““At that moment Bastogne was under siege by two of Hitler’s most dashing generals, Fritz Bayerlein of Afrika Korps fame, and Patton’s old adversary at Argentan, the famed cavalryman, General von Liittwitz, who were charged with reducing this obstacle without delay. Assuming that McAuliffe’s fate was sealed inside the ring, Bayerlein decided on a dramatic gesture. He sent a four-man delegation with a white flag of truce into the fortress, demanding that the defenders surrender. When their spiel was translated to McAuliffe, he answered with a single word that was to electrify the Allied armies in the whole of the Bulge. “Nuts!” he said and had the puzzled Germans (who did not know what the idiom meant) escorted back to their line.””
