DATELINE: ArenaCon December 7, 2002:

Today, a small detachment of armor and infantry engaged the Germans in the crossroads village of Gronnard. In the desperate battle, the allies sustained heavy casualties and had to withdraw from the village. From what this reporter has learned, the American forces were after some secret documents apparently left behind by Wehrmacht forces during their withdrawal. What the documents contained hasn't been revealed, but the Germans apparently wanted them badly enough to come back for them.

Early this morning, the Americans drove east along a country road to Gronnard. The infantry, riding in halftracks with support from Shermans, rolled into the center of town to the bombed out building that was Nazi headquarters for this sector. From the eastern edge of town the Germans came rolling in to contest its capture. The Americans attacked in two separate wings. The left wing came through some open fields on the edge of the village to flank the center of town. There two of the mighty Sherman tanks provided much needed support for two squads of infantry trying to rush up to take the headquarters building from behind. The other squad was attempting to deploy an anti-tank gun to fire down the center of one of the smaller lanes, into a field to the east where the Germans were deploying armor and troops.

The Nazi forces were also coming down the main road through Gronnard to drive off the advancing Americans and recover the missing papers. Jerry deployed well on both sides of the road. He also set up a pair of mortar batteries and an anti tank gun covering the road. This mirrored a similar deployment by U.S. forces with another anti tank gun and a pair of 60mm mortars firing down the center of town. An advance scouting party of three jeeps, one of which carried a .30 caliber machine gun team, came roaring through the center of the village and stopped in front of the old HQ. There they burst through a German roadblock and took heavy machine-gun fire from an advancing German halftrack. Two of the jeeps were immediately disabled. They also took fire from the mortars and the anti tank gun at the eastern end of town. Within short order, both remaining jeeps were knocked out, taking heavy casualties in the process. One jeep remained with its .50 caliber anti aircraft MG.

The Germans ran up to the HQ with their halftrack and reached the building with dead and wounded Americans lying just a few yards from the same goal. Two Americans survived, however, to man the .50 caliber MG and pepper the Kraut halftrack. They got into firing position too late to hit the vehicle loaded with German troops. The enemy troopers had entered the building and ran inside to seize their prize. The Americans continued chattering away until silenced by more MG fire from Germans on the far side of town.

Other U.S. troops began to assault the town. A bazooka team blew up a suspected enemy MG nest on the western side of the town near the jump off point. Another halftrack loaded with an American squad was destroyed by a PZ-IV just short of life saving cover. Two Shermans attempted to engage this tank and its supporting brother on the Western side. In the ensuing gun duel both Shermans were knocked out, one spectacularly exploding in a fireball and roar heard for some distance. To the south, Allied forces were having better luck. The anti tank gun managed to knock out the German's vaunted "88."

In an earlier attack, American tanks rolled up on the defensive hedgerow barrier burned clear of its trees and engaged two more panzers. The Germans were bold and good shots, managing to knock out one of the advancing Shermans. However, the other was hidden from sight by the naked mound on the opposite side of the road. As it became visible, a duel reminiscent of an Old West gunfight ensued. The Sherman took fire from the waiting panzer, but was undamaged and came on. The two metal behemoths faced off less than 60 yards apart and blazed away. The German tankers eventually managed to knock out this Sherman, as well. More infantry advanced with the bazooka team and got into position to take on the German tank.

On the Allied right flank, U.S. forces wound up successfully engaging two Pz IVs. The commander on the right flank, Steve Sandford, blasted a Nazi halftrack with an Easy 8 Sherman and M3 76mm anti tank gun, blowing off it's front wheel, rendering it immobile. This stopped the halftrack from attaining its goals. Steve was also in excellent form with his mortars, dropping his rounds right into the heart of a German Mortar pit and on top of a roadblocking MG-42 team.

Eventually the German infantry managed to make its way out of the HQ and head back on foot towards their own lines, not before being engaged by survivors from another halftrack, knocked out earlier in the fighting. The Germans were savaged by gunfire from the Americans, holed up in a small, ruined house next to the town church. The Americans pursued the retreating infantry, only to be cut down themselves by other German infantry and PZ IVs, who had also recently eliminated their tank support. The German infantrymen who survived eventually made it to cover, got on a spare 251 halftrack, and headed back toward their own lines.

It was a close run battle with the Germans barely ahead. Both sides were battered and bloody, with dead and wounded lying all across the battlefield that had once been a quiet French village. Had the battle continued a few more minutes the result would have been different. The Allies were closing on the right and had savaged the Whermacht forces there. The Germans had taken a pounding to retrieve their precious documents, as had the American forces that tried desperately to stop them. At the time of this writing, it is unknown whether or not the Allies will be continuing their assault on the Germans to capture these documents or not.