| Fifth Army Fifth United States Army United States Army North | |
|---|---|
 United States Army North shoulder sleeve insignia | |
| Active | 1921-1933 1943-1945 1946-present |
| Country |  United States of America |
| Branch |  United States Army |
| Type | Army Service Component Command |
| Role | Theater Army |
| Part of | Allied Armies in Italy (later renamed Allied forces in Italy and then15th Army Group) United States Northern Command |
| Garrison/HQ | Fort Sam Houston,Texas |
| Motto(s) | "Strength of the Nation!" |
| Engagements | World War II |
| Commanders | |
| Current commander | Lieutenant GeneralAllan Pepin |
| Notable commanders | Mark W. Clark Lucian Truscott John P. Lucas William B. Caldwell III Guy C. Swan III Thomas R. Turner II William B. Caldwell IV Laura J. Richardson |
| Insignia | |
| Distinctive unit insignia |  |
| Flag |  |
| NATO Map Symbol |  -_AA_-_US_Army_North_(FM_1-02%2c_2004_September_21).svg) |
| US Field Armies 1919-present | ||||
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TheUnited States Army North (ARNORTH) is a formation of theUnited States Army. AnArmy Service Component Command (ASCC) subordinate toUnited States Northern Command (NORTHCOM),[1][2] ARNORTH is the joint force land component of NORTHCOM.[3] ARNORTH is responsible for homeland defense and defense support of civil authorities.[4][3] ARNORTH is headquartered atFort Sam Houston,Texas.Redesignated ARNORTH in 2004, it was first activated in early January 1943 as theUnited States Fifth Army, under the command ofLieutenant GeneralMark W. Clark.
The first iteration of the Fifth Army was authorized by theNational Defense Act of 1920, and was originally to be composed ofOrganized Reserve units primarily from theFourth,Fifth, andSixth Corps Areas. The Headquarters and Headquarters Company were constituted in the Organized Reserve on 15 October 1921 and allotted to the Fifth Corps Area.Columbus, Ohio, was designated as headquarters upon organization, but the headquarters was never organized at that location. The Headquarters Company was initiated in 1922 in Columbus. Columbus remained the Fifth Army's designated headquarters location upon the event of its activation until 16 July 1932 whenIndianapolis,Indiana, was designated as the army's new headquarters location. Due to the abandonment of the "Six Army" plan in favor of the "Four Army" plan, the Fifth Army was deleted from mobilization plans on 1 October 1933 and demobilized (disbanded). Its subordinate units were reassigned to the Second Army, the General Headquarters Reserve, or demobilized.[5]
The United States Fifth Army was one of the principal formations of theU.S. Army in theMediterranean during World War II, and was the first Americanfield army ever to be activated outside of theUnited States.[6] It was officially activated on 5 January 1943 atOujda,French Morocco and made responsible for the defence ofAlgeria and Morocco. It was also given the responsibility for planning the American part of theinvasion of mainland Italy, and therefore was not involved in theAllied invasion of Sicily (codenamed Operation Husky), where it was instead assigned the role of training combat troops destined for Sicily.[7] The United States Fifth Army was initially commanded byLieutenant General Mark Clark, who would lead the Fifth Army for nearly two years,[8] and was to experience some of the toughest fighting ofWorld War II, where it was engaged on theItalian Front, which was, in many ways, often more reminiscent of thetrench warfare of theWestern Front inWorld War I. Writing to Lieutenant GeneralJacob L. Devers (American deputy toField MarshalSir Henry Maitland Wilson,Mediterranean Theater commander)[9] in late March 1944, Clark explained the difficulties of the fighting in Italy so far, which could be said of the whole campaign. They were, he claimed, "Terrain, weather, carefully prepared defensive positions in the mountains, determined and well-trained enemy troops, grossly inadequate means at our disposal while on the offensive, with approximately equal forces to the defender."[10]
The Fifth Army first saw action during theSalerno landings (Operation Avalanche), the assault landings atSalerno, part of theAllied invasion of Italy, in September 1943. Due to the comparatively low numbers of American troops available in the Mediterranean Theater it was made up of one American and one British corps. They were theU.S. VI Corps, underMajor GeneralErnest J. Dawley[11] and the
British X Corps, underLieutenant-GeneralRichard L. McCreery.[11] At Salerno, VI Corps landed on the right flank, and X Corps on the left flank. Progress was initially slow, due in part to a lack of initiative by Dawley, the VI Corps commander, and due also to heavier than expected German resistance. However, heavy naval and air bombardment, along with a parachute drop by elements of theU.S. 82nd Airborne Division, had saved the forces from any danger of being driven back into the sea, combined with the approach of theBritish Eighth Army, underGeneralBernard Montgomery (the Eighth Army had landed further south inOperation Baytown,[11] six days before Avalanche), theGerman 10th Army began to retreat. On 20 September, by which time the Fifth and Eighth Armies had linked up,[12] Major General Dawley, VI Corps commander, was relieved of his command by Clark. Dawley was temporarily made deputy army commander, and was soon replaced in command of VI Corps by Major GeneralJohn P. Lucas.[13]
Progress was then good for a couple of weeks and the Fifth Army crossed theBarbara Line and theVolturno Line until the Germans turned, stood and fought. They had established a position on theWinter Line (also known as the Gustav Line), which included the formidable defensive positions atSan Pietro Infine in the Liri Valley and atMonte Cassino. By this point, Fifth Army had been reinforced by a second American corps,II Corps, commanded by Major GeneralGeoffrey Keyes.[14] By the end of November Clark's Fifth Army had almost doubled in size, with the addition of French GeneralAlphonse Juin'sFrench Expeditionary Corps, from 130,247 men to 243,827.[15] With the failure of the first operations to capture Monte Cassino, an attempt was made to exploit theAllied preponderance in seapower before the cominginvasion of Normandy robbed the Mediterranean of the naval forces necessary for anamphibious assault to seizeRome.[16]
VI Corps, with its experience of amphibious landings at Salerno, was chosen for the assault and withdrawn from the line, replaced by the French Expeditionary Corps. They made a second attempt to capture Monte Cassino in conjunction with the amphibious assault by VI Corps, which again failed. VI Corpslanded at Anzio, unopposed,[17] on 22 January 1944 inOperation Shingle, and suffered many of the same problems as had been seen at Salerno. A perceived lack of initiative on the part of the commander, Major General Lucas, combined with worries about the Germans catching VI Corps off balance if it advanced too far inland resulted in thebeachhead being bottled up. The Germans launched a series of attacks and counterattacks, with both sides sustaining heavy losses, and nearly breached the last beachhead defences before again being driven off by heavy naval and air support. The fault, however,"was not due to Lucas's incompetence; it was due instead to wishful thinking, faulty operational planning, and theGerman army's ability to respond forcefully and aggressively."[18]
After the failure of Shingle, a large reorganization took place. Previously theApennines had been the rough dividing line between Fifth and Eighth Armies. However, the dividing line was shifted westwards, to allow the concentration of both armies on the western side of Italy for maximum firepower to break through to Rome.British V Corps was left on the Adriatic coast to pin down any German units there. Fifth Army was relieved of responsibility for Cassino[19] and the final phases of that battle sawIndian,New Zealand and finallyPolish troops thrown against the fortress. Fifth Army also lost McCreery's British X Corps at this time, since it was felt that having exclusively American-organised units under Fifth Army and British-organised units under Eighth Army would ease logistics.
The breakthrough was achieved during the spring of 1944. Coordinated assaults by all theAllied forces, except V Corps, which was confined to a holding action, broke through. II Corps attacked along the coast, the French Expeditionary Corps, in a classic demonstration ofmountain warfare, broke through on the right flank of Fifth Army, and VI Corps, now commanded by Major GeneralLucian K. Truscott, broke out of the Anzio beachhead. By early summer, Allied forces were well on their way to capturing Rome.
At this point, one of the more controversial incidents in the history of Fifth Army occurred. The strategic conception ofGeneralSir Harold Alexander, commanding theAllied Armies in Italy (later redesigned15th Army Group),[20] was that the forces of VI Corps, coming out of Anzio, would trap the retreating German forces, and leave them to be annihilated by the advancing Fifth and Eighth Armies.[21] However, in contravention of orders, Clark diverted units of VI Corps towards Rome, leaving a small blocking force to attempt to stop the Germans. It failed to do so, and the German forces were able to escape and reestablish a coherent line to the north of Rome. Clark claimed that there were significant German threats which necessitated the diversion, but many believe that he was primarily glory-seeking by being the first to liberate Rome.
On 6 June 1944, two days after Rome fell,Operation Overlord was launched.[22] The strategic conception of Overlord called for a supporting operation to be mounted by invading southern France. In order to do so, forces would have to be withdrawn from the Allied Armies in Italy. In the end, VI Corps was withdrawn, forming the nucleus of the field forces of theU.S. Seventh Army for the invasion of theFrench Riviera,Operation Dragoon. The French Expeditionary Corps was also withdrawn, to allow its men to be used to for theFrench First Army, a follow-up formation for Dragoon. In slightly less than two months, the strength of the Fifth Army dropped from 248,989 down to 153,323.[23] However, the 25,000-strongBrazilian Expeditionary Force, underMarshalJ.B. Mascarenhas de Morais,[24] as well as other divisions had arrived to align withU.S. IV Corps (which had arrived in June) under Major GeneralWillis D. Crittenberger, so two corps were maintained within Fifth Army.
In the second half of 1944, the Allied forces fighting on the Italian Front within the U.S. Fifth Army and British Eighth Army resembled more a multi-national force being constituted by: Americans (including segregated African/and/Japanese-Americans), British, French, members of French and British colonies (New Zealanders, Canadians, Indians, Gurkhas, Black Africans, Moroccans, Algerians, Jews and Arabs from theBritish Mandate in Palestine, South Africans,Rhodesians), as well as Brazilians and exiled forces from Poland, Greece, former Czechoslovakia and anti-fascist Italians.[25][26]
The Germans reestablished their line across Italy at the level ofPisa andRimini. The Allied forces spent another winter, after fierce fighting in the summer and autumn in front of theGothic Line, frustrated at their lack of ability to break through. This time Fifth Army, withBritish XIII Corps under command, led by Lieutenant-GeneralSidney Kirkman (whose relationship with Clark was apparently very stormy) was straddling the Apennines, with many of its units occupying high, exposed positions which were miserable to garrison. That winter also saw a significant change of command. Lieutenant General Clark moved to command 15th Army Group (previously styled the Allied Armies in Italy), and Lieutenant General Lucian K. Truscott was appointed to command Fifth Army in his place. Truscott would command the Army from 16 December 1944 until the war's end. Another change came in January 1945 when XIII Corps reverted to control of British Eighth Army, which had also seen many changes in composition and command, and was now commanded by Lieutenant-General Richard L. McCreery.
In thefinal offensive of the Italian campaign, launched in April 1945, against the GermanArmy Group C, the Eighth Army initiated the main offensive on the Adriatic coast, and then the Fifth Army also broke through the German defenses around Bologna. The German units, in the main, were pinned against thePo River and destroyed, or at the very least deprived of their transport and heavy weapons, which effectively made many of them useless. II Corps units raced through Milan towards the French frontier and the great port ofGenoa. IV Corps pushed due north through Verona, Vicenza and as far as Bolzano and to the Brenner Pass, where they linked up with elements of the U.S. Seventh Army, under Lieutenant GeneralAlexander Patch.
Its role in Italy cost Fifth Army dearly. It suffered 109,642 casualties in 602 days of combat, of which 19,475 were killed in action. The Fifth Army headquarters returned to the United States in September 1945. Fifth Army was inactivated on 2 October 1945 atCamp Myles Standish, Massachusetts.[27]
In the informal athletic competitions held between units of the European and North African theaters, the Fifth Army was among the most successful, winning titles in baseball, boxing, swimming and football during the 1944 season. The football championship was gained after a victory over12th Air Force in theSpaghetti Bowl on 1 January 1945.[28]
(Part of15th Army Group)
United States Fifth Army – (Lieutenant GeneralMark Clark)
U.S. II Corps – (Major GeneralGeoffrey Keyes)
U.S. 34th Infantry Division – (Major GeneralCharles L. Bolte)
U.S. 88th Infantry Division – (Major GeneralJohn E. Sloan)
U.S. 91st Infantry Division – (Major GeneralWilliam G. Livesay)
U.S. IV Corps – (Major GeneralWillis D. Crittenberger)
British XIII Corps – (Lieutenant-GeneralSidney Kirkman)
British 1st Infantry Division – (Major-GeneralCharles Loewen)
British 6th Armoured Division – (Major-GeneralHoratius Murray)
8th Indian Infantry Division – (Major-GeneralDudley Russell)
U.S. 1st Armored Division – (Major GeneralVernon Prichard)The Army's next role was considerably less violent, and it was reactivated on 11 June 1946 atChicago under the command ofMajor GeneralJohn P. Lucas, who had commandedU.S. VI Corps in the early stages of theBattle of Anzio (Operation Shingle) duringWorld War II before being relieved. The Army provided trained units and replacements to the U.S. forces in theKorean War from the summer of 1950 to late 1952.[1] It was redesignated as theFifth United States Army on 1 January 1957. Its postwar role was as a command and control headquarters forU.S. Army Reserve and National Guard units, formally responsible for the training of many Army troops and also the ground defense of part of the continental United States. In June 1971, the Fifth Army moved to its current base atFort Sam Houston,Texas.
In 2004, Fifth Army transferred its Reserve preparation obligations toFirst Army, and became responsible for homeland defense and Defense Support of Civil Authorities (DSCA) as United States Army North, the Army Service Component Command of United States Northern Command.Joint Task Force-Civil Support, a subordinate command, is designated as theDepartment of Defense (DoD) command element for Department of Defense assistance to the overall federal response to a state governments request for assistance in the event of a catastrophic chemical, biological, nuclear or high yield explosiveCBRNE emergency. The command also has a subordinate Contingency Command Post (CCP), known as Task Force-51, which is responsible for responding to all hazards incidents that require DOD assistance. TF-51 can be employed as an all-hazards task force or a Joint Task Force (JTF) with joint augmentation.
In 2020, ARNORTH mitigated theCOVID-19 pandemic by setting up hospitals using 15 Urban Augmentation Medical Task Forces.[29]
The current organization of US Army North as of 21 December 2021 is as follows:[30][31]
505th Military Intelligence Brigade (Theater) (Army Reserve)[32]
263rd Army Air and Missile Defense Command (South Carolina Army National Guard)[33][34]
3rd Sustainment Command (Expeditionary) – part ofXVIII Airborne Corps[35]
4th Infantry Division Sustainment Brigade – part of4th Infantry Division[36][37]
167th Theater Sustainment Command (Alabama Army National Guard)[38]
Fully qualified officers of the Regular Army, Army National Guard and Army Reserve are eligible and considered by the Secretary of Defense and Congress when selecting the United States Army North commanding general.[41]
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