Bannon's War Room - December 25, 2025


Episode 5023： WarRoom Christmas Day Special 2025 cont.

Hosted by
Steve Bannon
Mentioned
Patrick K. O'Donnell Bastogne John Mosby Steve John C. Reilly Annapolis Jesse Benton Fremont John Wilkes Booth Rocco Zulu Unvanquished Hitler George Rhine Robert E. Lee Stonewall Jackson Henry Kennard John Glover Rawls Anthony McAuliffe John Cadwallader and 17 more
Episode 5019： Does New Polling Reveal Christ Is Alive In The US Episode 5026： WarRoom Saturday Special： The Patriot's History Of America

Episode Stats


Length

50 minutes

Words per minute

154.69

Word count

7,820

Sentence count

515

Harmful content

Toxicity

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

17

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

On Christmas Day, January 20, 1846, General George W. H. J.W. Washington set out on a mission to turn the tide of battle against the British at Trenton, New Jersey. But the odds were stacked against him.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Okay, welcome back.
00:00:19.760 It is the 25th of December in the year of our Lord, 2025, a Thursday.
00:00:24.360 It's Christmas Day, or to be exact, Christmas morning.
00:00:28.560 Patrick K. O'Donnell, having lost everything, having tremendous pressure.
00:00:33.020 In fact, I think the Continental Congress were no longer sitting in Philadelphia.
00:00:36.900 I think they went down to Annapolis.
00:00:38.420 They got out of town because this thing was looking bad,
00:00:41.880 and the British said they were going to hang everybody that signed the declaration.
00:00:47.900 In fact, there's a proclifical story.
00:00:49.620 I don't think it's ever been totally verified that one of the signers of the declaration,
00:00:53.640 I think from New Jersey, had already renounced the declaration.
00:00:58.460 I think he had been captured.
00:00:59.840 They run up on him.
00:01:01.000 A string of defeats, tremendous pressure on General Washington.
00:01:04.460 If it had been really a rival around, they might have even traded him out.
00:01:07.620 Of course, his rival was captured by the British.
00:01:10.040 One catastrophic defeat after the other, but he's still got an army of 3,000 or 4,000 men,
00:01:14.860 but they're in bad shape.
00:01:16.220 They've been fighting constantly in a retreat and not a rout,
00:01:19.660 in a retreat for like three months.
00:01:22.980 They get across to Delaware.
00:01:25.440 Walk me through the plan.
00:01:26.380 How does Washington come up with this plan,
00:01:28.320 which is really what I call a throw of the iron dice of war?
00:01:34.200 As you mentioned, Steve, the Crown has seized New Jersey,
00:01:41.000 and they are now offering the population an oath of allegiance.
00:01:45.840 If they sign the oath of allegiance and they sign their fealty to the Crown,
00:01:50.520 all will be forgiven.
00:01:52.320 Even a sign around the Declaration of Independence does sign that.
00:01:57.980 But the tides of war are really shifting.
00:02:01.860 With it, the political climate has shifted too,
00:02:05.060 where there's real doubt that the Revolutionary War can be won
00:02:09.740 by the United States at this point.
00:02:13.660 Washington knows that he has to stake everything
00:02:15.760 on a single operation that will somehow turn the tide of battle.
00:02:21.460 And it's at Trenton.
00:02:23.440 The British have a number of small outposts across New Jersey
00:02:26.960 to hold the ground that they have just seized.
00:02:29.440 And the problem is they've got these little outposts,
00:02:34.000 and they are supposedly interlocking in terms of the way that they're able to be quickly –
00:02:41.900 if one is attacked, they can redirect their forces
00:02:45.480 in a quick reaction force to support the other.
00:02:48.880 But Trenton's is a little bit more vulnerable.
00:02:50.780 And despite that, British intelligence picks up that Washington will attack Trenton
00:03:01.420 within the next few days.
00:03:03.440 And Johan Rahl is warned.
00:03:05.200 And he is constantly under attack by small militia and other forces.
00:03:12.840 He's been harassed for the last several days.
00:03:15.780 And what happens is on Christmas Day, there is a massive Nor'easter again.
00:03:21.960 Think about –
00:03:22.480 But hang on.
00:03:23.140 But hang on.
00:03:23.980 Hang on.
00:03:25.200 Hang on.
00:03:25.980 Hang on for a second.
00:03:26.760 I want to – why would – what were the circumstances?
00:03:31.500 I want to put people inside of Washington's head.
00:03:33.440 But why did he decide to do – one of the hardest things to do is a forced cross of a river
00:03:43.140 at night that is armed on the other side.
00:03:46.680 Now, he didn't realize it wasn't going to be the – he didn't realize there wasn't going
00:03:51.180 to be a lack of activity until they got to Trenton.
00:03:53.400 But when you're planning this, you're rolling the dice to do a cross with an army that's
00:03:58.520 been beaten and is still underfed and cold to cross the Delaware, to get to the other
00:04:04.760 side to do a night attack on these mercenaries that are supposed to be even tougher than the
00:04:09.820 British Army.
00:04:11.180 Did he believe that if he didn't show at least some momentum with enlistments running out,
00:04:16.280 things like that, that the army would just fall apart, that he had to do something?
00:04:20.140 He had to – he needed some – you know, victory begets victory.
00:04:23.260 You needed something – men needed something to hang on to, that the Continental Congress
00:04:28.580 down in Annapolis needed something to hang on to, that they had nothing.
00:04:32.160 And if they went through the Christmas season and started the new year and were still just
00:04:35.560 freezing in Pennsylvania, that it would be over.
00:04:40.320 Because it's really one of the most audacious moves in the history of this country.
00:04:45.960 Because the odds of this succeeding were incredibly long.
00:04:49.180 I mean, you're banking on a lot of things going right, and as you said, oh, by the way,
00:04:53.480 when they get ready to cross, they had another Northeaster hit them and hit them hard.
00:04:59.740 This is – the odds of this thing are extraordinary on so many fronts, Steve, because, for instance,
00:05:09.220 if everything just sort of went normally, for instance, and they had a regular battle,
00:05:17.960 and the British were able to – or the Hessians were able to retreat, it would have been sort
00:05:23.320 of a nothing burger.
00:05:24.800 But it's a catastrophic double envelopment, which basically captures almost all of Rawls' forces.
00:05:31.860 But let me just go backwards a little bit and just walk everybody through sort of the things
00:05:36.640 that take place on Christmas Day.
00:05:39.500 There's a massive Nor'easter.
00:05:41.360 Washington loves complicated plans.
00:05:44.000 He divides his army into three parts to cross the river.
00:05:47.980 The only part that gets across the river are the forces under John Glover's command.
00:05:54.360 And that is the main – the force that's taking the main force across.
00:05:58.260 Everything else fails because the river is filled with ice.
00:06:01.440 It's a raging torrent.
00:06:03.700 There's a nor'easter howling and pelting the men.
00:06:09.620 All the other efforts to cross fail.
00:06:12.900 The first effort – that effort with the Glover, they cross.
00:06:16.520 They're about 12 miles north of Trenton.
00:06:20.940 And then they have to somehow stealthily get to Trenton without Johan Rawl knowing that they're coming.
00:06:28.040 And it's here that there's another really extraordinary coincidence that occurs.
00:06:34.220 It's in the middle of the night that Washington comes across several company of riflemen that are on the other side.
00:06:43.200 And he's absolutely dumbfounded that these men are there.
00:06:47.300 And they're there because they make – according to most theories, they make a revenge attack because they lost some men on an earlier raid.
00:06:56.980 They should have never been there under Adam Stevens' command.
00:07:01.060 And they make the raid, and they suddenly find Washington's men.
00:07:07.060 Many people believe that in this raging snowstorm, that it's that militia – those militia companies, those riflemen that Johan Rawl believed was the attack.
00:07:19.020 And then they basically are dispersed by the Hessian soldiers.
00:07:24.620 And it's that belief that they already overcame the attack and that they also – nobody would attack in the middle of the Nor'easter.
00:07:34.960 And it's this that screens Washington as he trudges down the 12 miles.
00:07:40.080 And at daybreak or a little bit after, they attack Trenton.
00:07:44.040 And they surprise Johan Rawl, who then puts up really a tough fight.
00:07:48.420 They move a number of guns in place, and he rallies his men.
00:07:54.660 But in this battle, a number of prongs of Washington's main force break out.
00:08:02.460 And John – the one force under Glover is able to seize the Asset Peak Creek, the Vidal Creek, which – bridge that would allow Johan Rawl to escape.
00:08:12.760 Instead of a situation where it's a typical 18th century battle where they fight, and then if one side feels that they have an advantage, they will retreat.
00:08:22.620 Johan Rawl did not have an opportunity to retreat because he also receives a rifleman's bullet to his – that mortally wounds him.
00:08:35.160 And his escape route is basically – is snuffed out by the Marbleheaders, and it's an overwhelming victory for Washington. 1.00
00:08:45.920 But it's only one of the –
00:08:47.600 How is this –
00:08:48.240 Ten crucial days that are put together.
00:08:51.960 There are two more victories that will –
00:08:52.700 They get on a roll and hit –
00:08:55.560 Give me the two more victories quickly because I want to get to the overall picture.
00:08:59.560 But they get momentum right then, right?
00:09:01.960 Tell me about the other two victories.
00:09:03.060 They get momentum, but what Washington does is then crosses back across the Delaware.
00:09:09.020 He's got about 900 Hessian soldiers along with their cannon and arms.
00:09:14.520 He's like, I'm going to sit back.
00:09:15.780 I'm going to savor my victory.
00:09:17.320 But what happens is one of those other forces under John Cadwallader – these are the Philadelphia Associators.
00:09:23.660 These are a militia group in Pennsylvania.
00:09:25.940 They cross without orders because they still think that they're supposed to attack Trenton.
00:09:31.380 And now what happens is there's a force of about 2,000 militiamen on the other side, and the local militia in New Jersey uprise because of the great victory at Trenton.
00:09:44.020 And Washington is faced with the decision.
00:09:46.140 Does he order Cadwallader back, or does he reinforce him?
00:09:49.160 And he reinforces him at Trenton, which a week later sets up the showdown for the second battle of Trenton or the Battle of S&P Creek.
00:09:58.780 And it's another situation, Steve, where they hold a bridge at all costs.
00:10:03.940 I tell the story in Washington's Immortals and the Indispensables.
00:10:07.120 It's one of the great untold stories of the American Revolution.
00:10:10.140 If they break through and they seize the bridge, they surround the army, the Revolutionary War is over for all intents and purposes.
00:10:19.280 But they hold the ground, and then Washington rolls the iron dice once again and attacks Princeton and overwhelms the garrison there.
00:10:30.420 Part of the 10 crucial days that will change world history forever and the momentum of the Revolutionary War.
00:10:36.460 It started with just the boldest gamble of all.
00:10:42.340 When the time we got left, I want to start in Annapolis about the thinking on Washington change dramatically, but also in London and also in the British Army, because they thought we were pretty hapless.
00:10:53.420 And then they saw this incredibly, not just bold initiative, but the combat, really tenacity of the troops.
00:10:59.860 Let's start in Annapolis.
00:11:00.680 How did the Continental Congress attitude to Washington at least change for a while?
00:11:03.880 There was a sense of this overwhelming victory, and it spreads.
00:11:10.480 It takes time because you've got an ocean to deal with where there's a massive lag in time, where eventually it does reach Europe.
00:11:18.760 And it has a seismic impact on world leaders that are suddenly looking at the American cause as something that's winnable.
00:11:28.740 The French in particular, Spanish, others are looking at this and saying, wow, this is amazing what these Americans are able to do.
00:11:38.640 And it's another step towards an alliance and more aid from foreign powers.
00:11:45.660 But it's a shift in momentum.
00:11:48.180 And the British are scared.
00:11:51.460 No, because the 12 days, that 12 days, you're right.
00:11:54.280 It was just incredible.
00:11:55.240 As we go to break, Christmas.
00:11:59.620 Washington very specifically chose Christmas.
00:12:02.580 Why did he do that, sir?
00:12:03.700 He wants to – it's the element of surprise.
00:12:10.660 It's sort of the ultimate element of surprise.
00:12:13.440 There's a thought that nobody would attack at Christmas, right?
00:12:16.260 The British themselves, they go into winter quarters like most European armies.
00:12:21.600 As the winter strikes, there's a real critical shortage of forage.
00:12:26.280 For instance, this is the thing that's – this is the gas that powers the 18th century.
00:12:32.640 You've got horses and wagons and they have to move cannons around and everything else.
00:12:37.760 So forage is scarce.
00:12:39.100 It's hard to induct warfare if you're a European army during the winter.
00:12:44.980 So they go into winter quarters.
00:12:46.260 And it's – they want to consolidate their gains and just basically hopefully wear down the Americans when in fact it's the Americans that are wearing down the great empire. 0.67
00:13:00.720 Where the Hessians – lore has it that the Hessians, as Germans, are wont to do on Christmas, were pretty under the weather with grog, with adult beverages.
00:13:14.940 Is that true?
00:13:16.480 Were they – were they – were they particularly Rawls?
00:13:18.340 Were they all drunk?
00:13:20.460 No.
00:13:21.240 What you see is it's a myth.
00:13:23.620 In fact, Rawls troops are some of the best troops in the British army.
00:13:27.320 They're trained.
00:13:28.220 They're in their uniforms that night.
00:13:30.280 They're with their muskets. 0.99
00:13:33.520 They're armed to the – as much as they can be.
00:13:37.060 And they've just been – they're in the ready, if you will.
00:13:41.060 But they've been worn down by all these little raids that have taken place.
00:13:44.560 And they're constantly going out and chasing the Americans. 0.94
00:13:48.460 So there's a little bit of a lag that occurs because they think that the militia that attacked earlier may have been the main effort that they were – that they – the British intelligence had predicted would occur.
00:14:02.600 And then also the snowstorm itself, I think, quells their fears of an American attack, thinking almost nobody would attack in this massive snowstorm.
00:14:14.260 Nor'easter.
00:14:14.840 Patrick, hang on for a second.
00:14:16.100 We're going to take a short commercial break.
00:14:18.040 On Christmas Day in 2025, as we relive the combat history of American troops in Christmas's past short break.
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00:16:37.280 Okay, welcome back.
00:16:38.660 The Combat History of Christmas, and we've got Patrick K. O'Donnell with us.
00:16:44.840 Patrick, first off, real quickly, the first two books you find out about the Revolution, Washington and the Immortals, about this incredible regiment from Maryland, and the Indispensables.
00:16:56.300 Where do people go to get those?
00:16:57.660 Those are two massive bestsellers.
00:17:00.400 We were very proud of being part of the effort to drive the sales of both of those.
00:17:04.320 Audience love, the feedback I got was tremendous.
00:17:06.360 You give talks all over the country.
00:17:07.580 Where do people go to get those two books?
00:17:10.600 Those books, you can get them in any bookstore pretty much.
00:17:13.980 Barnes & Noble is probably the best place.
00:17:16.540 They feature the book.
00:17:19.200 Amazon.com is a great place to get it as well.
00:17:23.120 The book, Washington's, or the Indispensables is almost approaching 2,000.
00:17:30.400 It's all five-star reviews on that book, and the other one has got four and a half stars.
00:17:35.560 Yeah, almost 2,000 as well.
00:17:37.580 Five-star reviews are so hard to get.
00:17:42.260 Okay, I want to go.
00:17:43.220 We've got the Civil War, World War II, and the Korean War to get through for the rest of the year, and we're going to do it.
00:17:50.220 I want to go Unvanquish, your book on the Civil War, unbelievable.
00:17:54.520 Tell me about the combat history of Christmas as shown in the Unvanquish.
00:18:00.000 Of course, you had a piece up on Breitbart about this.
00:18:01.840 Tell me about it.
00:18:04.440 Well, The Unvanquish is really one of my finest books.
00:18:08.420 It'll give you a different view of the American Civil War.
00:18:12.540 It really captures three stories.
00:18:15.280 The main story on that is the Jesse Scouts, or Lincoln Special Forces, who hunted the South's most dangerous men, and that would be John Singleton, Mosby, and the Confederate Secret Service.
00:18:27.800 And it's the story of those three units really converging.
00:18:32.560 And the piece that I wrote at Breitbart is about the death of Blazer Scouts, which occurs in a forgotten field in Meyerstown, West Virginia, which is right along the Potomac near the Virginia border.
00:18:45.960 And it's here that these forces clashed.
00:18:50.120 And the main, the first Blazer Scouts, or the Jesse Scouts, it's an element of the Jesse Scouts, they formed the first hunter-killer teams to go after Mosby.
00:19:01.400 And these guys were total badasses that were very, very effective as a partisan hunters.
00:19:07.880 But they were modern in the sense that they weren't using like a blowtorch.
00:19:12.420 They were using intelligence to gather, you know, tactical intelligence to go after their partisans where they needed to go after them.
00:19:19.740 And they were going after Mosby with the latest weapons, the Spencer repeating carbine, for instance, and rifle.
00:19:27.200 But at Meyerstown, at a forgotten field, farmer's field, they clash.
00:19:31.360 And Mosby's got three companies, and they basically lure them into a trap.
00:19:38.560 And as Mosby's men feign a retreat off the field, Blazer's men who are about to dismount are about to then remount their horses and then pursue.
00:19:51.040 And at that point, a massive, they are enveloped by Mosby's men, and they are in a open field, which is a, it's a giant gun battle on horseback in this forgotten field in Meyerstown in West Virginia.
00:20:07.300 And it's one of the great untold stories of the Civil War.
00:20:10.180 This field, for instance, is now going to be a solar panel farm.
00:20:14.980 They've never done an archaeological survey.
00:20:16.900 They've never marked it.
00:20:19.900 Pretty much one of the only places it's ever been written about is the Unvanquished.
00:20:24.280 But it's here that the leader of Blazer's scouts is running for his life along with these Jesse scouts.
00:20:32.180 Many of these guys are dressed in Confederate uniforms, and they are pursued in a massive horse race by about 30 or 40 of Mosby's men on horseback with their old pistols that bring them, eventually capture Blazer.
00:20:46.120 And what's important about the story is that the man that captures Blazer, one of them, is Lewis Powell, who is John Booth, John Wilkes Booth's co-conspirator.
00:20:57.900 And what makes this important is that he is a member of the Confederate Secret Service.
00:21:03.860 And the Unvanquished puts together a lot of, connects many, many dots on the assassination and the important thing being the kidnapping of the president.
00:21:14.840 And I tell a story there.
00:21:18.040 The kidnapping, the kidnapping that didn't take place, they tried.
00:21:21.680 Jesse scouts is named after one of my favorite characters in American history, Jesse Benton Fremont, who was General Fremont's, the great pathfinder, his wife, who was a hammer, right?
00:21:37.340 One of the greatest women in American history.
00:21:39.260 Talk to me about the Christmas episode.
00:21:42.580 Well, I mean, in a sense that there are multiple things that take place, the first being in 1862, which I bring into focus in the Unvanquished, is the Great Battle of Fredericksburg, Steve, which is a tremendous tragedy.
00:22:03.500 That, you know, they're hoping to end the war by Christmas and seize Richmond.
00:22:10.320 And, you know, Burnside, General Burnside, who has a bridge named after him in Antietam because it was a bloody affair there, has one of the most, you know, brutal and devastating battles of the American Civil War.
00:22:23.940 Well, hang on. We talked about Washington in the previous, that the Christmas Day of Trenton came about because he was under such pressure.
00:22:33.660 He had to think of something outside the box and said, let's attack them on Christmas night when they're all going to be drunk and eating, you know, and celebrating Christmas.
00:22:40.820 These German, you know, Christians will be taking the day off. 1.00
00:22:46.240 We got attacked. The same thing happened really in Fredericksburg in that Antietam, although it was a draw, Lincoln was under pressure, like, dude, you are, this thing is a disaster.
00:22:58.300 This is a fiasco. The Southern Army is winning the Times, the Illustrated Times of London.
00:23:03.180 Every time you pick up the, it's like the Daily Mail today, right, on the Internet.
00:23:07.740 You pick up a thing, it's got a picture of Stonewall Jackson or Robert E. Lee on the cover.
00:23:12.280 All the European capitals are going, hey, this Confederate Army is probably, pound for pound, the best army we've ever seen.
00:23:19.320 Lincoln is under tremendous pressure by the governors, by Congress, by everybody who said, you've got to start booking some wins here, right?
00:23:26.820 And so that's why they do something that everybody argues against.
00:23:30.120 You cannot go down and leave Washington on a direct line to Richmond as entrenched as the Confederate Army is with the type of leaders they have and try to cross a river at Fredericksburg and try to beat the Confederate Army.
00:23:44.980 I mean, it's a suicide attack, is it not?
00:23:46.960 Well, the biggest problem was they sort of telegraph where they're going to go, and oh, by the way, the pontoons that they need to use to span the Rappahannock, they don't show up for eight to ten days.
00:24:00.220 And then they dither away until December 11th, where they finally decide to put the pontoons together and cross, and then Confederate sharp shooters and snipers are pelting them.
00:24:14.380 They delay them again, and it's not until really the 13th of December that they make the attack.
00:24:20.520 Meanwhile, Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, they have time to build up their defenses, and they have really one of the greatest defenses in the Civil War, which is behind a stone wall on a sunken road at Mary's Heights, which, oh, by the way, is really just a diversionary attack.
00:24:42.760 The main effort being at a place called Prospect Hill, which is five miles down the line.
00:24:47.620 But it's an absolute fiasco, especially the diversionary attack, which consumes about 16 brigades.
00:24:58.260 30,000 men attempt to storm the stone wall and are basically annihilated in one way or another by the rifled musket, which can now reach out and touch you, and there's no cover at all before that stone wall.
00:25:17.120 In fact, the Confederate Army, I mean, even members of the Confederate Army, when the Irish Brigade and others attacked over that open field, were saying, this is not even war.
00:25:29.260 This is just a slaughter pen.
00:25:31.020 It was, of all the bloody, I mean, you had so much blood spilled to that time at Shiloh and other places.
00:25:37.620 People considered it Fredericksburg.
00:25:38.800 One of the reasons it's not talked about is that Lincoln and his team did not want the northern media to cover it because it was the type of thing that people would throw in the towel right after that.
00:25:48.620 Is that not correct?
00:25:49.380 It's true.
00:25:51.000 I mean, and then it's just, it's a victory for the, I mean, the south holds, they have a, they do it on the cheap effectively in the sense that anything that went up against that stone wall was like eight to one odds that, you know, the men that were valiantly storming that wall, but they were, they were slaughtered, as you mentioned, in front of that field, which has no ground.
00:26:12.700 There's a, there's a small swale where many of the men were hunkered down behind, but there's really very little cover.
00:26:19.900 And then you have the guns.
00:26:21.660 There are like, there's, there's Confederate artillery atop the hill itself that are firing down upon them, as well as the rifled muskets from behind the stone wall.
00:26:30.940 Many of the, if you read the memoirs of the, of the, the leaders of the Union Army, and I'm talking about not the senior leaders, but the, the combat leaders, the colonels, the majors, the captains after the war, that was one of the hardest nights after that attack, because they said the, the, it felt like the earth was moaning.
00:26:51.320 There were so many wounded soldiers out there, so bitter cold, uh, they couldn't go get them, uh, that it was just a horrible night to hear the agony of these soldiers before they died.
00:27:00.920 And it left, it really burnt into the soul of the Union Army, uh, exactly what a catastrophe this was.
00:27:07.920 It was, it was a memory that just seared into the, the soul of the Union Army.
00:27:11.780 It looked like a total, just waste of manpower.
00:27:13.660 Like you said, up near that stone wall, I think it was eight to one casualty ratio.
00:27:18.340 But it shows you, once again, the, um, during some of the, the holiest times of our, you know, Christian calendar, and during the times of, uh, when people think of families, we had some of the most horrible, horrific, uh, combat.
00:27:30.580 Let's take a short break.
00:27:32.060 We're going to get in, uh, you've got, uh, in your book, Unvanquished.
00:27:35.900 I can't recommend enough, uh, the Jesse Scouts, this whole story of, uh, really, America's real, the beginning of the special forces of the United States.
00:27:45.360 And for, for, for folks like, if you're like me from the South and you've read about Mosby's Rangers, uh, in, uh, Colonel John Mosby, this is a different take on things.
00:27:55.040 It's really, uh, very, very enlightening.
00:27:56.740 The Unvanquished from Patrick K. O'Donnell.
00:27:59.440 Uh, the Battle of the Bulge and Chosun Reservoir.
00:28:03.160 I mean, think about the horrible fighting that's gone over the Christmas season.
00:28:06.480 Next, we're going to go to World War II and the Korean War with Patrick K. O'Donnell.
00:28:10.660 Short break.
00:28:11.100 Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel.
00:28:39.440 Okay, welcome back.
00:28:47.680 We're now going to go to the 20th century.
00:28:50.280 Shows you the spans of pretty big part of time.
00:28:53.520 20th century, we're going to go to, uh, which really happened six years apart, which I don't think people make that much connections between the Battle of the Bulge and Chosun Reservoir.
00:29:03.500 Uh, World War II, uh, towards the last year of World War II and the first year of the Korean conflict.
00:29:10.280 Uh, let's go first off to the Battle of the Bulge.
00:29:12.620 One of the most famous Biles. 0.81
00:29:13.900 What it's known for is really the holding of Bastogne by the 101st Airborne, Moe's, uh, Moe's Division.
00:29:21.360 Uh, historic.
00:29:22.400 Really made them legendary.
00:29:23.780 But it starts off with really the 82nd Airborne.
00:29:26.440 Let's see if we can get it all in in about eight minutes.
00:29:28.860 Uh, Patrick K. O'Donnell.
00:29:30.140 You wrote a great, the book on this.
00:29:31.560 You wrote an amazing book on this.
00:29:32.860 What's the title of it?
00:29:35.140 The title of that book is, um, is Beyond Valor.
00:29:38.660 That, that really is the oral history of the Rangers and the Airborne in, in World War II.
00:29:44.240 I started out with another book called Dog Company, though, that fights in the Hurricane Forest at Hill 400.
00:29:49.660 And they oversee sort of the assembly areas, uh, and see what's going on.
00:29:54.640 It's an epic battle.
00:29:55.700 It's a bayonet charge up a hill.
00:29:57.320 And they have to hold the hill against all odds for three days, which they do.
00:30:01.080 One reason I want people, one reason I want people, I want people to, I want people to understand this is that at this time towards, when we're delivering the hammer blows to Germany and we're trying to cross the Rhine and try and get to the heart of Germany, just we're pouring troops in.
00:30:17.780 And these troops are very ill-trained.
00:30:20.340 In fact, correct me if I'm wrong.
00:30:22.160 I think the biggest surrender wasn't an entire regiment that like surrendered virtually unharmed because just the leadership kind of collapsed.
00:30:29.120 Because the intensity of what happened at the bulge and a lot of this was just from green troops that had 90, basically 90 days of kind of some de minimis training.
00:30:38.280 And they were just, they were just pouring troops in here right now because it was a slugfest between the Americans and the Germans on the Western Front.
00:30:44.500 Well, what's going on here is it's, it's December 1944 and it's, there's a, there's some people to believe that the war can be won by Christmas.
00:30:56.460 Germans are in full defeat.
00:30:58.300 They're, they're, they're streaming back across the Rhine and they're advancing, but there's, there's problems with the allies.
00:31:05.540 They have supply problems, for instance, they're not able to pursue as quickly as they possibly can.
00:31:09.260 But Hitler has other plans. 0.90
00:31:11.480 It's a bold counter-offensive to somehow split the allies.
00:31:16.760 And he attacks in the quiet front, which is the Ardennes.
00:31:21.600 And this is where in 1940 to attack France, this is where Hitler makes his bold gamble. 0.82
00:31:28.140 And they go through the Ardennes and they, they split the French army here.
00:31:33.360 And it's, he thinks that he, history can repeat itself and they strip many of the finest units, the Waffen SS, paratroopers and others from the Eastern Front.
00:31:43.040 And they secretly assemble them in front of the Ardennes force.
00:31:48.920 And they, you know, they, they realize that they, they suspect that the allies have cracked some of their codes and they, they insist that all communications have to be done in paper.
00:31:58.940 And much of the preparations is as stealthful as possible.
00:32:02.600 And then the allies make it a little bit worse because for instance, the OSS, the Office of Strategic Services is stripped from some of these frontline armies.
00:32:13.300 And so their eyes and ears are gone.
00:32:14.900 And it's December 16th, the morning hours of December 16th, and a massive juggernaut of the German army led by the Waffen SS and the first Panther army basically descends upon the, the sleepy Ardennes.
00:32:32.340 And it's here that they have an overwhelming surprise.
00:32:36.520 The weather is not cooperating with the allies and it's, it's wintry initially.
00:32:42.560 And this grounds many of the, the allies' greatest asset, which is the air power.
00:32:48.520 They're able to, the Yabos, they call the Germans, the fighter bombers that can strafe armor columns are basically put on hold because of the weather.
00:32:57.280 And the, and the Germans are able to pursue an attack.
00:33:00.900 And their goal is to reach the river crossing, the Meuse River, and then push on to Antwerp.
00:33:07.880 And then thereby, that's the, that's the goal to divide the allies between the, the British and the Americans.
00:33:13.300 And they have stunning initial momentum and many units surrender.
00:33:20.520 But then there are small groups of men that hold out and they stop the SS.
00:33:27.060 And the, the only real reserve that the allies have of quantity is the 18th, 18th Airborne Corps.
00:33:35.900 And it's the airborne, the, the 82nd, the 101st, and then later the 17th Airborne, which will be thrust into this, you know, vortex of battle.
00:33:46.580 So, as the, the Waffen-SS is, is quickly advancing towards these bridges, small groups of men like the engineers, combat engineers, mine bridges or destroy, you know, trees to block their advance.
00:34:02.060 But they're still moving forward at, at great speed.
00:34:05.660 You know, within this battle space is, um, the SS or, uh, specifically special units within the German Armed Forces are disguised as, as Americans, uh, speaking American, changing roadsides, you know, creating mass confusion.
00:34:22.840 Um, and it's, it's, it's here that the 82nd finds itself first, they're, they, they move into a place called Warbemont around December, uh, 19th or so.
00:34:34.060 And they are, they're quickly moving towards where the SS are trying to cross, uh, several rivers to get towards the Meas River.
00:34:43.480 And, um, they're near a place called Trapong.
00:34:46.780 And, um, another place, um, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh.
00:34:52.840 that, that is just, it's just swarming with SS troops. I mean, one of my favorite stories is
00:34:59.400 with the 504 Parachute Infantry Regiment led by Reuben Tucker. And these guys are the guys that
00:35:05.220 went after the Nijmegen Bridge, in a bridge too far. They are tasked with, with, with clearing
00:35:12.960 out Cheneau, which is a town that is swarming with SS. And they have dismounted, there's armor,
00:35:21.760 you know, there's, there's Panther tanks, they have flak guns and all kinds of stuff.
00:35:25.900 They're waiting for tank destroyers to attack. These guys say it's too dangerous. They're waiting
00:35:31.740 for a, you know, artillery barrage to support the attack. They don't get any of that and they attack
00:35:37.760 anyways. And these men take out several of the SS. They slow down the SS advance, which is absolutely
00:35:46.380 critical. And then they position themselves in and around this territory. And it's, it's hand-to-hand
00:35:53.100 combat with some of Germany's toughest troops. And, um, you know, they eventually, there are massive
00:36:01.280 reinforcements that are coming in from the Germans and they are, there's a decision that's made to pull
00:36:07.460 back the 82nd by British General Montgomery, who's in charge of the Northern shoulder at this stage
00:36:16.360 to shorten the line and to tidy it up, so to speak, which is probably a good decision because
00:36:23.080 many of these German units could have surrounded, uh, elements of the 7th, uh, armor division and
00:36:29.940 others, uh, as well as the 82nd, uh, which were still holding the line, which are really a critical
00:36:36.140 role. And it's at this time, the 101st comes in and they, um, move into position at a place called
00:36:44.400 Bastogne, which is a, a crossroads town where multiple, it's called a road octopus because there's
00:36:49.880 so many crossroads, critical roads that are, that, you know, that, that span out from it. And, uh, they're
00:36:57.000 joined by elements of, uh, tank destroyers and armor. And they, um, they basically have to hold the line
00:37:05.960 at Bastogne and after the 82nd basically stabilizes things and they, the Germans realize that they're 0.75
00:37:15.220 not going to be able to reach the Meuse river. They then focus their attention on, on Bastogne
00:37:21.180 itself. And it's the 101st and then many of these other smaller units that make an epic stand.
00:37:27.280 And, uh, you know, at this point also, this is the, this is the, this is the, yeah, this is the
00:37:33.100 famous one where Patton's Patton's army, the third army comes racing what in 72 hours or 90 hours to
00:37:39.580 save the, it's like Fort Apache. They, they, they're at Bastogne and to completely surrounded,
00:37:43.840 outnumbered, getting shelled, bombed in Patton's army hurdles across, uh, really, uh, really that,
00:37:50.800 that part of, uh, Germany to, to, to relieve the 101st of Bastogne, correct? Correct. And
00:37:57.280 uh, I mean, uh, it, it's worth pointing out that paratroopers are always surrounded. So this is not
00:38:05.300 anything new for them in many cases. And, um, and they were willing to hold out, but, uh, it, it was
00:38:12.380 a welcome sign when, when Patton's troops do break the siege, they were being air supplied, uh, at this
00:38:18.200 time. And they were really holding their own too. It's worth noting, uh, along with the other elements
00:38:23.420 of tank destroyers in armor and other sort of cats and dogs that were in, uh, Bastogne. They were
00:38:30.100 holding these sort of the villages that were around Bastogne. The Germans, the Germans didn't want to 0.88
00:38:37.980 figure they weren't going to, didn't want to annihilate these guys. So they gave them an
00:38:42.540 opportunity to surrender. And I think it was the general that sent back a, uh, a, at least in history,
00:38:48.220 it's passed down as saying nuts about an unconditional surrender, but, uh, the lore has it. He might've
00:38:54.560 used a more spicy term to inform the Germans that the 101st are going to fight. We're a standard
00:39:00.380 fight. I, um, I interviewed hundreds of paratroopers and Rangers that were in as well as their opponents
00:39:08.940 too. I'll put that up, point that out. The SS interviewed the SS and German paratroopers,
00:39:13.400 but I interviewed general Kennard, who is, uh, Henry Kennard, who was there right next to Anthony
00:39:20.320 McAuliffe, who's the assistant division commander who was in charge of the 101st at the time.
00:39:25.640 And, um, his response is there was something to the effect that, uh, a word I won't use on the air,
00:39:32.000 but the official response was one word nuts. And they send it back to the Germans who are befuddled 1.00
00:39:39.620 by this because they have an overwhelming force that has surrounded Bastogne. Because what happened
00:39:46.040 is as the, you know, SS attack up North collapses, many of those units are then sent down towards
00:39:53.480 Bastogne to crush Bastogne. Hitler wants a, uh, a moral victory of, of destroying, uh, Bastogne and 0.84
00:40:01.900 the 101st in it, and as well as the other units.
00:40:04.220 People have to remember that with Normandy and the landing in June of that year,
00:40:10.680 there was a huge effort because the American people, people were getting tired of this war
00:40:13.780 and the casualties were mounting. There's a big pressure to end the war by Christmas,
00:40:18.460 the Christmas of 1944. In fact, if you've seen a bridge too far, that whole, uh, that whole effort
00:40:24.200 of Market Garden to take those bridges in, uh, in Holland, uh, and get to the Rhine quickly was all
00:40:30.180 targeted to end the war by Christmas. And of course that wasn't going to happen. And you saw the
00:40:34.420 Christmas, the Christmas season fighting at Bastogne. People realize that the Germans, 0.68
00:40:39.500 although they're tied up on the Eastern front and getting bombed every day, that the Wehrmacht had a
00:40:43.720 lot of fight left in them, uh, Patrick, people realized this was going to be tough. And of course,
00:40:47.600 we finished it in May of the following year, but folks realized that this is going to be tough every day.
00:40:52.460 The Battle of the Bulge lasts almost a month, Steve. It, it, it goes well into the second week
00:40:58.760 of January and it's one of the bloodiest battles for, for America in World War II. It's, it's a,
00:41:05.880 a tremendous 19,000, uh, killed, um, you know, nearly over 85,000 casualties total. It's a,
00:41:15.500 it's an incredible battle, um, of, that was very tenacious and ruthless. And then it's also the
00:41:22.120 cold, the cold weather. Uh, many of the men are not properly equipped to deal with the cold weather.
00:41:27.860 And, and almost all of the veterans I interviewed had frostbite either in their, their, you know,
00:41:33.440 their hands or their feet from, from battling in the Battle of the Bulge.
00:41:40.200 Amazing. Incredible. Uh, that book again is what I want to make sure people get access to. Give me
00:41:44.900 your books on the, uh, that book is, uh, on the Bulge. It's Beyond Valor. It's an oral history of the
00:41:50.420 men that I interviewed as well as a bit of a narrative history. It ties all the, the stories
00:41:55.800 of the Bulge. And then Dog Company is a band of brothers on Dog Company, 2nd Ranger Battalion,
00:42:01.120 the boys of Pointe d'Haw and, uh, their story all the way through the liberation of Europe.
00:42:08.000 We're going to put them all up and get them all out. Hang on one second. We're going to come back.
00:42:11.880 We've got the Chosin Reservoir to finish up Christmas Day here, or Christmas morning,
00:42:16.560 actually, in the war room. Back in a moment.
00:42:38.440 Okay. Welcome back. Christmas morning. I want to thank you for being with us on our traditional
00:42:42.860 combat history of Christmas done to show the American sacrifice during this, uh, you know,
00:42:48.920 most family-oriented, holiest of seasons. Patrick K. O'Donnell, your book, Give Me Tomorrow,
00:42:55.060 the Chosin Reservoir, the Marines, and, and Army Elements, but man, is one of the most moving. Of
00:43:00.340 all your books, it's the one that I think often sticks with you the longest, just given the suffering.
00:43:06.140 And, and honestly, the lack of preparation these troops had, it's just incredible. The lack of
00:43:11.100 material, the lack of clothes, the weapons, it's horrific. Talk to me about Christmas 1950
00:43:18.080 in the, uh, in the Chosin Reservoir, sir.
00:43:23.220 Um, all the books I've ever written have found me. This one is a classic. I got back from Iraq
00:43:28.040 and I was alone. I told my family not to show up. I just didn't want to, I had a lot to deal with
00:43:33.860 pollution and everything else. And these old men, uh, came up to me and said, well, who are you? And I
00:43:40.060 said, who I was a combat historian. He said, we were George company three, one in the Chosin
00:43:45.020 Reservoir. And we held a hill against a Chinese regiment of about 2000 men. And this is the company
00:43:51.860 of 200. And the next thing I know, they're like, would you like to go to lunch? I said, sure.
00:43:57.660 You need to come to our reunion. And I said, no problem. And the next thing I know, I've got
00:44:02.480 a book that, uh, give me tomorrow, which is really a band of brothers on the Korean war,
00:44:08.940 which is an untold story until this time. It was an epic one. And it's Christmas 1950, Steve. And
00:44:17.620 the first Marine division is in near the Chosin Reservoir in North Korea. It's not far from the
00:44:26.380 Chinese border. And they, the Marines know that the Chinese are active and around them. And, um,
00:44:34.960 you know, the last weeks of, of around Thanksgiving, the, um, the Chinese army of 120,000 or more
00:44:44.760 of Mao Zedong's so-called volunteers, uh, descend upon elements of the first Marine division. And it's,
00:44:53.040 it's, it's really one of the greatest stories of the Marine Corps of how the Marine first Marine
00:44:58.660 division, um, is surrounded. And as they like to say, they were advancing in a different direction.
00:45:04.620 And they basically, in many cases, they really tear up the Chinese forces that overwhelmingly, 0.74
00:45:11.680 uh, they have all the, uh, odds on their side. I mean, they're in some cases it's a 10 or 20 to one
00:45:18.560 advantage of numbers that the, um,
00:45:23.040 the Marines are facing and the men of George company really have a truly, uh, epic story.
00:45:29.660 They're under the command. Uh, initially they were one of the units that was under Chesty Polar
00:45:34.880 at a, at a small mountain top type, uh, small hamlet called Coterie. And the main, uh,
00:45:43.120 first Marine division base was in a place called Hagerie, which was several miles down a road,
00:45:48.700 which it was a valley. And the, the Chinese had a division of troops on the heights of that valley.
00:45:56.000 And they had to go down the road and something called task force Drysdale was organized by Chesty
00:46:01.820 Polar. And the, uh, task force commander was a Royal Marine by the name of a Royal Marine commando
00:46:08.440 by the name of Drysdale and the George company, along with a company of tanks were put in the front
00:46:14.960 of this long column of trucks as they had to break into Hagerie. And they were faced immediately
00:46:23.340 by thousands of troops that were trying to destroy the task force as it was moving up the road.
00:46:31.480 And it was a, uh, against all odds kind of battle that these reinforcements were absolutely critical
00:46:39.380 to holding Hagerie. And the reason why that is important is because this is the consolidation
00:46:44.440 point where all of the wings of the first Marine division, as well as army elements will consolidate
00:46:51.140 and move towards the coast towards safety. And they had to break in to Hagerie. And it's up this
00:46:58.540 long road called Hellfire Valley that, you know, it's 20, 30 degrees below zero, Steve, the windchill
00:47:07.480 makes it such the men are, you know, not properly clothed, just like the battle of bulge.
00:47:13.560 And they are fighting for their lives. My first, my main, uh, the main character in my book
00:47:19.460 is a tough Vermont, uh, New Hampshire native named Rocco Zulu, Sergeant Rocco Zulu, who was a,
00:47:26.980 you know, a star, he went a silver star at Pella 1. He had to train these men, which had no training
00:47:33.520 at all. They were reservists. Many of the men in the book, it's, it's shocks many people. They'd
00:47:38.840 never gone through bootcamp as Marines. They were just reservists. They therefore did not receive
00:47:44.180 bootcamp training. And they literally had to look to learn how to fire M1 Garands and throw grenades 0.53
00:47:50.560 on the ships as they were going towards first Inchon where they have the great counter-offensive
00:47:55.880 that turns the tide against the North Koreans. And then later at Chosen Reservoir, but these men come 0.97
00:48:01.720 together and really have an amazing, uh, fighting unit. It's Rocco Zulu. That's on a 50 caliber machine
00:48:07.960 gun on a truck as they move towards Hagrid and, um, they come across the tent that is there. They
00:48:17.480 think, uh, they're greeted by friendly Americans. It's actually Chinese soldiers that are dressed in
00:48:22.820 American uniforms and they, um, fire upon Zulu and he gets around in the chest. I'll never forget. I I'm 0.97
00:48:30.700 interviewing him is it is place in New Hampshire and he pulls up his shirt. He's like, yeah, it's the
00:48:35.600 myring screen. His whole chest side of his, his, his torso was blown out by the rifle bullet.
00:48:43.340 And they believed that their leader was dead. And he put them on a pile of dead bodies.
00:48:48.200 We've got, we've, we've got to, we've got to bounce. Uh, but where do people go get the book?
00:48:55.280 Amazon.com. I'm on, uh, X and get her at, at combat historian. The book's a bestseller. You can get
00:49:02.940 it anywhere at Barnes and Noble, um, or, or, or, uh, any bookstore pretty much. And my website is
00:49:10.240 they go by, they go by these troops and they ask this young guy what he wants for Christmas. And
00:49:17.020 what is his answer? To give me tomorrow. And that's the photo on the, it's one of George,
00:49:23.380 the members of George company, famous photo taken by David Duncan. And, uh, he gave me permission to
00:49:30.600 use it for the cover of this book. It's, it tells, it's a photo that's just, they captured the entire
00:49:36.860 chosen reservoir. What do you want for Christmas? All those troops. Give me, give me tomorrow.
00:49:44.180 Patrick K. O'Donnell, Merry Christmas. Thank you very much. Merry Christmas, Patrick K. O'Donnell.
00:49:52.260 Appreciate you doing it. Appreciate you doing it, sir. Thank you. And for the war room posse,
00:49:57.100 have a great rest of the Christmas day. Enjoy it with your family. And, uh, we'll see you back here.
00:50:02.960 Raheem will be here tomorrow on Boxing Day. I'll be back on Saturday. See you then.
00:50:07.720 pandemic, you'll be back on Saturday.
00:50:10.100 Come on, and you'll be back on Sunday.