Editing Battle of Monte Cassino (section)

===Battle===
[[File:Goumier001.jpg|thumb|upright|Moroccan Goumier]]
The first assault (11–12 May) on Cassino opened at 23:00 with a massive artillery bombardment with 1,060 guns on the Eighth Army front and 600 guns on the Fifth Army front, manned by British, Americans, Poles, New Zealanders, South Africans, and French.<ref>{{harvnb|Gooderson|2003|p=103}}</ref> Within an hour and a half, the attack was in motion in all four sectors. By daylight, the U.S. II Corps had made little progress, but their Fifth Army colleagues, the French Expeditionary Corps, had achieved their objectives and were fanning out in the Aurunci Mountains towards the Eighth Army to their right, rolling up the German positions between the two armies. On the Eighth Army front, the British XIII Corps had made two strongly opposed crossings of the Garigliano (by the [[4th Infantry Division (United Kingdom)|British 4th Infantry Division]] and the [[8th Infantry Division (India)|8th Indian Division]]). Crucially, the engineers of [[Dudley Russell]]'s 8th Indian Division had by the morning succeeded in bridging the river, enabling the armour of the [[1st Canadian Armoured Brigade]] to cross and provide the vital element (so missed by the Americans in the first battle and the New Zealanders in the second battle) to beat off the inevitable counterattacks from German tanks that would come.
[[File:The Campaign in Italy, May 1944 TR1800.jpg|thumb|left|A British soldier with a Bren gun in the ruins of Monte Cassino]]

In the mountains above Cassino, Mount Calvary (''Monte Calvario'', or Point 593 on Snakeshead Ridge) was taken by the Polish 2nd Corps, under the command of General Władysław Anders, only to be recaptured by German paratroopers.<ref>{{harvnb|Parker|2004|p=307}}</ref> For three days, Polish attacks and German counterattacks brought heavy losses to both sides. The Polish II Corps lost 281 officers and 3,503 other ranks in assaults on ''[[Oberst]]'' [[Ludwig Heilmann]]'s 4th Parachute Regiment until the attacks were called off.<ref name="Whiting, p. 123">{{harvnb|Whiting|1974|p=123}}</ref> "Just eight hundred Germans had succeeded in driving off attacks by two divisions,"<ref>{{harvnb|Parker|2004|p=308}}</ref> the area around the mountain having turned into a "miniature [[Battle of Verdun|Verdun]]".{{citation needed|date=August 2012}} In the early morning hours of 12 May, the Polish infantry divisions were met with "such devastating mortar, artillery and small-arms fire that the leading battalions were all but wiped out".<ref>Olson, p. 311</ref>

By the afternoon of 12 May, the Gari bridgeheads were increasing despite furious counterattacks, while attrition on the coast and in the mountains continued. By 13 May the pressure was starting to tell. The German right wing began to give way to the Fifth Army. The French Corps had captured [[Monte Maio]] and were now in a position to give material flank assistance to the Eighth Army in the Liri Valley, against whom Kesselring had thrown every available reserve in order to buy time to switch to his second prepared defensive position, the [[Hitler Line]], some {{convert|8|mi}} to the rear. On 14 May Moroccan [[Goumier]]s, travelling through the mountains parallel to the Liri valley on ground that was undefended because it was not thought possible to traverse such terrain, outflanked the German defence while materially assisting the XIII Corps in the valley. In 1943, the Goumiers were [[colonial troops]] formed into four ''Groupements des Tabors Marocains'' ("Groups of Moroccan Tabors"; GTM), each consisting of three loosely organised Tabors (roughly equivalent to a battalion) that specialised in [[mountain warfare]]. Juin's French Expeditionary Corps consisted of General [[Augustin Guillaume]]'s ''Commandement des Goumiers Marocains'' (CGM) (with the 1st, 3rd, and 4th GTM)<ref name="FECOrbat">{{cite web|title=The French Expeditionary Corps in Italy: Order of battle|work=Steven's Balagan website |first=Steven |last=Thomas |date=7 June 2003 |url=http://www.balagan.org.uk/war/ww2/france/cef/orbat.htm |access-date=21 February 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120126080431/http://balagan.org.uk/war/ww2/france/cef/orbat.htm |archive-date=26 January 2012 }}</ref> totaling around 7,800 fighting men,<ref>{{harvnb|Blaxland|1979|p=83}}</ref> roughly the same infantry strength as a division, and four more conventional divisions: the [[2nd Moroccan Infantry Division]] (2 DIM), the [[3rd Algerian Infantry Division]] (3 DIA), the [[4th Moroccan Mountain Division]] (4 DMM) and the [[1st Free French Division]] (1 DM).<ref name="FECOrbat"/>

Clark also paid tribute to the Goumiers and the Moroccan regulars of the Tirailleur units:
{{blockquote|In spite of the stiffening enemy resistance, the 2nd Moroccan Division penetrated the Gustave {{sic}} Line in less than two-day's {{sic}} fighting. The next 48 hours on the French front were decisive. The knife-wielding Goumiers swarmed over the hills, particularly at night and General Juin's entire force showed an aggressiveness hour after hour that the Germans could not withstand. Cerasola, [[San Giorgio a Liri|San Giorgio]], Mt. D'Oro, [[Ausonia, Lazio|Ausonia]] and [[Esperia]] were seized in one of the most brilliant and daring advances of the war in Italy&nbsp;... For this performance, which was to be a key to the success of the entire drive on Rome, I shall always be a grateful admirer of General Juin and his magnificent FEC.}}

On 15 May, the British 78th Division, with an attached armoured brigade under command, came into the British XIII Corps line from reserve, passing through the British 4th Infantry Division's bridgehead to execute the turning move to isolate Cassino from the Liri valley.<ref>{{cite book|first=Cyril|last=Ray|title=Algiers to Austria. A history of 78 Division in the Second World War|publisher=Naval & Military Press|location=Uckfield, UK|year=2014|page=124|orig-year=1st. pub. Eyre & Spottiswoode: 1952|isbn=978-1-78331-026-5|name-list-style=amp}}</ref>

On 17 May, General Anders led the Polish II Corps in launching their second attack on Monte Cassino. Under constant artillery and mortar fire from the strongly fortified German positions and with little natural cover for protection, the fighting was fierce and at times hand-to-hand. With their line of supply threatened by the Allied advance in the Liri valley, the Germans decided to withdraw from the Cassino Heights to the new defensive positions on the Hitler Line.<ref name="Molony133"/> In the early hours of 18 May, the British 78th Division and Polish II Corps linked up in the Liri valley, {{convert|2|mi|km}} west of Cassino town. On the Cassino high ground, the survivors of the second Polish offensive were so battered that "it took some time to find men with enough strength to climb the few hundred yards to the summit."<ref name="Olson312">{{harvnb|Olson|Cloud|2003|p=312}}</ref> A patrol of the [[12th Podolian Uhlan Regiment|Polish 12th Podolian Cavalry Regiment]] finally made it to the heights and raised a Polish flag over the ruins.<ref name="Molony133">Molony, Vol. VI, p. 133.</ref> The only remnants of the defenders were a group of thirty<ref name="Molony133"/> German wounded who had been unable to move.

<gallery class="center" widths="250px" heights="200px">
File:Monte Cassino transport.jpg|Polish soldiers carry ammunition to the front lines just before the capture of the abbey
File:Polish Bugler Monte Cassino.jpg|{{ill|Emil Czech|pl}}, a Polish bugler, plays the [[Hejnał mariacki]], announcing the victory
File:Monte Cassino.jpg|Ruins of the town of [[Cassino]] after the battle
</gallery>