlefield with steady reliability.

 Millions of shells and train thousands of skilled crews, then deliver them to the battlefield with steady reliability. Germany, short of resources and under constant bombing, could not match this industrial strength. The final irony is that nothing about the long tom was complex. It was simply a large gun, heavy shells, accurate calculations, and endless supply.

What made it powerful was not invention, but scale. After the war, some German commanders remarked that the American way of fighting relied more on calculation, planning, and overwhelming resources than on dramatic battlefield gestures. You Americans fight like engineers, he said.

 You calculate the problem, apply overwhelming force, and move on. It is not glorious, but it works. Today, preserved guns at Fort Sil and Abedine stand in silence. From 14 mi away, the long tom demonstrated that no fortification was completely safe when accurate fire, industrial capacity, and careful calculation were combined. Industry and firepower were applied together.

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