By midafternoon of January 23, 1943, units from USA Combat Command B, 1st Armored Division moved north to join their British allies. However, remnants of the Battle Group Lueder, 10th Panzer Division remaining in the Ousseltia area were dug in on the hills east and west of the main trail, blocking their path. The Americans sent pickets to the rocky ground near the road to reconnoiter and spot for artillery. Then, Allied units advanced to the SW hill and the tip of the SE ridge. By 1500 hours, intense fighting was occurring on both east and west flanks in the south. By 1530, an armor battle had resulted in both a Lee and Pz.IIIn platoons being decimated while the Americans advanced slowly on both flanks. A Lee platoon accompanied by an M3/75 group penetrated the eastern flank and moved north. By 1630 hours, all Axis armor had been destroyed while the Allies still had Lee and Sherman platoons in operation. As dusk set in, the Americans moved to the south edge of the northern hills, but they were unable to advance any further. The Americans were awarded a major victory despite not being able to displace the German artillery from the 60-meter NE hilltop. Capt. Weitel received the Iron Cross, 2nd Class, for holding the southeast ridge with his infantry platoon for two hours despite repeated Allied attacks.

This objectives for this skirmish include hill control, Allied unit map control and exit, and step loss VP’s. The US has an advantage in the sheer numbers of armor and can use the range of their tanks and TD’s to hit the Panzer III’s; however, they need to use the hills and move judiciously to avoid the StuG IIIG until such time as it can be swarmed and vectored. In this playthrough, the US could have scored better but their leaders were consistently compromised and slow to recover, which limited night-time movement to gain points at game end for occupying the northern map. Nonetheless, the Americans ended up with 67 VP’s to 49 for the Germans, a major American victory, with the difference coming primarily from northern map occupancy (17 VP’s) and exit (6 VP’s). The step losses were pretty even with US (23) and German (25), and hill control yielded 19 VP’s to the US compared to 26 for the Germans.