Sixty years ago today began what came to be called the Battle of the Bulge. It was Hitler’s last, desperate attempt to throw the invaders back across the Channel, or to get them to sue for peace, or at the least, to buy time until he could reconstitute his forces. Initially successful, the battle lasted six weeks, through Christmas and most of January, 1945. When it ended, the Allies had broken the back of the German western front, and all but Hitler himself knew that the war had been lost, though it took another three months to finally occupy Germany.