250 yards of snow-covered ground was only the first hurdle Easy Company had to overcome during the assault on Foy. An assault over open ground is not the favored way to take an objective, but it is what it is sometimes… and this was Easy Company; they specialized in completing hard, difficult, and not ideal missions.
13 January 1945
The company started at a good pace, enjoying the covering fire from two machine gun positions that were doing a great job keeping the enemy pinned down. A few soldiers were hit here and there, but the assault was moving forward at a good pace.
Until…
The company commander, Lieutenant Norman Dike, halted the assault. There was no apparent barrier or problem; he just stopped. Speculation is that he lost sight of Lt. Foley’s platoon, and rather than continue the assault and let them do their jobs, he halted the advance.
This left his men stranded on open ground, vulnerable to artillery, mortars, and sniper fire. Soon, those weapons began to take their toll on the men of Easy Company. The battalion commander, Captain Dick Winters, was demanding to speak to Dike; his subordinate leaders pressed him for orders; and men were falling on the battlefield. Dike was completely overwhelmed and unable to make a call…
Then he finally made a call — a dumb one. Take a platoon, move around the town’s perimeter, and attack the German positions from the rear. It probably made sense in his head, but the battle-hardened NCOs and platoon leaders knew it made no sense. A single platoon executing a flanking maneuver to move to the rear of the town would leave them exposed and cut off. It was a suicide mission.
They were all sitting ducks waiting on Dike to get the company moving again.
Enter Lt. Ronald Speirs.
“Speirs! Take over that company, relieve Dike, and take that attack on it!” — Captain Winters (the battalion commander) had had enough of Dike.
If you have seen the Band of Brothers series on HBO, then you know the scene that follows. Picture a rugged, fearless guy with sharp features sprinting through the smoke and gunfire, hopping over holes and walls, and finishing with a dramatic stop.
He grabs Lt. Dike by his lapels: “I’m taking over.”
In my mind, Speirs’ trot across the battlefield, under fire, is as iconic as Washington crossing the Delaware. A leader doing what leaders do… heading into the fight to fix a problem.
“Where’s Dike?”
The plight in the middle of the field at Foy was not the typical “fog of war” kind of thing where a leader loses their bearings and slows the assault to regain situational awareness. It was the culmination of months of no real leadership.
The battle-hardened men of Easy Company lost their legendary leader, Captain Winters, to a promotion to battalion staff, and it would be a tall order to find someone who could fill the void left by such a venerated leader. It would also be difficult to find a leader that could wrangle a company of soldiers who had survived Normandy, Carentan, Operation Market Garden, and Holland.
But, true to military form, a staff guy was selected so that he could gain combat experience to support his future command aspirations. No one had more of that than Easy. But instead of a leader, they got a bureaucrat. A staff guy who needed combat time to advance his career. He had no experience or concept of leading men in the field beyond his initial training.
One of the most common utterances by Easy Company during the Battle of Bastogne, other than “incoming” and “medic,” was “where’s Dike?” Dike was constantly and conveniently “pulled away” to the rear for “meetings” and “briefings.” The empty uniform “Foxhole Norman,” as he was known, never brought back information or guidance from his “meetings” which further casted doubt on his whereabouts while he was gone. Each day that passed and each “meeting” that was attended eroded the trust and respect from the men.
Without an engaged leader the men had lost some of their edge and were not quite the same unit that had assaulted Brecourt Manor and held the line in Holland. Easy had also lost some key leaders during their time in Bastogne, further exacerbating the problem of Dike and his ineptitude. All of the ingredients needed for mission failure were in place the morning of the assault on Foy.
Back to the Fight
Speirs lays down a couple of clear and concise goals and the men go to work.
But he doesn’t just show up and bark orders… Seeing the need to deconflict with and reestablish contact with the platoon on the flanking maneuver, he runs under fire to them, gives the message, and then runs back. The interesting and truly extraordinary thing about this is the additional detail that he didn’t just run under fire, but he ran through enemy lines as well.
Easy had their leader. Speirs would remain as the commander of Easy Company for the duration of the war.
Lessons:
Teams do not rise to the level of their aspirations, they fall to the effectiveness of the leadership:
Dike’s presence was an example of using a highly effective team to train a new leader. Instead of rising to the level of leader that was required to lead men like those of Easy company, he left a trail of destruction and eroded the effectiveness and combat power of the unit. Men died under his command that did not have to. His indecision and ineffectiveness were lethal.
This is a reality not limited to WWII, Easy Company, or the military.
Careerism and Team Culture:
This is not an example of friction between the veteran soldiers and a new leader with a different leadership style than they were used to. It wasn’t that Dike wasn’t “hardcore” enough for the veterans of Easy… it was that he was inept and absent. He was simply filling a role and marking the days until he was moved up to the next rung in his career ladder. He was qualified for the role… but he was not suited for it. To be fair, the reality of the situation was that there were no other options for Easy, all of the other officers were assigned and committed.
Perhaps Dike wasn’t just an inept bumbling fool. What if he was simply a bad fit for Easy? Nothing will take away the fact that Dike’s indecision got men killed, but should he have even been placed in that position in the first place? By all accounts, the resounding answer is, no. But was he set up for success? I believe that answer is also, no. Easy was a company of soldiers who had been together since 1942, nearly 3 years by the time of the assault on Foy. There was an established culture (built by both Winters and Sobel) and they had the receipts to go with it. Dike spent the majority of his time from 1942 until Bastogne as a staff officer and not in combat (although he had seen some action by the time he caught up to Easy).
While it seems that the culture would be strong enough to withstand a leader like Dike, and in my opinion it was, it was not strong enough to withstand Dike and the intense combat of what was happening in the Ardennes in the winter of 1943. Withering fire, constant artillery barrages, cold climate, and Dike… perfect collection of ingredients to make a mediocre burnout casserole. Fast forward a few decades and you will find a similar situation during COVID in the medical community.
Leadership Abhors a Vacuum:
The only reason that it wasn’t dramatically worse was due to the efforts of the senior enlisted man. The company was held together by their First Sergeant, Carwood Lipton. A Taccoa and Normandy veteran, Lipton had endured the same hardships as the men of Easy Company since day 1.
He knew the men and he knew how to take care of them. Beyond just keeping them alive, he worked to keep them focused on the task at hand instead of the gaping hole where their leader should be. He trooped the line, checked on the men, talked to them, rendered aid when they were injured, and earned their respect in the process. He did all of the things that leaders do in combat, and his soldiers saw him doing it. This all in stark contrast to Foxhole Norman’s packed “meeting” and “briefing” schedule.
Of note: his efforts to keep the unit together during the ordeal in the Ardennes and Bastogne earned a battlefield commission from Captain Winters. He served the rest of the war as Lt. Lipton.
Take Away
The assault on Foy is the perfect example of lions being led by lamb. A proven and respected combat unit had been reduced to “the problem” hampering the advance of an entire battalion, and the cause can be isolated to leadership (or the lack thereof).
Another way to describe it is a team of A-players, led by a C student in leadership. There is more than enough talent and experience to win, but the coach just doesn’t know what they’re doing. A team will NOT succeed and achieve outstanding results IN SPITE of a lackluster leader.
References:
https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/ronald-speirs-imperfect-but-daring-leader
