Ben I know I'm throwing a lot of information at you the last several days, so please use your own discretion as to how you distribute it.  When I put the timeline together of the battles of Soy-Hotton, Manhay and then Hunnage it is almost inconceivable that the Regiment was thrown into the Huertgen Forrest in a diversionary attack on Bergstein on February 4th 1945.  I correlate these actions against the casualty reports for Dec 1944 through January 1945 and see that the Regiment had been bleed white and had lost a significant number of it's leadership..  My Grandfather, Col. Thomas J. Cross, commanded the 121st Infantry Regiment of the 8th Division during the bloody fighting in the Huertgen in November and December of 1944.  The 121st won a Presidential Unit Citation for the capture of the town of Huertgen and the battles for Kleinhau and Schmidt  at great sacrifice.  My Grandfather knew only too well what was being asked of the 517th and I believe he offered his opinion to Col. Graves that the cost would be terrible.  What follows is an incredibly honest account of the attack by Captain Gohmert who I believe was the 517th  Regimental Communications Officer.  I would be very interested in getting Howard's opinion on this Monograph and the attack on Bergstein.

https://www.infantry.army.mil/monographs/content/wwii/STUP2/GohmertRolandL.%20CPT.pdf