Winter Line

Clark made it clear to Frederick that he was especially pleased at the arrival of the force, which he knew was a unit trained to do anything from making a ski assault to dropping by parachute on the enemy's rear.

His plan was to use the force to enable the Fifth Army to move the Germans off the Camino Hill Mass and puncture Hitler's winter line, which was a series of well-fortified mountain strongholds created for the purpose of making it impossible for Allied forces to pass through the rugged mountainous territory.

The German winter line ran from the Gulf of Gaeta, just north of the Garagleno River, to the great granite blocks of Monte Camino and Monte Simocro that stand like watchtowers blocking the approaches to Casino, and on yet through more mountainous terrain toward the Sangro River.

In easy-to-understand words, the German winter line ran west to east across the middle of Italy, about 100 miles south of Rome, and there was only one highway up which the Allies could move supplies, and that was Route 6.

Whoever held Route 6 held Italy, and the Germans were well dug in with concrete-fortified mountain batteries that were considered impregnable, batteries that looked down over the valleys where any attacker would have to cross to attack them.

The force was tasked with taking two heavily fortified German positions in the Italian mountains, one at Monte La Defensa and the other at Monte La Remetania.

These positions were controlled by the 104th Panzer Grenadier Regiment with the 1st Fallschirm-Panzer Division Hermann Göring in reserve.

The importance of these mountains lay in their position relative to Hitler's Gustav line.