i live in arnhem, so im well aware of what went down here. after the war the US army enigeers built a new permanent bridge at the exact posistion of the old one, wich is called the John Frost bridge, every year theres a huge memorial ceremony, followed by a re-enactment of the mass parachutist drop at the Ginkelse Heide. back in the day there would be a boat load of actual market garden veterans, but he number is declining each year, wich is absolutely heartbreaking.
I had the privilege of attending the 1986 and 87 memorial. There were still many of the Vets attending back then. I even met a couple of them that attended the same British Legion club I did 10 years before. The way the citizens treated these men and the children placing flowers on the graves at the service in Oosterbeek CWGS Cemetery was heart-warming
Shame.. Hi from 🇳🇿.., I have known this story from childhood, our was ww2 RNZAF.., what an absolute example stupendous poor management… nearly saved by the absolute courage and guts of the worker/ the “do er” in the situation… The selflessness, I remember reading how the men of 30 corp.., having fought to Nijmegen… were in absolute awe of the commanders of men of the 82nd and their painfully slow crossing of the Waal.. in open boats.. under heavy fire.., many wrote of the 82nd as hero’s
@@tigertiger1699 Did you know that 30 Corps tanks were already across the river and watched this crossing in amazement? From R G Poulussen's book "Lost at Nijmegen"
@@patrickkelly6691 Sorry but I have read it so manual times so many years ago.. I can’t remember.. I remember the reported comments from the British commanders.. at the length of knife carried by the 82nd airborne commanders…, as in 1- they were no gentlemanly lot (like British).., they wore a blade on their thighs.. it ran near the full length of their thighs… & to.. it was clear they were there to take Europe from the Nazi at all costs… Brad pits character in inglorious bastards reminds me of the description of these airborne commanders .. and for them to have left that impression on men as tough as what 30 corp had been through to get to Nijmegen…🤯🌹
I'll never forget reading A Bridge Too Far by Cornelius Ryan. My father was a glider pilot. He flew 5 invasion missions. He was one of only 50 Americans who flew copilot with the Brits into Sicily, he flew the Pathfinders into Normandy, first wave into Southern France where they got in to a hell of a dust up in Le Muy..and 2 flights in Market-Garden, he fought at the Waal crossing. About 3/4s of the way through the book, I'm going "wait a minute, this doesn't look good, when do we win?" and the Dad goes "Oh, you didn't know?, nah, that one didn't work out too well..."
My father was a "flying bus driver". He was shot down dropping pathfinders of the 82nd in Normandy. He had an inner ear disorder in mid-Sept and missed being shot down again...this time his replacement pilot was killed. He was shot down a 2nd time over Bastogne dropping supplies to the 101st.
Cornelius Ryan took part in a whitewashing and character assassinations in order to deflect the blame. Still, he knew the audience would be in the US and where the dollars were going to be made. It wouldn't do to allow the truth stand between himself and a best seller eh!?
as a Polish I can't stand the way Montgomery treated Sosabowski as the scape goat for the failure of this operation where in fact this plan was ill fated from the start. It was so disgraceful for the people who lost their lives in there
I don't understand what happened there. Montgomery intially wrote to Sosabowski a letter of praise for his unit's actions and asked him for 10 nominations for decorations. Sometime later he changed his tune. I can only wonder if it was for Sosabowski's insubordination to Horrocks, but that doesn't seem a sufficient reason to me. In any case, the Polish Brigade had nothing to do with the operation's failure, it was another allied unit at Nijmegen that was responsible, but I'm afraid politics prevented that truth from being aired until the last 10 years, with the publication of a number of books going back to primary sources again.
@@davemac1197 both Browning and Horrocks clashed with Sosabowski. It was on the strength of those complaints that Montgomery changed his tune. As you say, it doesn't seem to have been sufficient reason and the Poles were definitely NOT the reason it failed. While I think this gets most of the facts right, it is guilty of downplaying the part of Gavin's decision to prioritise the Heights over his primary objectives, as ordered by Brereton, which was to take the bridges with "thunderclap surprise". Contrary to what the IWM has stated, the air intelligence was not ignored. If it was, then Operation Comet would have gone ahead. That Comet was cancelled and Market done instead, but with significantly more resources allocated illustrates quite clearly that the intelligence was absolutely taken into consideration. Neither 9th SS Panzer nor 10th SS Panzer had anything of note to fight with, and were not deemed sufficient reason to cancel the operation. In fact, the tanks that turned the battle were not even in The Netherlands until the 21st Sept, although two Tiger 1s did arrive at about 20:00 on the 19th Sept. Had Gavin taken his primary objective, then XXX Corps would have been in Arnhem before those reinforcements turned up. Some blame Browning for the decision, but in Gavin's own book "On to Berlin", he states quite clearly that it was his plan that was presented to Browning and on the strength of that plan, was "ordered" to put the Heights first. He stated that the taking of the major bridge presented him with a problem if it left his LZ exposed.
as a Dutch I can't stand the way Montgomery treated Sosabowski as scape goat either. Nor the enormous time it took to honour Sosabowski and the Polish para's who fought in the Netherlands while their own country was being occupied for a second time in the war. Fortunately they were finally honoured by Queen Beatrix on behalf of the Dutch government and people in 2005 when they received the highest military honour.
@@martijnb5887 - I agree, but I don't think Montgomery was the source. He initially praised Sosabowski and his Brigade, but then changed his tune. I have yet to discover why that was. The only marks against the Poles I can see are Sosabowski's insubordination to Horrocks during the Valburg conference, but he backed down and accepted Horrocks' authority, and the German complaints about the Poles not respecting the Red Cross and firing on their medics. The Germans complained the British always allowed them to collect their wounded, but the Poles did not. Both incidents are understandable, given the Poles' history with the Germans, and if I was a British officer at the Valburg conference I would forget Sosabowski's outburst, it's of little consequence. I don't understand why Montgomery changed his attitude. There has to be a story behind that somewhere.
I'm English and writing this from Cracow in Poland this evening. The reason we entered WWII was to defend Poland. If we had got to Berlin in 1944 - as we could and should have done - we might have been able to save Poland from 44 wasted years under Communism. Over-rated generals like Montgomery - and poor decision making by Churchill - are responsible for us letting the Poles down. If Churchill hadn't gone on his insane Greek adventure in 1941 (echoes of the Dardanelles in WWI), we would have cleared the Axis out of North Africa in 1941 and not 1943. The invasion of Italy was a strategic error - should have been France in 1943.
by 1944 the Germans had become exceptionally good at defensive responses. The troops in Holland were shattered and regrouping from the France disaster. The moment they realized what was happening, every German in Holland, from the Heer and Waffen-SS troops to Luftwaffe auxiliary personal, the railway workers and members of the RAD labor services were organized into mixed Kampfgruppes and deployed to counter the attack with great success. This sort of flexibility can counter just about everything a top down chain of command can throw together.
Yeah, a while back I read a review of the German reaction to M/G; one of the personal tales was how a regular German landser was trying to get to his unit and was shanghaied into an SS unit. An SS officer handwrote his new SS rank in his 'soldbuch', he was given those famous SS Cammies and a pair of "Runes", and Voila= Instant SS soldier. I always remembered that story because of the constant 'squealing' from the wereabos about there not being 'Poles in the SS' (or the other one: ALL SS were top quality volunteers!) in reaction to the famous 'crossroads' episode in Band of Brothers. Apparently any darned warm body would be used.
@@nickmitsialis Yeah the Waffen- SS had far looser restrictions on recruitment than the Heer after getting decimated in the winter of 1941-42. They learned a lot of lessons during that winter and emerged a far more effective fighting force.
Under the road bridge you can still see evidence on the stonework of the German attacks that came down the road from the east and also the germans shooting from the south side of the river. I visited in 1989. I think the little enclosure with the plaque in it on the bridge is where the pillbox was (?)
My father flew paratroopers into Operation Market Garden. He talked very little about his experiences during the war, but he did speak about watching paratroopers cut down in the air or tangling in their chutes. He was shot down behind enemy lines close to Grave and was picked up by the Dutch Underground, spending eight days hiding by day and moving at night. He remembers hiding in a ditch and watching German troops march by. He said he could have touched their boots. At one point a little brass band greeted them at a barn where they were hiding. The local people thought they had been liberated. He finally made it back to friendly territory, at the very end finding himself and his driver running through a tank battle, and was reunited with his crew. Amazingly none had died. My father could never speak highly enough of the Dutch people who saved so many at such risk to themselves. He never knew the names of the people who sheltered him or the Underground operators who guided him, but he always told me that I owed my life to the Dutch people because without them, I never would have been born.
Sounds like one of many similar stories researched by Dutch author Hans den Brok in his volumes of books called Market Flights. If you know which unit he was in I might be able to find if he's mentioned and identify the specific volume.
I was lucky enough to jump at the 30th anniversary of the Bruneval Raid, the first battle honour of the Parachute Regiment. John Frost commanded there as well and we were honoured to have him give us a talk through/walk through of that raid, a truly living legend.
I live in Arnhem (and drive on the bridge everyday) and this operation is still a very important thing in the history of Arnhem. The name of the bridge is the John Frost bridge now, and in the north there is a memorial (airborne plein).
I listened to an interview of an American Colonel who was on the ground in Operation Market Garden . His answer was the poms where dropped 8 miles away from their objective, as a result cost the lives of 10, 000 men.The Colonel was if l remember correctly was 96 years old . To stand up and give a talk for about an hour and have audience enthralled, fantastic.
@@lauriemattila5936 The total number of dead suffered by the Allies in Operation Market Garden was around 2,000, of which the number killed in the airborne force which attacked Arnhem was 1,485, with another 6,414 being taken prisoner.
Market Garden needed too many elements to go right to be successful. Too complex and not enough transports/troops. The Germans put up more of a defense than expected, which should have been expected.
So true, yet another Montgomery failure. I am a retired FDNY Captain, 1980-2003. My series Fatal Flaws traces 9/11 back to WWI. Fatal Flaws Book 1 1914-1945 traces the mistakes of those days and how it affected the future. I found Monty was the best ally Germany had. Everything he did after Africa failed, prolonging the war.
The Germans were usually brilliant in defence... as well as attack ! Able to mount superb counter attacks in the worst possible conditions and situations.
@@lastguy8613 There wasn't one main road of advance, there were two. And despite attempts by the Germans to cut the road, they did not manage to delay the British advance or attack it in any meaningful way, which arrived at Nijmegen on schedule.
"No plan survives initial contact with the enemy." The more complicated a plan, the more a single point of failure can doom the operation, the more rigid or lacking of options there are in the plan, the more the plan is likely to fail. To me the worst part of the plan was deciding to move the 50,000 men and their vehicles mainly up a single track. The tip of that spear is going to become mighty dull mighty soon. Yes, they were able to fan out in certain areas but then they still needed to concentrate as they crossed the numerous waterways. Any delays, such as the need to rebuild a bridge, the need to defend against stronger than expected counter attacks, the delay in taking a major crossing, combined with the sheer size of XXX Corps just adds to the likelihood of failure.
the issue of the single road is absolutely over-played. Only on "the island" was it really an issue, and had the bridge at Nijmegen been taken by 82nd AB when they first dropped, then XXX Corps would have been across the island on the 19th Sept before the German reinforcements arrived on the 21st Sept!
@@sean640307 Have you been driving along that road? I drove to Arnhem on my way to Calais and then followed the same road south that XXX corps would have used going north. It was of course a modern road now but still only two lanes one northward and one southward. Having 50.000 men in trucks and transportvehilces and armor on that road, that surely looked different then, must have been a chokepoint.
My great uncle was a glider pilot and died at Arnhem on the 18th of September 1944. He was one of the 6 glider pilots who flew into France late on the 5th June to take Pegasus Bridge before D DAY.
I went out with a girl in the '60's, her father was a glider pilot at Arnhem and he was still serving in the AAC at Middle Wallop at that time. A grand older man whom I should have picked the brains of and paid more attention to rather than having a one track mind about his daughter. Especiall as I joined the army that year! Shame on me.
This past August 12th I experienced an abbreviated land tour of the operation. I was duly impressed with the size of the 82nd’s LZ in the Groesbeek Heights used for both paratroopers and gliders. For those interested, Market Garden provides a fertile field for additional study. Currently reading an after action report on Jedbough Teams that liaised with Dutch resistance during Market Garden. A lot of moving pieces!
I'm jealous! That area is a lot more built up around Groesbeek than it was in 1944, but it still must have given a good impression of the terrain. I only recently learned that the entire block of woodland to the southwest of Groesbeek was a Luftwaffe ammunition dump called 'Feld-Luftmunitionslager 15/VI Mook', and the Mooksebaan between Groesbeek and the Restaurant 't Zwaantje ran through the middle of it, closed off at both ends with security checkpoints. It was an MG position guarding the perimeter of this installation that nearly killed General Gavin on his way to his Division CP location on the Rijlaan.
Dave Now you got me interested! I am going to check with my guide to see what he knows about the ammo dump. I did not realize how close Germany and the Siegfried line were till my guide pointed it the green hills in the distance (SSE). Prior to Amsterdam, I was on a Rhine River boat and saw the remnants of the Ludendorff Bridge. I mentioned this to my son, an Army Combat Engineer,and the bridging of the Rhine. He stated that people have no idea of the planning required to bridge a river like the Rhine
@@patrickmorrissey8754 - See what your guide thinks of this: I kept hearing about the ammo dump in first-hand accounts but couldn't pin down the location until I got some volumes from Hans den Brok's series on Market Flights - the IX Troop Carrier Command units that transported the Airborne in Operation Market. I was keen to figure out how the American glider pilots operated, so his books on their first hand accounts of their experiences was invaluable. The unexpected bonus was photos of the front or back gate to the Munitionslager opposite the 't Zwaantje restaurant, so that explained they closed the public road (Mooksebaan) running through the dump. Also, a 1945 edition of the military AMS GSGS map for Groesbeek shows the rail spur line from Groesbeek that loops around the south side of town and goes into the Munitionslager from the east, but doesn't indicate the perimeter fence or the extent of the facility, but it's most of that block of woodland as I found on a German document with a map online. The glider pilots also referred to a work camp they used for accommodation, previously a Dutch labour camp (search 'N.A.D. Kamp de Mookerheide') before the war, and after the occupation the German R.A.D. (Reich Arbeits Dienst - State Labour Service) took over the camp for their own purposes. A RAD unit there was digging trenches and anti-tank defences along the Maas-Waalkanaal at the time of Market Garden, and because it was feared it might be a military barracks it was a target for 2nd Battalion 505th PIR before going into Divisional reserve. Hans said in his book the location was unknown, but I was able to help him out with it - it's gone now, replaced with private homes, but visible on RAF aerial photos. The location is next to the railway and bounded by the streets Oude Bovensteweg, Heumensebaan, Lindenlaan, and Stationstraat. The Westwall technically ran through the Reichswald and terminated in the Nütterden village area with a few bunkers. There were bunkers in the Grunewald area on the south side of the Reichswald, and this was the battalion HQ for the Füsilier-Ersatz-Bataillon 39, part of the River Maas defence line. The road through the forest to Frasselt was the line of the Westwall, but I think in this section it was only a trench system and dugouts constructed out of logs. 505th PIR patrols that explored the western end of the Reichswald reported it 'empty' and unsuitable for tanks, which relieved Gavin of one his major concerns on the first day. Another local HQ was for Landesschützen-Ausbildungs-Bataillon I./6, consisting of WW1 rear echelon troops deemed unsuitable for combat when they were young men, based in the Haus Kreuzfuhrt near Kranenbourg, and this unit had three of its five companies detached to defend the Maas-Waalkanaal bridges.
Patrick Morrissey Have you read "Abundance of Valor" by Will Irwin? It's about the Jedburgh teams that led the way into the Netherlands and during Market-Garden. Embarrassingly, I had studied Market-Garden for decades, and had never noticed anything about the Jedburgh teams until I found this book.
@@dongilleo9743 Don! I found an after-action report about the four Jedbough teams deployed for Market-Garden on the internet after coming back to Albuquerque. I will check-out the book you mentioned. Than you for the info! Patrick Morrissey
Fascinating, thank you for uploading this. Greetings from ‘The Island’, I cross the John Frost Bridge in Arnhem every day as I go to work. These images pass through my mind regularly as I make my way across the Rhine.
I'm guessing it was either the weakened bridge at Honinghutje after the Germans tried to demolish it, or the temporary wooden crossing alongside the inadequate drawbridge at Veghel?
@@michaelwear2252 - bless him! A lot of people are unaware that the Airborne operation involved about 24 target bridges, not counting the Westervoort bridges at Arnhem that couldn't be occupied, and minor bridges that were ancilliary crossings, such as the ones either side of the Son bridge that were demolished before the operation. The rail bridge at Ravenstein was also demolished by the Germans when they saw an American patrol on the riverbank, and it wasn't even a target for the operation. Thanks for the reply.
We shall honour and remember them all. The bravery and heroism of all that took part in this ill-fated mission will always stand as a testament and example to all that follow them.
One element not mentioned here is that Market Garden delayed the capture of the approaches of Antwerp. When Monty came round to capturing them, he found that during the delay, the Germans had heavily fortified them, meaning Antwerp was useless for many more months.
One of Montgomery's few serious blunders was not taking the Antwerp approaches when they were undefended, before M-G. Forgetting to take a port is not easily dismissed. The need to employ a large, idle, gliry-hungry force, not landing on the bridges directly, and a lack of serious close air support were big factors in the failure (I'm not saying many others have not already).
The British and Polish soldiers who took and, for a time, held that bridge fought like absolute legends. Too bad they were dropped too far away, in separate groups and their radios were not up to par for the mission.
9th SS was close to decimated! 10th SS was, intentionally, dismantling their armour to prevent them from being handed over to other units! Neither unit was combat ready when MG began. 10th SS was ferrying over dismantled Sturmgeschütze, which had to be both repaired and then ferried back again. What greatly hampered the advance was the vast, VAST amount of artillery and their near limitless supply of ammunition. This artillery was also perfectly placed in relation to the corridor and able to pound beyond Nijmegen to the south and well north of the Rhine. This cut the corridor several times. While the weather did play a role, finding the complete plans in a crashed Horsa glider provided the German troops around Arnhem and Oosterbeek with all the data they needed to engage the further coming droppings. A very good book on the German immediate response as well as the prior preparations by Field Marshall Walter Model is Een Andere Kijk op de Slag om Arnhem: De Snelle Duitse Reactie - Peter Berends from 2002. This is only available in Dutch though.
The SS panzer division was still in the area and had not completely dismantled their armour, which contributed to the demise of the British paratroopers at Arnhem bridge. Yes, they were dismantling, but they were still an in tact division that had tanks at the moment when the operation began, and was responsible for the coup de grace at Arnhem. The dutch resistance tried warning Montgomery about this iirc
@Herbert Ackermans: I have never heard of this before. Only of the "surprise" presence of panzers. Where did all of the artillery come from? Very little German equipment made it out of Normandy, so it must have come from units which had not been deployed in Normandy.
@@str2010 - Absolutely not an intact division by any stretch of the imagination. The remnants of SS-Panzer-Regiment 9 under an SS-Lieutenant based at the Saksen-Weimarkazerne (barracks) in northern Arnhem had exactly three Mark V 'Panther' tanks and two Flakpanzer IV 'Möbelwagen' on 17 September. 100 Panther crewmen were grouped into an 'alarm' company acting as infantry, and the Werkstatt (workshop Company) formed another. All other tanks (Mark IV) had been handed over to II./SS-Panzer-Regiment 10 at Vorden, bringing their total to 16 concentrated in the 5.Kompanie. The remaining five 9.SS tanks had been moved out of the barracks (presumably having their tracks and guns refitted in the workshops after removing them to record them as 'non-operational' to avoid handover) on Friday 15 September, to be hidden under trees on Heijenoordseweg (according to Dutch residents in a house at the end of Callunastraat who were asked for milk by the panzer crews). During the battle, two of the three Panthers of Kampfgruppe Harder were dealt with by a PIAT and a Gammon bomb dropped from an upstairs window by Major Peter Waddy (Commander 'B' Company, 3rd Para Battalion) in the western outskirts of Arnhem on 18 September. The Flakpanzers were in action on the Dreyenscheweg against 4th Parachute Brigade, their 3.7cm Flak guns proving to be devastating against infantry. The remaining Panther was in action throughout the seige of the Oosterbeek perimeter, but wary of anti-tank weapons the Germans avoided getting too close and used their tanks as SP guns to shell houses from a distance. Also during the battle, the 10.SS received deliveries of 8 and then 12 brand new Panthers direct from the factory, and they were crewed by the 100 Panther crewmen transferred from the SS-Panzer-Regiment 9 alarm company. Some of the Panthers were lost in the area of Elst after the Arnhem bridge was retaken. They were still in the overall desert yellow factory paint finish, having no time for camouflage colours or tactical numbers to be applied. The Dutch resistance reports were taken seriously, but could not be confirmed. A plan for the 82nd Airborne to be dropped at Arnhem and the 1st Airborne at Nijmegen was switched, because the British Airborne had far more anti-tank guns, including 17-pounders, while the American Airborne units had more field artillery. The Dutch had identified SS units between Arnhem-Apeldoorn-Zutphen as belonging to the 'H' (9.SS Hohenstaufen) Division, but there was no information on the location of the 10.SS at all. There was concern they may have been in Nijmegen and drawing new tanks from a depot thought to be in the Kleve area (SHAEF Intel Summary #26 dated 16 September 1944), which led to a silly rumour the Reichswald forest could be hiding up to 1000 tanks! It's quite wrong to suggest Montgomery knew two Panzer-Divisions were at Arnhem. It wasn't even true, both in terms of strength or location, and the intelligence picture was more complex in both reality and perception at the time.
@@dpeasehead - you're right about the equipment not coming from Normandy. The 10.SS-Panzer-Division became 'over establishment' in artillery as the commander of their 4./Flak-Abteilung battery discovered 40 brand new 10.5cm leFH 18/40 guns on a freight train at Arras station in northern France during the retreat. The escorting troops had abandoned the train in the panic. Since 10.SS had lost most of their artillery and the prime movers (heavy half-tracks), arrangements were made to find enough trucks from the logistics trains in the Division to move them. They absorbed the guns by having six guns instead of the establishment four in each leFH battery, although they somehow ended up with two '10.Batterie' listed on strength.
@@davemac1197 In military strategy, a choke point (or chokepoint), or sometimes bottleneck, is a geographical feature on land such as a valley, defile or bridge, or maritime passage through a critical waterway such as a strait, which an armed force is forced to pass through in order to reach its objective, sometimes on a substantially narrowed front and therefore greatly decreasing its combat effectiveness by making it harder to bring superior numbers to bear. A choke point can allow a numerically inferior defending force to use the terrain as a force multiplier to thwart or ambush a much larger opponent, as the attacker cannot advance any further without first securing passage through the choke point.
The Nazi Party member, and SS man Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands was shown door by both British, and US intelligence organizations due his supect loyalties. Only his royal connections kept him out prison in the 1970s, due to the Lockheed scandal that engulfed the Dutch Royal family.
HQ blaming Montgomery *Alan Brooke's own words with Adml Ramsay chiming in* *"Triumph in the West, by Arthur Bryant, From the diary of Field Marshal Lord Alan Brooke, entry for 5 October 1944:Page 219" During the whole discussion one fact stood out clearly, that access to Antwerp must be captured with the least possible delay. I feel that Monty's strategy for once is at fault, Instead of carrying out the advance on Arnhem he ought to have made certain of Antwerp in the first place. Admiral Ramsay brought this out as well in the discussion and criticized Monty freely....."* Monty later admitting it *The Guns at Last Light, by Rick Atkinson, page 303 In his diary Admiral Ramsey wrote and warned that clearing the Scheldt of mines would take weeks, even after the German defenders were flicked away from the banks of the waterway" Monty made the startling announcement that he would take the Ruhr without Antwerp this afforded me the cue I needed to lambaste him.......I let fly with all my guns at the faulty strategy we had allowed Montgomery. Who would acknowledge as much after the war, conceding "a bad mistake on my part"*
Watching this from my living room with a view over the Nijmegen bridge. Always nice to see such a good summary of what happened. Almost every bridge over the rhine or waal rivers at Nijmegen and Arnhem is named in honour of the brave hero's of this operation
"Lieutenant-General Browning specified to their commander, Brigadier-General Gavin, who gave his approval, that the 82nd Airborne's priorities were, first, the large area of high ground known as the Groesbeek Heights, second, the bridge over the River Maas at Grave, then three bridges over the Maas-Waal Canal, and finally Nijmegen Bridge." Pegasus Archive Arnhem 30. Reasons for the Failure
Tik History does an interesting video covering this. From what I remember some of these sources were written years after the battle and contradict what Gavin said at the time where he states it was his decision to de-prioritise the Nijmegen bridge.
@@nickdanger3802 I don't get that impression from Tik. I know one of the sources he referenced was Poulussen who is Dutch so not likely to have an axe to grind either way. Personally I think with the heavy hitters like Beevor and Hastings, although they should be respected they aren't infallible and there can be a sense of a chumocracy at play. I think it is healthy that they be challenged where the evidence supports it.
@@CB-fz3li Tik did a vid on supply vs demand economy in WWII so he could bitch about the NHS. The Dutch told the British the plan was a bad idea due to the terrain.
There were no German forces in the Reichswald that Gavin was shelling and the Groesbeek heights secured and taken with little force and did not need the whole of the 82nd to do so . The landing zone for the second wave between Groesbeek and Reichswald had been quickleynsecured and HQ established .The delay in sending elements led by Warren under Lindquist on day 1 , allowed 10 Panzer at Arnhem to speed south to Nijmegen and occupy the town on the south bank of the Waal . Time lost at the Son had been made up by 30 Corps after intercepting radio messages that the bridge was lost and fotwarded Bailey equipment which was in place overnight . The 101st under Maxwell-Taylor had done an excellent job of achieving and maintaining their objectives throughout . On reaching Nijmegen on schedule , 30 Corps was now facing 10 Panzer that was not there before . The delay that resulted was insufferable. The force eventually sent against the Groesbeek Heights on day 4 was an ad hoc KG made up of a hospital unit and injured infantry that were easily beaten back with very few casualties taken by the 82nd . The orders for Lindquist to take the Bridge were clear on the 15th September and reinforced on the 17th . The report from Gavin stating Browning had agreed to prioritise the Heights was not produced by Gavin and was dated 5th October after the event and must be considered unreliable. In any case Gavin has subsequently blamed Lindquist for the failure . Regardless of what had ensued Gavin was in command and had failed to correctly allocate troops to achieve the directive. The IWM has a responsibility to ensure history is correctly presented regardless of sensibilities.
It was the British AO so where did the intel on the Reichswald come from ? Browning with his HQ brought in by 38 of first AB's gliders was in command of all airborne. "He (Browning) became anxious on the same day as he watched the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment and the Grenadier Guards making their attempt to capture Nijmegen Bridge, and when it fell he said to Horrocks of the American crossing, "I have never seen a more gallant action." Pegasus Archive Browning
I agree with what you say except for the 82nd having more resources than they needed. That was how it worked out on the Groesbeek heights on the first day, but they didn't know that going in because the intelligence picture was not complete. The Dutch resistance had not positively located or identified the 10.SS-Panzer-Division, so there was a possibility the division (reduced to a regimental battlegroup in Normandy) could be in Nijmegen. The only firm intelligence was Ultra, placing the II.SS-Panzerkorps (with the 9.'Hohenstaufen' and presumably the 10.'Frundsberg' divisions) in the eastern Netherlands, but even the existence of Ultra was not made known to commanders at Corps and Division level, or below the rank of (four-star) General (so Montgomery and Dempsey knew it existed, but Brereton of 1st Allied Airborne Army did not). Gavin was given a vague 'santitised' estimate that "a regiment of SS" may be located in the excellent Dutch army barrack facilities in Nijmegen, and possibly drawing new tanks from a depot thought to be in the Kleve area just behind the Reichswald (it was actually near Münster deeper into Germany), so the Reichswald may be a tank laager. This certainly influenced Gavin's divisonal plan. Having decided his best regiment, the 504th PIR, would be assigned the capture of the Maas highway bridge at Grave to secure his division's supply line to XXX Corps, he seemed to decide his next priority was to defend the division from a potential armoured attack from the Reichswald, so the very experienced and aggressive 505th Regiment was assigned to the Reichswald sector, and to secure a secondary Maas bridge - the rail bridge at Mook. This left the 508th PIR, on only its second combat operation and with a commander that had not performed well in Normandy, to secure the Groesbeek ridge (potentially defended by an SS regiment), and if at all possible to send a battalion directly to the highway bridge over the Waal. Gavin made no coup de main plan for the Nijmegen highway bridge, as at Arnhem with Urquhart's Reconnaissance Squadron, but Colonel Reuben Tucker of the 504th had the experience and grit to demand a special drop zone for one company to drop near the southern end of the Grave bridge so it could be taken from both ends, and he got it. Gavin instead only ensured Colonel Lindquist was given what he thought was a clear instruction to send a battalion to the bridge in the final divisional briefing before the operation, and one source says he even stood with Lindquist over a map to show him the exact route he wanted the 1st Battalion to take to the bridge. When this did not happen and Lindquist had sent only a small recon force, Gavin was as "mad" as the 508th liaison officer (the unfortunate messenger) had ever seen him, and they went immediately to the 508th CP to get Lindquist moving. By this time it was too late. Most of the patrol had got lost in the city and the 10.SS-Panzer-Division (which had been in the Achterhoek region northeast of Arnhem) won the race to reinforce the bridge and the city centre. Unfortunately for historians, this story does not seem to have come out until 2012 and 82nd Airborne historian Phil Nordykes' combat history of the 508th PIR in WW2 - Put Us Down In Hell, and American historian John C McManus' September Hope - The American Side of a Bridge Too Far, who both rely on junior officers coming forward to speak out now that all the senior figures in this drama have passed away. All Gavin said to Cornelius Ryan in his interview in 1967 was that Ridgeway (82nd CO in Normandy) did not trust Lindquist and would not promote him - presumably meaning when Ridgway was given command of the US XVIII Airborne Corps in August, and in fact Ridgway had a problem in that he could not promote any other Colonel in the Division over him because Lindquist had seniority in the grade. Gavin said no more and Ryan did no further digging, because the whole Nijmegen blunder did not appear in his book and unknown to the many other historians who relied on Ryan's primary research. Gavin may also have had the same problem with promotions, because after he inherited the division from Ridgway he failed to replace himself as Assistant Division Commander, so he was running himself ragged doing both jobs during Market Garden. As far as I know, Gavin has never thrown Lindquist under the bus and he seems to have taken responsibility for the failure on his own shoulders by conflating the relative priorities of bridge and ridge, with support from Browning in their post-war correspondence. Gavin also wrote in a report for the US Army suggesting a change in doctrine that senior commanders making mistakes be given a second chance to learn from their mistakes instead of the current policy of immediate removal. Many may have thought he was referring to himself, but I think he may have been referring to Lindquist as well and had already been applying his own doctrine, since Lindquist remained in post for the remainder of the war. Having caused unnecessary casualties in the battle for Hill 95 (Sainte Catherine) near La Hay in Normandy on 4 July, and then failed to move on a key objective at Nijmegen in September, Lindquist seemed to perform without further incident duing the battle of the bulge.
Always astonished by the short view about Market Garden. Of course the 3 days long planned airborne deployment was the major flaw. But what about "most secret" plans, not to be brought, in ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, on the battle ground, featuring all the operation plans fell in germans hands ? What about Browning landing with his staff in the Nijmegen area with more than 18 gliders on the FIRST day, that could have been more useful elsewhere (Arnhem area?) and he, be as useful in a rear area or England ? What about Browning subscribing to Gavin's concern about the "10000 german tanks lurking in the Reichwald" SSW Groosbeeh heights thus delaying the advance on the capital targets that were Nimjegen rail and road bridges ? On a further note, what about appointing an infantry officer to lead an airborne division ? He lacked almost all support a regular british ID could expect at this time in WWII. And why the Polish Ind Bde was assigned LZ an DZ that were not suitable for 1st AIR, since taking a bridge from two sides should seem more efficient than on only one ? I know a youtuber that tried to face some of these questions In very lengnth.. He has currently heavy real life matters to deal with. Then not available to enquire, I gess.. You IWM, should have many more and deeper to provide than a quickie such as this. My regards, anyway.
Even if Nijmegen bridge had been captured and held on day one, a difficult and not sure thing, Market-Garden would have still come to a dead stop at Arnhem. The tiny bridgehead at the Arnhem bridge wasn't sufficient for 30th Corps to cross, turn right, and sweep into Germany to end the war by Christmas. The leading elements of 30th Corps would have been bunched up at Arnhem just in time for the German counterattack to cut the corridor further south for a day and a half. Then there's the problem of supplies. British supply lines stretch all the way back to Normandy. The 1st Canadian Army and a bunch of British divisions are spread out halfway back to Normandy; some of them deliberately halted so their transportation assets could be used to try to keep other divisions supplied. Without the docks at Antwerp to fully supply the Allied armies, they weren't going to cross the Rhine in strength until Spring of 1945.
@@dongilleo9743 Fair point and it would be hard to hold the airfield to the north which was one of the objectives as well. Arnhem could have turned into another Caen. But even if there was time to evacuate civilians south imagine the traffic jam.
My great uncle took part in Operation Market Garden..... Tommy Scullion from Ballymena Northern Ireland. He had a part in a film about it playing himself. Oddly in the film he gets captured but in reality as far as I'm aware he fought his way back to his own lines
It failed because 1) It was commanded by Montgomery who just wasn’t up to this type of operation. 2) Lack of sufficient transport aircraft 3) Gen Gavin delayed taking the Waal Bridge at Nijmegen. 4) Poor choice of landing zones at Arnhem. 5) Inadequate radios. But it was marked by incredibly heroic action by all the forces involved. The British paratroopers at Arnhem in particular fought like lions and held on despite strong German attacks.
Number 3) was the only problem actually fatal to the operation, but it was the 508th Regiment Commander, not Gavin, that delayed. When Gavin found out they were diggin-in on the Groesbeek ridge, he was as angry as the 508th's Liaison Officer had ever seen him. This was NOT Gavin's divisional plan being carried out at all. The limitation on transport aircraft was taken into account by the planners (what else could they do?), choice of landing zones were dictated by Flak and terrain (what alternatives did they have?), terrain effects on radio communications were not known about (they affected the Germans as well), and Montgomery's plan was brilliant and audacious, but he only made the mistake of thinking his allies were just as capable as his own troops. He gave the Americans too much credit. Why the Americans would blame Montgomery is an emotional response and not a rational one based on the facts.
@@davemac1197 What could they do about not having enough transport aircraft and not having a landing zone close enough to the bridge at Arnhem especially given the German forces available near Arnhem? Well they could not attempt the operation for one thing. The fact that they went ahead given those limitations is the fault of the planners. And the fault of the Commander who insisted it go forward. Eisenhower wrote a note taking all the blame for the failure of D Day had it gone wrong and he relied on his British and Canadian and French Allies. It’s the nature of command. But Montgomery was well known for being cautious and methodical and insisting on large material advantages before launching operations. He failed to take Caen according to the Overlord time table, whose fault was that? He failed to close the Falaise (sp) gap during the end stage of the battle of the bulge, whose fault was that? Montgomery was a great general, but he was not capable of making rapid advances, it wasn’t in his nature. He also wisely realized that the British people were down to their manpower limits and that he could not afford to lose men by being too aggressive but then he planned a too aggressive attack and didn’t account for the change in intelligence when they learned of the German forces that had been moved into the Arnhem area. All commanders have their strengths and weaknesses, British, American, German and Soviet alike. Montgomery was not good in a rapid advance he was his best in a methodical set piece battle and Market Garden was as much a race as any battle of WW2.
@@Whitpusmc - obviously you enjoy having a joke! The operation almost succeeded (according even to the Germans) and would have done so if the Nijmegen bridges had been secured on the first afternoon. The fact they weren't cannot be placed at Montgomery's door.
@@davemac1197 He was both the planner and in overall command and insisted on a plan where a series of subsidiary operations all had to succeed or it failed with no “plan b.” The Germans could have blown the Arnhem bridge at any time and that fact alone meant that it didn’t have a significant chance of success. Furthermore as other posters have pointed out Gen Gavin did secure the Waal bridge when 30 Corps got to them and even then they had to turn around and recapture part of the road behind them. Securing the bridge before 30 corps got there would not have done anything. Monty was the overall commander and insisted on an overly complex operation and didn’t change it when new intelligence on German forces made the chance of success significantly less. He’s to blame, no joke especially given the casualties taken.
@@Whitpusmc - Gavin's Divisonal plan for Nijmegen did not 'fail'. It simply wasn't carried out. This was the fault of the Regimental commander, who had also exhibited very questionable decision-making in Normandy. Reading Phil Nordyke's combat history of the 508th - Put Us Down In Hell (2012) is very illuminating in this respect. Gavin inherited a Division from Matthew Ridgway with a problem Parachute Regiment and two excellent combat veteren units (three, if you include the Glider Infantry). Gavin entrusted the 508th with securing the Groesbeek ridge and then proceeding into Nijmegen to grab the bridges. The reason for the initial ridge objective is clear if you study a map. The German strength in Nijmegen was unknown and it was feared the 10.SS-Panzer-Division (reduced to a regimental battlegroup) might be in the city - its whereabouts were unknown at the time. If the ridge was occupied, it would be a significant defensive position blocking access to the city and its bridges. In the event, the city was evacuated of its rear echelon units and the available combat units were all deployed defending the Maas-Waalkanaal bridges west of the city. The 508th's commander, having secured the ridge without any opposition, then started digging-in, against orders, while sending only recon patrols into the city. The patrol from the 1st Battalion, consisted of the S-2 (Intelligence) Section, the 3rd Platoon from 'C' Company, an LMG Section from HQ Company, and equipped with 'C' Company's SCR-300 radio (on the battalion net). The patrol got separated in the city due to the Dutch citizens coming out onto the streets and celebrating their 'liberation' (source: Chapter 10, Put Us Down In Hell, Phil Nordyke, 2012). Only three lead Scouts from the S-2 Section got to the highway bridge. They surprised 6/7 Germans, taking them prisoner and capturing a "small artillery weapon". They waited for reinforcements that never arrived, until at dusk they decided to release their prisoners and withdraw. As they did so, they could hear "heavy equipment" arriving at the other end of the bridge (source: 'Nijmegen Bridge', Chapter 6, The 508th Connection, Zig Boroughs, 2013). Montgomery wrote after the war that he made a mistake in thinking the Canadian 1st Army would be able to clear the approaches to Antwerp on their own (it was in their sector), while he was going for the Ruhr with British 2nd Army. He made a similar mistake in Market Garden when he obviously thought the American units he was loaned for the operation were at least as capable as his own troops. In this case he was too polite to write that about his allies (probably another mistake), but it's very clear he was wrong to trust them. The result was the failure of the entire operation and the virtual destruction of 1st Airborne Division. The Parachute Infantry Regiment at Nijmegen had an easier job to do than the Parachute Brigade at Arnhem. They landed 30 minutes earlier, had 3 Km less to march to their main objective, and had less opposition than even Frost's battalion at Arnhem (he had MGs and armoured cars on his route). Frost held his bridge for four days, as Browning had promised, against a reduced SS-Panzer-Division and reinforcements from Germany. The 508th got three men to their bridge, and then had to withdraw. Blaming Montgomery is an emotional response, not a rational one based on the facts.
This operation is a textbook example of underestimating an enemy when victory seems within sight to the commanders. All that Montgomery had built his successes on at that point, particularly from his time in Africa, where he bided his time until he knew he had superiority in every way, suddenly went out the window with Market Garden. Still, if it hadn't been for the borderline suicidal bravery of Major Robert Caine VC, the situation afterwards would have been far worse
MG was not Monty..he had planned COMET which was cancelled on the 10th of sep, COMETS plans were then Ike gave them to Brereton and Williams who came up with MARKET and GARDEN..a good plan sadly Gavin messed it up by not taking the Waal bridge on landing.
Monty cancelled the original plan when Intel showed increased enemy strength. He then requested a postponement until the supplies that had been promised arrived. Ike ordered the Operation go ahead when it did.
One of the bitterly sad consequences of this failure was the summary execution of the many Dutch civilians who were suspected of assisting the allied effort during Market Garden. No POW camps for them. Also, the Germans exacted further retribution by demolishing much unscathed housing after the Arnhem battle....as a warning to the population. As a Brit who lived in Holland, I can tell you that the Dutch respect and appreciation of allied sacrifice, allied graves etc is overwhelming and incredibly moving. The German occupation of Holland (and other European countries) during WW2 has left deep psychological scars throughout mainland Europe that will (and should) linger for hundreds of years.
I was expecting a revisionist version of history; pleasantly suprised that this was not the case. Any commander today that would deploy troops into a conflict with defective communications (non-working radios) and deliberately hide the intelligence reports of heavy armour would and should face time behind bars. It was mainly through the tenacity of the individual soldier that the operation was partially successful; despite the incompetence of those of higher office.
@@spoddie The fact is; they were known to be defective and inoperable prior to take-off (how's that for incompetence - check with the Imperial Museum if you don't believe me).
You are so correct. Monty refused to allow the Intel about the SS Panzer Units to affect "His Grandiose Plan.) He was actually the best ally Germany had. Every one of his operations after Africa failed. I am a retired FDNY Captain, 1980-2003. My series Fatal Flaws traces 9/11 back to WWI. Fatal Flaws Book 1 1914-1945 goes in depth to examine all of the failures from that war as it related to world events. Especially Monty's.
@@richardmeo2503 Another brainwashed yank... Monty was a very good commander. Why dont you write about the bloody incompetence at hurtgen forest or pattons failures in the lorraine campaign. In Normandy while Monty fought the majority of german armour, Bradley couldnt overcome a few understrength german divisions. Had General Gavin captured Nijmegan bridge and had brereton not altered the plans for dropping paratroopers Market Garden wouldnt have ended so badly. Both American generals who evade criticism. Monty was the best the western allies had.
@Stephen Jackson Not true. They were discovered because overflights took photos of their tanks trying to stay under cover. Monty and company were warned of the tanks, but they never cancelled the plan nor did they warn their Paras.
Not taking the estuary of Antwerp was a failure of epic proportions. He shouldn't have been allowed to command anymore after that blunder. Instead he was given another chance with disastrous consequences. Not only did Market Garden fail, but it led to reprisals against the Dutch and this in turn made the situation for the Dutch in the following winter worse as well.
B A, let's just overlook his successes in Africa then and the fact that he was Commander in Chief of all allied land forces on D Day and for many weeks after and devised the plan for the ground forces. What an idiot he clearly was.
Market Garden was not Monty's plan. It was his idea, he did not do the planning. At Caen, there was more German armour per square mile than there was at Kursk.
@@CIMAmotor and the weather was garbage. Its amazing that the Americans get cut some slack in south where they faced minimal opposition because of the poor weather but Montgomery gets chastised for not being able to steamroll the largest concentration of armor assembled on the western front in a day.
Everyone has different views, and having studied it for years I still think it was very close to success, and if the plan had gone accordingly at Nijmegen, it might indeed have succeeded. I don't have the depth of knowledge of many though. But here goes.........firstly it all depends whether you assess the time they took against the 'hoped for' 48 hour (2 day) limit to reach Arnhem, or the outer time limit of 96 hours and 4 days. There were contributing factors, such as complexity, too many objectives for Paratroopers, distance of drops from objectives, drops carried out over different days rather than the single day intended, communication difficulties between air and ground, supply drop issues, weather, and critically speed and quality of German response, but still, it nearly succeeded. They knew of the presence of 10th SS Panzer Division, though there is debate whether they knew about 9th as well, totalling around 6,000 men near Arnhem, a depleted but still very capable force, but felt they could be overcome. So intelligence wasn't ignored, it was just under-estimated. Indeed, perhaps the biggest criticism is that they under-estimated the organisation and remaining strength of the German Army overall following their rout at Normandy, and under-estimated the effect of strong direct supply links between Germany and Arnhem, especially by rail. They also had excellent Commanders like Model, Student, Hemel, and Bittrich who knew the area like the back of their hand. But we cannot ignore the fundamental fact that Brereton reiterated that all Paratroopers must go for the bridges with 'thunderclap speed', so quite why the Waal bridge at Nijmegen was demoted to 4th priority by a combination of Boy Browning and US 82nd Commander Gavin (ultimately Gavin states this was his decision) remains a mystery, especially as Dutch intelligence told arriving US troops that there were no German tanks in the nearby Reichswold Heights or adjacent forest, which was instead given top priority. But holding landing zones and the Heights was given top priority by Gavin, and Browning was perfectly happy to authorise this battle order. In simple terms, too little priority was given by Gavin or Browning to take the Waal road bridge, though there is further internal 82nd debate whether Gavin's own Colonel's misinterpreted his own orders. The US Army official enquiry admonished Lindquist in this respect. As shock-troops, the lightly-armed British, US, and Polish Paratroopers all performed superbly, that is without question, as they were dropped at three different strategic locations along the route. The British only took the northern end of Arnhem Bridge however, with others bogged down on the outskirts at Oosterbeek, and the Poles were belatedly dropped into a 'hornets nest' but at least they helped relieve the encircled Brits there. 101st US did well to attain most objectives with relatively little initial opposition but later coming under constant attack, but as highlighted, 82nd delayed attacking the main Waal bridge, allowing 10th SS Panzer Division based near Arnhem to make the short journey and bed in strongly at the bridge later the same day, and also create strong defences on the elevated ground just south of the bridge, facing the adjacent town centre itself. They also bedded in within the town. This delay was critical as a window of opportunity was missed. 30 Corps (2nd British Army), containing 50,000 men, are often criticised, but Route 69 (Hells Highway) was a single-track 64-mile long, often elevated and exposed road that was well-defended at various points by anti-tank traps and 88-mil guns. 9 tanks were knocked out soon after they set off. 30 Corps - the Guards Brigade tanks and 50th Northumbrian Division took Valkenswaard by the evening on their first day, but they had only gained 6 miles. British 8th and 12th Divisions moved slowly forward on either flank. 30 Corps were further slowed by counter-attacks along the route and had to build a bailey bridge at Son on the evening of Day 2, before arriving at Nijmegen on schedule at mid-day on the 19th, only to find Nijmegen and its bridge firmly in the hands of the Germans. 30 Corps and 82nd US Division then spent more than 2 full days fighting in Nijmegen and for the bridge, eventually taking it at 7.30pm-8pm on 20th. This attack on the Waal bridge chiefly involved the King's Company of the 1st Grenadier Guards (30 Corps), who with 82nd US gradually cleared Nijmegen. The Grenadier's eventually charged the elevated defences at the southern end of the Waal bridge at the heavily-defended 'Valkhof' during heroic hand-to-hand fighting in ditches and defences, whilst the remaining Grenadier Guards and 82nd US Division took the adjacent Hunnerspark. These heroic efforts are little recognised, but these attacks where the Grenadier's lost nearly 100 dead enabled the bridge to be taken, when a few British Guards Brigade tanks rolled across the defended bridge, whilst 504th US Brigade heroically traversed the river under heavy fire, losing 48 men, taking the rail bridge and then meeting up at the northern end of the road bridge and around nearby Lent. A dozen tanks eventually got across despite the ongoing threat that it would be detonated, and formed a defensive semi-circle against counter-attack. Lets be clear, they were at this point only late because of having to take Nijmegen and its Waal bridge over 2 days. It is alleged that they could have gone on at this point, at 8pm on 20th, but in darkness they stopped to consolidate, with 30 Corps infantry still fighting in Nijmegen and also being pulled back to help 101st US division from counter-attack near Veghel where 107th SS Panzer Division broke the supply line for two full days. The Coldstream Guards were also helping 82nd US Division from an attack that now came from the Reichswold Heights, which was beaten off. On 21 September, the following morning, Guards Brigade set off but tanks were quickly taken out as they traversed along the exposed, raised road, so 43rd infantry (of 30 Corps) were brought forward and over the next few days they and Guards Brigade tanks were involved in heavy fighting between Nijmegen and Arnhem around Elst and what was called 'The Island'. After taking Elst, 30 Corps artillery were able to fire shells at the Germans at Oosterbeek. The brave Poles were dropped in and frantically tried to relieve the encircled British Airborne Paras at Oosterbeek, but separated by the river. The efforts of the British Paras at Arnhem are legendary, but once the bridge there fell totally into German hands late on the 20th, German troops and armaments from nearby Germany poured across the bridge into the region between Arnhem and Nijmegen, and the Allies withdrew over a few days to Nijmegen where both sides eventually settled, drawing a line for a period. So 30 Corps were involved in fighting backwards and forwards along the whole length of the 64 mile route, as Germans counter-attacked. Could they had moved more quickly at times? Possibly but who knows? Strategically, it was inevitably very difficult to organise and co-ordinate 50,000 troops, tanks and artillery to different, appropriate points of the narrow, littered highway as counter-attacks occurred. If Nijmegen Bridge had been taken when there were only a handful of guards there, on the day of arrival on 17th, and then kept, 30 Corps would have potentially been able to roll on to Arnhem rather than getting bogged down completing a job that was not meant to be their objective. The one other question that is open to debate is whether they could have gone on to Arnhem after taking Nijmegen Bridge on the evening of the 20th September, just 7-8 miles away. Model later confirmed that there were few defences between Nijmegen and Arnhem that evening, but the British did not know this and were fearing counter-attack. They only had a small contingent of tanks, and 30 Corps infantry were still on the other side of the river fighting in Nijmegen and further back south that night, and they state they were exhausted after 4 days of fighting. But Horracks had seemingly implied that they would do just that to 504th US troops prior to the attack. The situation was so fluid and the following day the German defences along the route were strong, and became stronger still over coming days. For me, this is the only criticism of 30 Corps that is arguable, and even then I think it is only said with the benefit of hindsight, and used as a deflection for 82nds failure to prioritise the Waal bridge. Those leading British tanks had bravely taken the bridge under the fear that it was about to be blown. In my opinion 30 Corps were on a hiding to nothing, and General Horracks always believes they performed very well against strong German defences, in difficult terrain. But yes, after taking the Waal bridge, they may have been overly cautious, but concurrently perhaps for good reason. The Germans were apparently very close to defeat at Arnhem, but strong supplies were being brought in, so whilst Operation MG, following closely after Normandy, seemed like a gamble worth taking at the time, it failed by a whisker. That marks the difference between post-battle assessment describing its creators as overly-ambitious and unrealistic egoists, to tactically brilliant and innovative leaders. But perhaps the Allies had severely underestimated the remaining strength of the Germans overall at this point, a justified criticism but of course easy to say after the event. It seemed a risk worth taking at the time, with leaders and planners determined to strike whilst the iron was hot and bring an end to the wretched war.
I would say; strategically excellent, operationally doubtful, tactically excellent. And that should have been obvious in the planning stages and steps should have been taken to offset the doubts (disadvantages in Wellington's decision making matrix).
@@graemesydney38 Well, that plan was doomed from the start - an overly-ambitious dream... But I was responding to a previous comment: "if the plan had gone accordingly, it might indeed have succeeded."
@@graemesydney38 I'm sorry sir, but as an X-Army officer, infantry, airborne, had I proposed such a plan at Fort Benning, (The Infantry Officer School) I fear I would have been laughed out of Georgia... Far too many critical path items, (single points of failure), coupled with weak intelligence on enemy dispositions. And on a personal note, as an Airborne officer, I can only feel disgust for the wasteful destruction of the 1st Paras.
my grandfather was I co 3rd battalion 504th pir 82nd airborne. He served with them from North Africa and participated in Sicily Salerno and Anzio prior to market garden. He made that assault in the first wave on the 20th of September across the waal. He helped organize and lead the survivors of the assault to clear the dike on the German side of the bridge. He was severely wounded trying to take out a mg-42 in a barn with a rifle grenade. Suffice to say his war was finally over., and he'd just turned 20 on September 16th of 44. Different breed.
If Market Garden had been a success, the Allied Forces had probably reached the Ruhr Area in October 1944. The Ruhr Area - a heavily industrialised region in Western Germany - was an important part of the German war industry. The loss of this large industry complex might have shortened the war by several months. Possibly the Western Allied Forces would have been the first to reach Berlin. Looking at the benefits, It was worth it IMO.
a successful Market Garden would also have cut off 15th Army Group, and opened up access to the port of Rotterdam, and potentially Amsterdam, too, making Antwerp a bonus port once available. The intention of Eisenhower for Market Garden was to push to the Ziederzee region, in addition to being at the gateway to the Rhur.
@@VeteranR No, the territories was already cut up between the Allies. The Soviet Union received Eastern Europe, including Poland. Some parts of Eastern Germany and Czechoslovakia were liberated by the Americans, but they had those territories given back to the Soviets.
Capturing Berlin would have a costly affair, it costs the Soviet Army 80.000 men. And Eastern Germany was already promised to Stalin, so no need to take Berlin.
My grandfather was a paratrooper in the British Army and took part in this disaster. He was "lucky" (his words) that he landed in a tree and broke both legs during his jump. He was found by other paratroopers and sent back to Britain, his war over. Many of his mates were not so lucky and joined the glorious dead or were captured. His only lament was that after signing up in 1940 - he was an Irishman from Tipperary living in London and was told to sign up or go back to Ireland - he spent "4 years marching on f'ing beaches" only to "never see a bloody German". Ironically, in the decades that followed the war, his best friend was "Fred" (Friedrich) a German man who was captured, was a POW in the UK, and later married an English woman. They became neighbours and then best mates. Fred gave the eulogy at granddad's funeral in 1997. RIP Grandad.
The plan wasn't merely complex, it was complex and each element was necessary to be successful for the next element to have any chance. In reality not a single airborne group took all of their objectives, but there wasn't really a good contingency if they failed to do so. Namingen may have been the worst failure (or the luckiest success, by all rights to bridge should have been blown), but the whole plan was susceptible to delays from each failure. So yeah, it really was a bridge too far.
@@johnschmidt1262 its a bit important that you know history and learn to spell place names correctly. u didnt even correct your scentence lmfao. and yes they are watching! this time i couldnt stand seeing a city name in the country where i live being spelled wrong, the correct spelling of the name can even be seen in the video many times !
If you look at the history of airborne operations in WW2(American, British, German, and Russian), most of them were flawed, failures, or even near disasters. To plan such an ambitious and complicated operation like Market-Garden, thinking and even depending on everything going absolutely right, was not being realistic. The planning for Market-Garden also ignored or deliberately violated the hard earned lessons of previous airborne operations. By spreading the airborne landings out over THREE days, the element of surprise was lost by day two. The airborne divisions were being asked to take and hold their objectives at reduced strength; in the case of the British 1st Airborne with barely a third of it's strength. Previous operations had shown the importance of landing airborne units on or immediately close to their objective. Landing miles from their main objectives, threw away the the element of surprise. Within a half hour of the landings, any competent German General with a map could see what Market-Garden was about, and take the initiative to oppose it. Lastly was the need of regular ground forces to quickly link up with airborne units. By necessity, airborne units are lightly armed and have less firepower. Even the overly optimistic expectation of 30th Corps to reach Arnhem in two days was pushing it.
@@dongilleo9743 I read your above conclusion in the book "War as I knew it": by General George Patton. About airborne troops must be close to their objectives and must be relieved by Allied ground troops fast.
The American 82nd never attempted to take the Bridge. And there was no major counterattack from the forest. As for the attack across the river the crews of the canvas boats were British and although the Americans had to cross the river once the boat crews crossed it 14 or more times and suffered 50%+ casualties.
Just to clarify some details, the first attempt to take the Nijmegen bridge was too late, due to a command failure in the 508th PIR on the first afternoon, 17 September. Subsequent attempts on the 19 September by the 505th with support from Guards Armoured Division also failed due to strong opposition by 10.SS-Panzer-Division. The final attacks in co-ordination with the river assualt by the 504th were successful, but the boats were crewed by engineers from C Company of the US 307th Airborne Engineer Battalion, which normally supported the 504th Regimental Combat Team. The first wave carrying H and I Companies 504th suffered 50% casualties, losing half of the 26 boats. Royal Engineers provided rafts for the Jeeps and anti-tank guns in the 504th RCT. Counter-attacks from the Reichswald forest did take place, conducted by myriad infantry units of poor quality from Division 406 of Wehrkreis VI and later II.Fallschirm-korps.
The major and most obvious reason the plan failed was the Allied decision to ignore vital intelligence. Admittedly the Dutch resistance had been infiltrated by the Germans which made any reports from them deemed unreliable but they did have aerial recon that showed tanks and troop build up. Gavin's decision not to prioritise Nijmegen bridge was a huge mistake as that was, after all, what the plan was all about, the bridges. Take them first, hold them, then worry about everything else. It also didn't help that the man in control of the Germans forces defending the front line with 30 corp was General Karl Student, the father of modern parachute tactics. He immediately saw what the Allies intended and used what forces he had to stop them, he knew just where to hurt them thanks to his experience and of course the captured plans from a crashed glider. With hindsight its easy to suggest ways the plan may have worked. For example use all the planes available to drop the 101st and 82nd on day one so they had full strength to take every bridge and hold it if 30 Corp had issues. The Germans would come south to try and retake Nijmegan and then on day two or 3 drop the entire British and Polish forces on Arnhem and capture the bridge putting the Germans in a vice between Arnhem and Nijmegan.
@@nickdanger3802 Not correct. Browning used over thirty invaluable gliders to fly his corps staff into the 82nd Div area with the first lift. These were actually the only people Browning commanded (they holed up in woods in the Groesbeek area under the command of Thomas Firbank, the author). In the Market garden plan the Divisions would retain independent command until reached by the ground forces. They would then come under the control of XXX Corps. It's likely that Browning just wanted to be in the combat area before the4 war ended.
@@nickdanger3802 No reason at all. Even Thomas Firbank, who commanded this motley collection of signallers and clerks, could see no reason for their presence at Groesbeek. He covers it loosely in his book 'I bought a star'
Montgomery staff didn’t believe the intelligence reports it was getting from the Dutch underground and the reconnaissance photos showing a few tanks were dismissed. In the end British and Polish paratroopers ended up going against an elite Armor division.
It wasn't that they didn't believe them, they just couldn't get confirmation. The Dutch resistance were normally very reliable and usually had good information, but the Germans had some counter-intelligence successes in penetrating Dutch resistance cells. The information could not be relied on without confirmation, but there is evidence the planning of the operation took into account the available information. At one stage the 82nd Airborne were planned to drop on Arnhem and the 1st Airborne at Nijmegen, but this was reversed after the only suggestion of panzer units remained in the Arnhem area and British Airborne Divisions had more anti-tank guns in their establishments. These included the heavy 17-pounder guns capable of taking on Tiger tanks, now air transportable for the first time, much to the surprise of the Germans. The tanks that were photographed in the Arnhem area were rightly dismissed, as a study conducted in 2015 by the RAF after the original photo came to light has proved. The tanks were obsolete models that did not belong to a 1944 Panzer-Division, and the only unit in Holland with such tanks were a training unit near the 101st Airborne's drop zones on the day the operation started, and were a minimal threat dealt with by the escorting fighter aircraft. The way Browning was portrayed in A Bridge Too Far greatly upset his widow, and also Dirk Bogarde who played him had misgivings, as he served during the war as an RAF Intelligence officer on Dempsey's 2nd Army staff. Most of the German opposition at Arnhem were from a vast array of training and replacement units mobilised from all over Holland and Germany. The 'elite' SS-Panzer-Divisions had been virtually destroyed by British units in Normandy and were in Holland to refit, although the 9.SS was actually in the process of leaving for Germany to refit.
"didn’t believe the intelligence reports" or chose not to believe them ? Chose not to present information to Montgomery because they knew he would demote or sack them ?
Actually, they did believe them which is why the operation was upgraded from Operation COMET (British 1st Airborne Division plus 1st Polish Independent Parachute Brigade) to Operation MARKET (adding the US 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions). This meant that Arnhem was assigned 4 brigades in stead of the initial one (1st Parachute Brigade). The two divisions refitting in the vicinity of Arnhem were hardly elite. They were divisions in name alone with very little armour - the only element that was anything close to strength was the 9th SS Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion which headed to Nijmegen initially only to drive into 1st Parachute Brigade’s 6-pounder guns when they returned to Arnhem. So understrength were they, that they were using captured pre-war French tanks in the initial phases of the action. Where the German’s excelled (and which was probably underestimated by the Allies) was their ability to reorganise rapidly (battle group) and to move armour to the area very quickly indeed.
I've studied WWII for over 25 years and have read more books on the subject than I could keep track of. And the inescapable truth is that Market Garden was a terrible waste of elite allied troops and was something that never should have been allowed to take place. In my view, it's a miracle that it got as far as it did and the only reason for that was the extremely fortunate and RARE accuracy of the air drops and the heroic efforts of the troops. Having said all of that, I try to keep my criticism in check because I try to keep in mind the lure of difficult operations that look like short cuts to victory. Everyone is desperate to end the war and as quickly as possible and I think often judgement is clouded by that sincere but desperate desire. The amphibious landings at Inchon during the Korean War comes to mind as an example of a daring operation that was successful. Had it failed, it would have been remembered with Market Garden.
Have you read Phil Nordyke's combat history of the 508th PIR, Put Us Down In Hell (2012), chapters 9 and 10? I've posted the key points in William Schutter's thread below if you would like to read them. The plan was working, until Nijmegen, and there it wasn't even followed. The operation was undone by a totally unforced error.
Market Garden wasn't that bad of an operation, it almost succeeded but was doomed by the 82nd airbornes inability to take Nijmegen. From what I've read the Germans had about a platoon holding the bridge but the 82nd didn't attack the bridge until the evening and even then it was only a battalion. Had the 82nd taken the bridge and Nijmegen and held it till 30 Corp got there, then 30 Corp would have reached Arnhem, instead the 82nd failed to take Nijmegen and 30 Corp had to clean Nijmegen up.
@@kieranwilliams6277 - Not even a platoon - Dutch resistance sources told the 508th PIR that only 18 Germans were guarding the highway bridge. The three Scouts from the 1/508th S-2 Section that made it to the south end took 6/7 Germans by surprise and captured "a small artillery weapon". (That would leave 11/12 at the north end, presumably another Flak weapon - I've seen a photo of a quad 2cm Flak gun located there - and probably some guards at the concrete barrier checkpoint). The Scouts waited until dusk for reinforcements that never arrived then decided to release their prisoners and withdraw. As they did so, they could hear "heavy equipment" arriving at the north end of the bridge (9.SS-Panzer recon battalion). Source: The 508th Connection, Zig Boroughs (2013). The 1st Battalion attack with two Companies later in the evening bumped elements of 9.SS-Panzer recon at the Keiser Karelplein traffic circle near the railway station, some distance from the bridge. It was far too late.
@@kieranwilliams6277 Right, because 88 and 20mm flak guns could not be used for defense. How long did it the 740 men who actually made to the last intact bridge in Arnhem take to secure one lightly defended end? When did the rest of 1st AB get there?
IWM "By 1944 Britain was running out of soldiers. The campaigns in the Mediterranean and Far East, the war at sea and the bomber offensive had all drained her manpower reserves. The army that was sent to Normandy lacked for nothing except adequate reserves of fighting troops. Though well supplied with weapons, vehicles and equipment, Second Army could not afford huge losses, militarily or indeed politically. With vast reserves of US manpower now coming on stream, it was vital for Britain's interests and national standing that her field army was strong enough both to engage and defeat the Germans, and then also provide a sustainable army of occupation. Everything had to be done to minimize casualties and preserve the army's fighting strength. One who understood this only too well was the land forces commander, General Sir Bernard Montgomery." Tactics and the Cost of Victory in Normandy
Stretching supply line requirements too far from the beginning as the original plan, doomed Market Garden to failure. Eisenhower should never have agreed to the plan.
I think that is exaggerated. But the picture could have been very different if the RAF and the USAF had cleared the IX and X SS panzer divisions the day before the attack and if the paras were dropped close the the Arnhem bridge. The idea of crossing the Waal with a Bailey bridge does not show any appreciation of the huge width of this river. But the ferry at Driel could have been very useful had the British not ignored it.
@@lyndoncmp5751 Indeed, you could argue that Market-Garden was set to fail back in 1942-43, when the Americans and British were setting their production and training priorities. If all three airborne divisions and the Polish brigade had been able to land at full strength at one time on the first day of Market-Garden, the course of the operation would almost certainty have been successful. To have the required number of transport planes, gliders, glider tugs, pilots and crews in September 1944 would have required that they be put in the production and procurement system in the 1942-43 time period. In 1942-43, American and British procurement people had to plan for what they might need come 1944. Do they build fighters, fighter-bombers, and bombers, which they know will be useful, or do they devote precious and scarce resources to build transport planes and gliders, and train crews to go with them, that might be useful in some unforeseen future large airborne operations? They did the logical thing at the time and built warplanes, not transport planes. Not having the required number of transports for Market-Garden meant the operation either had to be scaled back to use the available air assets, or that the airborne units had to go in piecemeal over several days. Going in piecemeal meant the divisions were understrength on the crucial first day when it was most important to seize their assigned objectives. After that, the most important element of surprise was lost, and they found themselves increasingly set up on by German reinforcements. It is strange that both the Americans and British devoted so much to building airborne forces, without devoting the effort, expense, and resources to build the necessary air assets to deploy them; at least not all at once. There was never the expectation that more than one or two divisions would be used at a time. Even by the time of Operation Varsity in March 1945, the Americans and British still only had the air assets to deploy two airborne divisions at once. Originally, an additional American airborne division was planned to participate, but the lesson of the importance of landing airborne units at full strength on day one had been brutally relearned from Market -Garden.
My take on Operation Market Garden was that it was set to a strict schedule which, doesn't always work, this kind of thing was used in WW1 aswell with the "Creeping Barrage" that shielded allied troops, monty also tried this kind of thing during el alamein, but the only reason it worked in the desert/el alamein was because the General before him claude auckinleck already setup 8th armies defences so all monty had to do was train his troops and then beat rommel through attrition. Now with market garden, if it worked then it would've been the master-stroke of the war, but even i think advancing up a single road is just asking for trouble which ofcourse it was, since it was nicknamed "hells highway", now what they could've done was set 30th corps off first, and then drop the paras from each division as soon as 30th corps reaches each bridge, this would've caught the germans by surprise each time, then maybe instead of going for arnhem, perhaps they could've crossed via Driel instead over into oostbeek and then swung to their right into arnhem. But i think alot of people will probably say that going for antwerp would've been the better choice , all in all market garden was only successful in creating a sailient , monty then had to help the canadians clear the scheldt estuary of germans, personally i think the broad front strategy was better , either way...theirs so many ways market garden could've worked if it was allowed to be "adapted" depending on the situation , it failed mainly due to sticking to a time-table. I don't mind if someone corrects me or disagree's , just voicing my take on it.
MARKET GARDEN had three main supply routes for the three Corps of British 2nd Army, and there was nothing unusual about using this system in MARKET GARDEN, which seems to have escaped most historians. The centre line 'Club Route' was the code name used by the Guards Armoured Division all the way from Normandy to Bremen in Germany, 1945. The US 101st Airborne nicknamed their section of the Highway 69 route as 'Hell's Highway' during MARKET GARDEN, mainly because they were constantly moving up and down the highway fighting fires to keep it open, but I suspect the Americans just like being dramatic and everything is "hell" in one way or another. Only this afternoon I was watching the Hollywood Audie Murphy biopic "To Hell And Back" (1955) - it didn't look that bad to me! The Guards Armoured Division had previously encountered problems on their traditional 'Club Route' during the advance from the Seine, when they encountered reconnaissance units from the US 2nd Armoured Division ('Hell on Wheels') on their route that had strayed across the inter-divisional/corps/army/army group boundary, and had to be politely redirected. There was no bridge at Driel and one would have to be built based on the ferry crossing point, which would slow the operation down. The next bridge to the west was a rail bridge at Rhenen, and Horrocks was denied permission to go for it by Montgomery, presumably because it would be too far an extension to the west from the main axis. Antwerp could not have been opened in mid-September. The Scheldt was in the Canadian sector and they were repositioning themselves around Antwerp during MARKET GARDEN in preparation for commencing their operations to clear the estuary after MARKET GARDEN was successfully concluded and logistics could be prioritised to Canadian 1st Army. Montgomery argued that leaving Antwerp behind on the left flank and cutting off all German forces in the western Netherlands by advancing to the Zuider Zee (Ijsselmeer) coast would ease the operations around Antwerp. Opening Antwerp first would allow the Germans more time to strengthen their river and canal defence lines in the Netherlands and make an eventual Rhine crossing operation more difficult and costly. The port was needed to supply Eisenhower's broad front advance into Germany after multiple Rhine crossings, not the advances to the Rhine. Even Eisenhower saw the sense in this and felt that he had to set the record straight after A Bridge Too Far was published: 'Eisenhower was similarly unapologetic when he declared after the publication of Cornelius Ryan's best-selling account, A Bridge Too Far, “I not only approved Market-Garden, I insisted upon it. We needed a bridgehead over the Rhine. If that could be accomplished I was quite willing to wait on all other operations.” ' (Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life, Carlo D'Este, 2015)
@salvadorvizcarra769 - who kept Russia in the war between 1941 and 1945? I suggest you research US Lend Lease to the Soviet Union - it amounted to $11.3 billion, or $180 billion in today's money.
Montgomery's ego killed so many soldiers. He came up with a plan with no room for anything to go wrong, ignoring the factors that made it impractical. Because, you imagine, he was so busy picturing the accolades and parades people would give him for his brilliant plan, he didn't want to hear that it wouldn't work. That it worked as well as it did was due to almost superhuman effort by the poor soldiers throw into this stupid plan.
Far fewer troops were killed in Market Garden than other allied battles at the same time such as the Lorraine, Hurtgen Forest, Operation Queen etc. And those all failed too.
A background factor was that there was infighting over control of the airborne corp and this had to have a detrimental effect on communication/coordination.
Let’s not forget that hindsight is a wonderful thing. With a few different factors in the allies favour it would be heralded as the best manoeuvre ever.
@@Goulmy86 The Rhur was maybe the eventual destination. However the original plans were to secure the airstrip at Driel and swing north first. This would cut off a large section of German troops and open Antwerp up to supplies.
Michel Goulmy The Ijssel was irrelevant. Easily Bailey Bridged. The plan for Market Garden was also for much of Arnhem to be taken not just the bridge. If this was achieved, the Ijssel wouldn't have presented many problems. The Germans possibly would have even pulled back with XXX Corps in Arnhem in great force and allied ground attack aircraft prevalent during consolidation. Of course, the Americans would have had to get past Aachen and then Cologne for a pincer attack into the Ruhr, and that would have been a bigger problem. They couldn't get much further than Aachen all through the rest of 1944.
Market-Garden was similar to Japanese naval battle plans. Complex and requiring the enemy to act as expected. Disregarding that an enemy may not do as the plan expected them too. The enemy always had a say in how the battle proceeds
@@davemac1197 …. One reason the US Army is said in WW2 to have done well is chaos. As in war is chaos. And the US Army was practiced in chaos. On a daily basis. The US Navy had it’s own traditions separate from the Royal Navy. Before the end of the first year of the Pacific War lessons had been learned and underperforming senior naval officers replaced. As Admiral Yamamoto warned after Pearl Harbor Japan was headed into a war it couldn’t win. However his IJN took a grim toll on the US Fleet that first year
@@Idahoguy10157 - that's a really interesting point. For many years since reading Cornelius Ryan in 1977, I thought all the problems that Market Garden suffered were the reason it failed. It's only in the last 10 years that a number of books have emerged going back to the source material and taking a fresh look at it to arrive at a different conclusion. It's now clear to me that Market Garden failed because of one regimental commander in 82nd Airborne failed to follow the plan at Nijmegen, and that officer was also criticised in his unit's first operation in Normandy and got a lot of men killed. It's clear that the divisional commander should have taken action to remove that officer from command of the regiment, either during or after Normandy. In fact Matthew Ridgway had an easy way out of the problem, because he was promoted to command the XVIII Airborne Corps in August, and the officer in command of the 508th Parachute Infantry began his Airborne career as a very talented S-1 (Admin officer) to the Airborne forces, so Ridgway could have taken that officer with him to XVIII Airborne Corps as his S-1, and a proven combat officer take over the 508th Regiment. The division was taken over by James Gavin, the Assistant Divisional Commander, and the first mistake he made was not to replace himself, so in Market Garden he was running himself ragged doing both jobs!
@@Idahoguy10157 - to answer your original post, the enemy actually took advantage of an Allied mistake - the failure to secure the Nijmegen bridges on the first afternoon. The Germans correctly identified Nijmegen as their 'schwerpunkt' (point of main effort), and that's where they defeated Market Garden.
@@davemac1197 …. Obviously you’re more well read than I am. I’ve opined that sending armor and mechanized infantry up one raised exposed two lane road was one fatal flaw. IMHO Monty should instead have prioritized securing the Schelt estuary to get the port of Antwerp online. I realize the entire Airborne Army was waiting for a mission. But as Market-Garden showed there was already a lack of C-47’s and gliders to use them all expeditiously in a drop. Compare that to simply trucking the 101st Division to reinforce Bastogne in December. Where they were invaluable to holding off the Germans
RAF on Market Garden "In their view the right course was to use all available transport aircraft to maintain supplies to Patton's army, which was the furthest forward, so that he could continue his offensive. It was impossible to do both once the Supreme Commander ruled in favour --192-- of airborne operations." Hyperwar Royal Air Force 1939-1945 Vol III
@@str2010 Patton's supplies were never diverted to Montgomery - that's one of the many myths around Market Garden. Patton had already exhausted his own supplies, those he'd captured from a German supply dump, and the extra allocation (proportionately) that Bradley was giving him over Hodges' 1st US Army and yet he was still stuck at Metz before Market Garden had even begun to be planned! Yes again, one of the many myths that surround Market Garden and Patton, himself!!
@@sean640307 the battle of Metz began on 27 September. Operation Market Garden began on 15 September. How exactly was Patton bogged down at a battle well before market garden began to be planned when said battle began after market garden began?
@@str2010 Market Garden started on the 17th September, but the battle for Metz unofficially begins as early as the 2nd Sept, with the capture of Nancy, Verdun, etc, which is the precursor to it and Patton had already over-extended his lines of supply. The biggest issue for Patton was actually not just fuel, but was also heavy ammunition. Patton had run out of fuel on the 2nd of September, when he claimed to have patrols at Metz and on the Moselle. In reality, he didn't, but that was what he told Eisenhower and Bradley in an effort to force them to prioritise his supply chain over Hodges and Montgomery. The claim that Montgomery was responsible for Patton not having fuel was Bradley's work after the war, but it simply wasn't true. Eisenhower's broad front strategy was the issue, and all armies were suffering because of it. They had all moved far quicker than had been planned for, and this meant that none of the armies had what they needed, let alone what they wanted. Bradley unofficially prioritised Patton over Hodges, by allocating resources on a one-for-one basis, but as Patton's 3rd US Army was smaller than Hodges' 1st US Army (having given up units for 9th US Army under Simpson to take Brest!) The US style of always trying to attack everywhere, all at once, with the same intensity needed to have a logistics chain that could keep up with it. Given that at this stage, Antwerp was still in German hands, Le Havre had only just been captured by the First Canadian Army (and made available to the US for supply) and that the US had failed to take Brest, their allocated deep water port, there simply was no way that any of the armies could continue on like they did. Patton had moved at break-neck speed across vacant ground, which looked great on a map, but was against no opposition. 21AG had moved at a similar pace through France and Belgium and only had fuel reserves for about another 150 miles, at best. Patton needed about 350,000 gallons per day, but was getting about 200,000 (the Red Ball express was burning a gallon for every gallon it carried!) It was during this period that Patton's forces had their win at Arracourt, destroying many German Panthers for negligible losses of their own, but just after that, he came to a complete stop. The real fight for Metz had begun!
I'm going to say something to my friends who have commented on this video that will be controversial, but from my studies of WWII I don't believe Operation Market Garden was ever meat to be, or going to be a total success. However, it was far from a total failure. The Allies were able to secure the port at Antwerp for supplies for the winter & open a huge new front against the Germans which eventually led to the Battle of the Bulge & the end of WWII. The allies & Montgomery made the decision & put mostly British forces in harm's way just as they did on D Day by landing in Caen. Operation Market Garden gave the Allies multiple ways to resupply & keep pouring the pressure on the German High Command. It wasn't a popular battle plan because it led to so many casualties, but it was the right & necessary thing to do to win the war. It had to be done.
"Montgomery later admitted that he was wrong to assume the Canadians could open the approaches to Antwerp while his forces tried to reach Germany. But his timing was off. The Canadians began fighting around Antwerp in early October, after Market Garden had ended. So, our original question prompts another: Why did it take to the middle of October for Montgomery to support the embattled Canadians and make Antwerp a priority?" Legion magazine Should Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery have tried to clear the Scheldt Estuary in September 1944?
@@nickdanger3802 But if you look at the big picture, Antwerp would have never really been secured as the Germans could have launched a successful counter offensive earlier against that port which failed in December when they finally did launch their final assault against the allies. Personally, I believe the reason the Germans didn't was because they were very concerned that the allies could attack from a myriad of fronts thanks to Market Garden. I'm not in love with Monty as a master strategist, but the operation was far from a total failure.
Actor Dirk Bogarde plays General Browning, who discounts the reports of photo interpreters that detected German tanks in the area. During the War Bogarde actually was a photo interpreter.
05:22 this mostly concurs with TIK’s assessment for his Battlestorm series on Market Garden, BUT... the point is that Gavin ignored his main objective when he could have grabbed it immediately. He needed to go for it, but instead... much as I dislike that egotist Patton, at least *he’d* have gone for it even if he had to charge over there himself.
But what good would holding the Nijmegen bridge do when 30th corps is still several days away? Gavin took the bridge as soon as the bridge was useful. After taking the bridge, 30th corps had to turn around to recapture the road to Nijmegen.
Gavin's operational instructions to the 508th PIR were to go for the bridges as soon as the Groesbeek ridge was secure. They didn't. That's what went wrong, and Gavin was furious when he found out they were digging-in on the ridge.
"Lieutenant-General Browning specified to their commander, Brigadier-General Gavin, who gave his approval, that the 82nd Airborne's priorities were, first, the large area of high ground known as the Groesbeek Heights, second, the bridge over the River Maas at Grave, then three bridges over the Maas-Waal Canal, and finally Nijmegen Bridge." Pegasus Archive Arnhem 30. Reasons for the Failure
@@morganmcallister2001 no, XXX Corps didn't have to turn around and recapture the road to Nijmegen. Some of the Guards units were sent back down the road, but the rest did not.
@@davemac1197 508PIR written orders state they were to secure the Heights first, then go for the bridge. It's open to interpretation as to what "secure" meant. Clearly, in Lindquist's eyes, his orders were to dig in first before making a move. Gavin also allegedly gave Lindquist verbal orders to go for the bridge immediately upon landing, something Lindquist denied and in the post-Op interview with Capt Westover, Westover concurred with Lindquist's summation of events.
1st airborne division never ran out of 6pdr and 17 pdr ammunition in the final cauldron north of the north rhine-which is why the perimeter wasnt overun
*Historynet Martin van Creveld calculated in his superb study of logistics, Supplying War: Logistics From Wallenstein to Patton Monty’s “40 divisions” realistically would have been quickly reduced to a mere 18 when all logistical and operational requirements were considered. Captured ground could not simply be left in a vacuum, but had to be occupied and defended against the inevitable German counterattacks. Supply lines had to be protected and secured, and as a force advanced, those key “sinews of war” extended longer and longer, requiring the diversion of increasing numbers of combat troops to protect them.* Ike approved the September 1944 Operation Market-Garden, Monty’s attempt to “jump” the lower Rhine and position his army group to drive on to the Ruhr industrial region. Market-Garden famously and disastrously failed at the “bridge too far” at Arnhem at the same time that German forces supposedly were so depleted and disorganized that Monty’s narrow thrust, it was claimed, would easily slice right through them and capture the Ruhr. Monty’s boast that his single axis advance would quickly win the war was both literally and figuratively “a bridge too far” at that point of the war in Europe. Moreover, because Monty failed to capture the Scheldt Estuary expeditiously and open the port of Antwerp (closed to Allied shipping until December), Ike’s SHAEF logisticians at the time calculated that only 12 divisions could have been supported in a rapid advance. *Van Creveld weighed all the factors in the “broad front” vs. “narrow thrust” strategy debate and concluded, “In the final account, the question as to whether Montgomery’s plan presented a real alternative to Eisenhower’s strategy must be answered in the negative" Eisenhower actually gave Montgomery a chance to show that his narrow thrust strategy could succeed - and Monty botched it.*
I read that the Dutch Staff College had an exercise that involved an advance up the highway that XXX Corp was supposed to advance. Each time this was tested it failed. I also read that despite the shortage of transports Browning insisted that a large number of planes be used to fly in his staff. His staff, apparently, were not effective in the battle.
Well, it is something of a mandatory item for an officer to have to investigate and assess the Market-Garden operation. As such this has been undertaken so many times (also by yours truly) that it's almost not funny. What otoh is, is the fact that about 50% came up with a winning scenario in which all major objectives were attained and all of those deviated from historic reality in that 82nd Airborne would have stuck to their original priorities to capture and secure the Nijmegen bridge asap and in force. i.e. NOT the half-hearted and miserly attempt with about a measly company-sized and already combat-spent unit. Whether it had been Gen. 'Boy' Browning or Gen. Gavin who got all worked up about the rumoured threat to Groesbeek Heights from the direction of the Reichswald (that never and could never have materialized) I will leave in the middle but the crucial reason for failure was the failure to Capture the Nijmegen bridge in time.
@@Centurion101B3C "Lieutenant-General Browning specified to their commander, Brigadier-General Gavin, who gave his approval, that the 82nd Airborne's priorities were, first, the large area of high ground known as the Groesbeek Heights, second, the bridge over the River Maas at Grave, then three bridges over the Maas-Waal Canal, and finally Nijmegen Bridge." Pegasus Archive Arnhem 30. Reasons for the Failure
@@Centurion101B3C At about 0630 on day two 2,300 grade B Germans with five armored cars, three halftracks with quad 20mm guns and 24 medium mortars attacked the Heights. They were driven off about 1330 by fighters escorting the day two glider landing with the rest of the 82nd and the bulk of 82nd arty.
@@nickdanger3802 Yeas!? That was on Day 2, when it already was WAY too late to do the itchy-bridgy thingy in Nijmegen that should and could have been done immediately after landing on day 1. 30th Corps was already chomping at the bit to get things going in Grave after linking up with 82 Airborne. At which time it became necessary to apply 30th Corps to get into the nitty-gritty of fighting German SS units throughout the Northern urban areas in Nijmegen. Something that the mostly Cavalry units of 30th Corps were not exquisitely suited for. Tanks and urban areas infested with a tenacious opponent defending do not mix overly well and the fighting reflected that.
It wasn't a success for the Germans, they lost 4 bridges and lost a ton of ground, and key position, sure they prevented it from being a total disaster by not losing Arkhem but they were fighting with heavy armor and tanks against a few surrounded and under equipped paratroopers divisions there, obviously would be an embarrassment to lose that fight.
As I understand the situation, a large part of the failure can be laid at the feet of Gen. Gavin. He had one objective and one only: capture of the bridge(s) at Nijmegen. Now I do understand the need to protect your flanks but Gavin seem to have made protecting his flanks a priority which delayed capturing the bridge. By the time the flanks were deemed sufficiently fortified, the Germans had fortified positions at both bridges with a defensive perimeter around it in the town. From that moment on the paratroopers had very little chance of capturing any of the Nijmegen bridges before being reinforced by armoured units that were being held up between Son and Veghel.
That's essentially correct, but just a couple of points. Of Gavin's three Parachute Regiments, the 504th were assigned to the Maas bridge at Grave and taking the Maas-Waalkanaal bridges from the west, the 505th to assist in taking the canal bridges from the east, clear the town of Groesbeek, take a rail bridge over the Maas at Mook, and patrol the Reichswald forest. The 508th were assigned to first secure the Groesbeek ridge (a possible German defensive position), and once that was secure, to move on the bridges in Nijmegen as soon as possible. The problem was the 508th was the least aggressive unit in the Division, because of its poor leadership. At 1800 hrs on the first day, Gavin learned the 504th had secured his supply line - his top priority, the 505th reported the Reichswald empty and unsuitable for tanks, and the 508th were reported digging-in on the Groesbeek ridge against absolutely no opposition. Gavin was furious and ordered the 508th's Liaison Officer into a Jeep to "get them moving!" It was too late. The XXX Corps ground forces were still on schedule when they made contact with the 504th at Grave, about 45 hours into the operation, only to find the Nijmegen bridges were still in German hands and heavily reinforced with SS-Panzer troops. There was no delay between Son and Grave, they did that journey in 2.5 hours for the armoured cars and 4 hours for the tanks. In fact there wasn't even really a hold up at Son because the Bailey bridge was constructed overnight when it was doctrine not to operate tanks. They would have to stop overnight in the 101st Airborne's area anyway. The delay that put the operation 36 hours behind the notional schedule happened at Nijmegen, when two combined operations, the first unsuccessful, had to be mounted to finally capture the Waal bridges.
He had four objectives capture the bridges at Nimegan, Waal, Graves and secure the high ground against possible counter attack. Three of them were achieved on schedule. The problem was he needed to take all four for the operation to be considered successful. That was really the underlying problem of operation Market Garden, there were too many things that could go wrong that simply couldn't be worked around.
@@johnschmidt1262 The bridges were the key though, what is the point of holding the heights if you haven't secured the bridges. Gavin has a well deserved good reputation but the delay at Nijmegen was potentially crucial.
@@johnschmidt1262 yet he was to prioritise the bridges and he didn't. He has to take a fair share of the blame like the planners should for ignoring key intelligence.
@@Challis1989 I saw the Tik video also. It's fine to believe Gavin made a mistake, I was simply pointing out it is factually wrong to say that he only had one objective. It's also worth pointing out that none of the airborne groups actually achieved all of their objectives successfully. But most of the fault has to lie with the plan itself, they really didn't ask what would happen if any group fails, a possibility you should always consider. The whole plan was set up in a way such that any one element failing causes the failure of everything further down the line.
Eisenhower gave it an 85% thumbs up once the Nijmegen bridge was secure we moved supplies to Antwerp about 140 k from Nijmegen where we crossed into Germany with all the supplies we needed the Nijmegen bridge was so important the RAF built RAF Laarbruch after the war to defend the Bridge the Furthest northern Airfield built by the British Once we realised we could not take the Arnhem bridge, we bombed it so it became irrelevant that is where the Mistakes began narrow Road tanks advancing to quickly for the Infantry to catch up and a failure to read the evidence of tanks Located the German side of the Bridge and dropping the Troops off 8 miles away Note it was the Canadians who Liberated the Nederland's
I'm not a fan of Montgomery's plan here but this is a silly comment. Montgomery was an Army Group commander. He didn't lead Corps. He was way above that.
Modern warfare does put commanders in rear echelon positions not like the old days When even kings rode into battle! Saul has slain thousands David tens of thousands!
@@angloaust1575 The Romans smashed army after army of brave warrior kings because by in large their commanders would sit up on commanding terrain, properly see the battlefield, and be able to react to the battle as it unfolded. Save the heroics for the rank and file. Commanders need to lead.
Don't know which German soldiers you're talking about, but 9 and 10.SS-Panzer-Divisions were raised in France in 1943 and trained for counter-airborne operations in preparation for the expected Allied invasion of the continent, but were sent to Ukraine to rescue the 1.Panzerarmee at Tarnopol in April 1944 and therefore missed the D-Day landings for which they were trained to fight in June. They were brought back to Normandy by late June and further reduced by British units in the fighting around Caen and Hill 112. After helping to keep the Falaise gap open as long as possible they conducted a withdrawal to Arnhem to refit in early September. They were in Ukraine on the Eastern Front for barely three months, not years.
One of the commanders of German forces there was Kurt Student - former commander of German airborne forces,so the trap for allied airborne assault was well-prepared.
There was no trap set for Allied airborne forces on any large scale, the airborne operation was a complete surprise, the Germans were only expecting British 2nd Army to continue their advance from their Neerpelt bridgehead on the Meuse-Escaut canal at any time, but they were not expecting the airborne landings. The reason General Kurt Student was sent to the Netherlands was because Hermann Göring had completely surprised Hitler's staff during a discussion on how to close the huge gap that had opened up in their lines in Belgium by offering tens of thousands of redundant Luftwaffe ground personnel who were no longer needed because of the parlous state of his air force. These personnel were therefore transferred to the Fallschirmtruppe and used to rebuild the Fallschirmjäger regiments decimated by the fighting in Normandy. Student was in Berlin and available, so he was assigned to command the new 1.Fallschirm-Armee, based at 's-Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands, where there was a collection centre for surviving Fallschirmjäger troops from Normandy forming a cadre for rebuilding the Fallschirmtruppe. Student was also given command of the army's LXXXVIII Korps, which were part of the occupation forces based in the Netherlands and contained a couple of static divisions redeployed from the Dutch coast. The only officer who predicted an airborne assault specifically in the Arnhem area was Luftwaffe Generalmajor Walter Grabmann, commander of the 3.Jagd-Division at Deelen airbase north of Arnhem. He tried to warn Generalfeldmarschall Walter Model at a dinner hosted by Model at his new headquarters in Oosterbeek that the fields to the west of Oosterbeek around Wolfheze made ideal landing zones and his headquarters might be vulnerable. Model dismissed these concerns as he felt secure so far from the front lines and behind several river barriers, he thought it was unlikely the Allies would try such a deep penetration with an airborne operation. The one officer present at the dinner who took Grabmann's warning seriously was SS-Sturmbannführer Sepp Krafft, commander of the SS-Panzergrenadier-Ausbildungs-und-Erstaz-Bataillon 16, who decided to remove his two training companies of Hitler Youth, who were finishing their training as replacements for 12.SS-Panzer-Division 'Hitlerjugend', from their barracks in Arnhem and have them camped in the woods just north of Oosterbeek on the Johannahoeve estate. Krafft himself occupied the nearby Villa Waldfriede. The next day the airborne attack began with the preliminary bombing of the barracks in Arnhem and other towns, followed by glider and parachute landings at Wolfheze. Krafft had his 2.Kompanie on an exercise in the woods near the Hotel Wolfheze at the time, and they were immediately ordered to attack the landing zones with an aggressive reconnaissance, while he brought up his 4.Kompanie and ordered his 7.(Stamm) reception and 8.(Genesenden) convalescent companies in Arnhem and Velp respectively to form a 9.(Marsch) march company to reinforce them. This battalion was the only unit placed in exactly the right location at the right time to cause the most immediate impediment to the airborne deployment at Arnhem, and neither the II.SS-Panzerkorps in the Veluwe and Achterhoek regions or Student's 1.Fallschirm-Armee in the province of Noord-Brabant were anticipating an airborne operation at all.
The Parachute Regiment museum at Arnhem is wonderful as a resource for this. And it tells more of the story, as the Germans afterwards took out their frustrations on the Dutch citizens. But in all of this, Monty's ego shines through. The plan would have been brilliant had it worked, but it was extremely complex and complicated. Everything would have to work perfectly, and of course it didn't. But Monty was so fixated on the plan that he willfully ignored the intelligence of the presence of 2 SS Panzer divisions in Arnhem, which previously was thought to be defended by weak homeguard units that would put up light resistance. He was told, but that didn't fit his plan, so he ignored it, and 7,500 paratroopers were lost. Not to mention all the other units that took casualties during the operation.
@@CIMAmotor The driving force behind the creation of Market Garden was Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, who disagreed with the 'broad front' strategy favoured by Eisenhower, in which all Allied armies in North-West Europe advanced simultaneously. The whole operation would not have taken place if it was n´t for Montgomery insisting on having it his way.
Montgomery's objective was to reach eventually even further into the Netherlands; even to the IJsselmeer lake which separates the West part of the Netherlands to the North and East, and in that way cut off the German troops and encircle those in the key provinces of North and South Holland. Isolated they would have been easily forced to surrender. He probably counted on a shock effect too, disorganised defense. Instead he found refitted troops, SS army pantzer groups with veterans that previously fought in Normandy and had a score to settle. I also think he wanted to stop V1 and V2 rockets that were mostly fired from the Netherlands. Although it was an opportunistic, ultimately brazen plan, but I would not call it a complete failure. Even if they did not liberate the Netherlands, they did cut through the German front, in fact the allies made enormous and fast progress to the north and west wards. They fought extremely hard and it was a huge blow to the Germans. It also cost a lot of civilian lives and many cities and towns were left in total ruin. For the Dutch, the price was very high; while expected to be liberated, and you face this destruction instead, let's say it left some bitter and mixed emotions about Montgomery's ambitions. But this is war, you can hardly blame a single general, the tip of the spear always takes the brunt of the impact, but the spear itself lodged deep. The Germans north of the Rhine never managed to cross or wage a significant counter offensive. When the last winter of war turned very harsh in the lowlands, a horrific famine followed, especially hit hard were the big cities, like Amsterdam and Rotterdam, as already scarcely available food was taken mostly by the Germans, thousands of people died. This was the hangover for the Dutch after the high expectations of september 1944.
I agree with every word except the SS-Panzer units (9.SS and 10.SS-Panzer-Divisons of II.SS-Panzerkorps) were not yet "refitted". Your English is obviously very good, but it would be correct to say they were in the area to "refit", but this process had not yet started.
In reality Monty's plan had No Chance of success because of his constant failures. (He was the best ally Germany Had!) Ike had ordered him to clear the Estuary to enable him to get his supplies from Antwerp. Monty refused. He was supposed to form the northern pincer at Falaise to surround the Germans in Normandy with Patton. Monty again failed and over 50,000 escaped. Many of those units were re-equipped and waiting in Belgium and Holland!
@@richardmeo2503 - and yet Market Garden came very close to succeeding - I understand now why an American unit at Nijmegen deliberately had to screw up to ensure Montgomery maintained his perfect record of failure. Thanks for straightening me out, Dick. By the way, Montgomery wrote after the war that he also made a mistake in thinking the Canadian 1st Army would be able to clear the Scheldt Estuary on their own - it was in their sector after all. Since Montgomery was commander of 21st Army Group, 1st Canadian Army was part of his command. He didn't refuse to do anything. He overestimated the capability of an ally. Seems to be a habit of his, doesn't it? And at Falaise, Patton's Third Army was under Montgomery's command. Land Forces command did not transfer to Eisenhower until 1st September. So which arm of the pincer was at fault? Dempsey's British 2nd Army, or Patton's US 3rd Army? I would put that one down to the Germans, unless hipocrisy is another hobby of yours?
@@davemac1197 No, MG did not come close to succeeding. It was a ridiculous plan and IKE was wrong in allowng it. Patton was NOT under Monty's command at Falaise, He was under Bradley. And both were under IKE who had taken over in July. Had Monty made it to Caan on DDay as was planned and he boasted he would, Falaise would never have happened. But since Monty took 28 days to reach Caan, just 12 miles from the beaches, and within range of Navy guns, the Americans had to plod through the Bocage getting decimated. The Allies planned on 12 fighter strips, all in Monty's sector. Since he never advanced, they were never built, increasing US losses in the Bocage. You should read my book. It has over 200 footnotes, and the series was written over 12 years. As far as "Monty writing after the war," it was done to cover his failures, which prolonged the war costing hundreds of thousands of casualties, military and civilian, and assisted Stalin in controlling most of Europe. If you can't face my work, read It Never Snows in September, Death of a Nazi Army and The Battle for Mortain. Those works highlight his failures, and what should have been done.
@@richardmeo2503 - and Bradley's 12th Army Group was under Montgomery's command during Falaise - he was Land Forces Commander until Eisenhower took over on 1st September, not 1st July! 'On August 13, 1944, concerned that American troops would clash with Canadian forces advancing from the north-west, Bradley overrode Patton's orders for a further push north towards Falaise, while ordering XV Corps to "concentrate for operations in another direction".[1] Any American troops in the vicinity of Argentan were ordered to withdraw.[2] This order halted the southern pincer movement of General Haislip's XV Corps.[3] Though Patton protested the order, he obeyed it, leaving an exit-a "trap with a gap"-for the remaining German forces.' [1] Essame, Herbert, Patton: As Military Commander, (1998) p.168 [2] Essame, p.168: Bradley was supported in his decision by Eisenhower. [3] Essame, p.182 Looks to me like Bradley stopped Patton closing the gap in case he caused Canadian casualties! Around Caen, British and Canadian Armies had both SS-Panzerkorps and army panzer units in their sector, because the Germans knew how important Caen was. I don't think they received a copy of Montgomery's planned phase lines! After Paris, Allied armies were ahead of schedule, and the Guards Armoured Division's advance to Brussels on 3rd September was a record daily divisional advance that bettered than anything Patton ever achieved. I'm sure your work is very popular for covering US failures, but it sounds like another American friendly fire incident to me.
For anyone interested, an interesting examination of Market-Garden is "The Last German Victory" by Aaron Bates. The training and tactical doctrine of the German Army, it's emphasis on individual officers and even soldiers exercising personal initiative on every level, gave it a distinct advantage. The British Army , by virtue of it's training, tactical doctrine, and the war fighting techniques it had grown accustomed by this point in the war, was ill suited and unprepared to succeed in an operation of the scope and type of Market-Garden.
I agree with you, thanks to the identical training to all different German troops, SS-men could fight with the Grüne Polizei-men (Green Police) seamlessly. And all other German troops of the Heer (Army) and Luftwaffe.
Great post Don and the truth,of course Monty with the spine of a gummy bear never appeared.Unlike an actual Field Marshall Walter Model directing in person
Actually Garden, the ground part, mostly suceeded. Market, the air part, mostly failed. In Market Garden, the British Army advanced the fastest against German opposition in the entire September 1944 to February 1945 period. It wasnt the British Army that failed Market Garden. It was the air forces. The First Allied Airborne Army, USAAF and RAF all made major tactical errors which doomed the operating. None of the three airborne divisions suceeded in their objectives. The British Army, without any airborne input, went on to further push the Germans back in Operation Aintree in October, taking Overloon and Venray etc.
Ah another of Monty's apologists pokes his head out of Monty's backside to explain why Monty was not responsible for the failure of Monty's plan. Actually it was Monty who admitted it - and like you he LIES, MONGTOMERY lied to IKE stating the Air Marshalls Ageed when in fact they were not even consulted.They had the the hard part of the planning.1,600 flights over 300 miles with less and less daylight. There is a lot of logistics involved, try removing your head from Monty's backside and read *Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality* The pinhead Monty just pointed toward Arnhem and told the tanks to go that way. He was nothing more than a shady sargeant doing a poor private's job and did not have the decency to show up and command
I think it’s unfair to say the British Airborne performed poorly against SS panzer divisions. I think it should be respected that they held the north end of the Bridge till they ran out of Ammunition. I think it comes down to poor planning from the higher ups and them underestimating German strength in the area
The main issue as far as I’m concerned is the dismissal of intelligence reports of Panzers in the immediate area,particularly with a concise description of the makeup of forces and the order of battle from Dutch sources, including the fact that the II SS Panzer Corps was refitting in the vicinity….thus laying the groundwork for failure even before a single paratrooper left the ground or a single British tank rolled forward…
@54blewis The actual strength of the II SS Panzer Corps was in reality less than that of a single understrength motorized division. At the start of the battle the 9th SS Panzer Division had no tanks, just a few assault guns and a number of armoured half tracks, it also only had about 6,000 men, of whom only 3,000 were combat troops. 10th SS Panzer wasn't much better with just 8 Panthers, 16 Panzer VI's and 4 Stug III's. That is approximately it for armour around Arnhem, of course, thanks to the closeness of Germany, armoured reinforcements were rushed to the area. Knowing this the Allies took 83 anti tank guns into the Operation.
@@Bullet-Tooth-Tony- true, I was merely mentioning the beginning of a whole series of lapses,plus paras v panzer (even a depleted Kampf Gruppe as oppose to a full strength division)is not a desirable situation…
Dismissal of intelligence is a myth, apart from Browning's correct dismissal of the aerial photo showing obsolete tanks near Arnhem and that photo came to light in 2015 from a Dutch archive and did show obsolete Mark III and older Mark IV models, ruling out a 1944 panzer division. That story rested entirely on Cornelius Ryan's interview of Browning's Corps Intelligence Officer after Browning had passed away and the photo could not be located. We now know the identity of the unit and those tanks were laagered opposite the 506th PIR's drop zone near Son on D-Day of the operation and shot up by escorting USAAF fighters. Montgomery cancelled the original Operation Comet because the II.SS-Panzerkorps moved into the Netherlands and upgraded it to Market Garden by adding the two US divisions, so he didn't ignore any intelligence. The Dutch resistance did not have an order of battle, the II.SS-Panzerkorps was only identified from 'Ultra' decryptions known only to exist to Allied headquarters at Army and Army Group level, the Dutch only reported vehicle insignia with an 'H' bisected by a vertical sword on a shield (9.SS-Panzer-Division 'Hohenstaufen') and identified Ruurlo as a division headquarters, but not which division. Gavin was told there may be a regiment of SS in Nijmegen and tank storage in the Reichswald forest, because the location of the 10.SS-Panzer-Division 'Frundsberg' had not been identified. The operation was only fatally compromised on the ground by the 508th PIR's failure to secure the undefended Nijmegen highway bridge on the first afternoon, contrary to Gavin's instructions, and that was not in Cornelius Ryan's book and would never be contemplated in an American financed Hollywood film. Nor did you see any British anti-tank guns in the film, when in fact the 1st Airborne Division and Polish Brigade combined had exactly the same number (84) as Model had operational tanks in his entire Army Group B front from Aachen to the North Sea in September 1944. 83 anti-tank guns were taken by air to Arnhem, and for context Model was facing Montgomery's 21st Army Group with 2,400 tanks, plus whatever US 1st Army had at Aachen. The main issue as far as I'm concerned is that Americans believe their own propaganda is gospel and it's getting very old.
@@Bullet-Tooth-Tony- - just to get the numbers right, Tony... SS-Panzer-Regiment 9 at Arnhem had just 3 Panthers and 2 Flakpanzer IV 'Möbelwagen' off the books and hidden under trees on the Heijenoordseweg in western Arnhem since Friday 15 September, after moving them out of the barracks to avoid bombing, and an 'alarm kompanie' of 100 Panther crewmen acting as infantry in the Saksen-Weimar barracks in northern Arnhem, having lost their tanks in Normandy. All Mark IVs previously laagered on the Rozendaal Golf Links near the barracks had been handed over to the 'Frundsberg' Division. SS-Panzerjäger-Abteilung 9 at Apeldoorn had 2 surviving Jagdpanzer IV/L48 tank destroyers having only become operational in time for the retreat from Normandy and lost the other 19 vehicles covering the division's withdrawal. I./SS-Panzer-Regiment 10 (Panther abteilung) were still training at Grafenwöhr in Germany and would not be ready until operation 'Nordwind' in January 1945. II./SS-Panzer-Regiment 10 at Kranenburg monastery in Vorden had 16 Panzer IV (most transferred from the 'Hohenstaufen') concentrated in 5.Kompanie, and 4 StuG IIIG assault guns concentrated in 7.Kompanie. The StuGs were ferried across the Pannerden canal to Nijmegen on 18 September, but the Mark IV tanks were too heavy for the raft and had to be held back until the Arnhem bridge was cleared on 21 September. When Model sent 20 new Panthers to Arnhem direct from the factory during the battle in a batch of 8 and another of 12, they were crewed by the 100 men from the 9.SS-Panzer-Regiment alarm kompanie and transferred to the 10.SS-Panzer-Regiment as the 8.Kompanie, but they were deployed to Elst after the Arnhem bridge was retaken and operated under the army Kampfgruppe Knaust.
Montgomery OVERESTIMATED his allies at Nijmegen - they failed to secure an undefended bridge in a city evacuated by the Germans on the first afternoon of the operation.
Pretty good video and good summation of the reasons for failure. There's a number of British historical revisionists in the comments of every video discussing Market Garden who desperately want to pin the entire failure of the operation on MG Gavin and the 82nd Airborne's failure to take Nijmegen road bridge on the first day. Without going into all the particulars of why that notion is silly, this video appropriately takes the macro view and points out the structural shortcomings of the operational design. What's amazing is that the operation did as well as it did. Fact of the matter though, is it wasn't as close as we like to imagine. We like to pretend that if XXX Corps had been able to link up with Frost's battalion at Arnhem bridge they would have been able to cross in force and take Arnhem. That's a rather ridiculous notion. As this video points out well, the terrain between Nijmegen and Arnhem was not conducive to XXX Corps getting into battle formation and massing it's fires for a penetration. They were sitting ducks on that elevated highway and the terrain on either side of the road were wet lowlands tanks couldn't move in. They would have been dismantled in detail trying to cross that bridge with the Germans in Arnhem even with Frost's men on the far side of the bridge. 1st Airborne, just like the 82nd and 101st had more to do than just take the bridges themselves. They also had to take and retain the terrain that commanded them. Not one of the Airborne Divisions successfully did both. 1st Airborne took the bridge (sort of) but couldn't hold the commanding terrain. The 82nd took the terrain (sort of) but not the bridges until very late in the game, and the 101st lost the bridge entirely, took the terrain, then lost it again. Also XXX Corps was simultaneously being engaged up and down the entire line of advance, which again, prevented them from being able to mass a sufficient force at the decisive point of Arnhem. This whole plan breaks one of the oldest rules of land warfare. That being you need interior lines of supply which run perpendicular to your front so they aren't vulnerable to being cut by the enemy. This supply line ran parallel to the front and was too close to it, allowing the Germans to do what they did, and ending what hope for the operation's success might have remained.
Gavin was a Brigadier General during Market Garden and revisionism is a valid historical process when new information becomes available. The TIK history channel did a whole video on that point and is also across the real reasons for Market Garden's failure. There's too many Americans here guilty of the very things of which they accuse the British - arrogance and ignorance. It's about time they looked at the evidence and revised their own attitudes.
@@davemac1197 and as I pointed out to Beau D elsewhere, had 82nd AB taken their bridge, then XXX Corps would have rolled right over it, like they did with the one at Grave and had been onto and across the "island", before any of the reinforcements had arrived and the Germans lacked the critical mass to have stopped XXX Corps.
I originally posted this for Sean in an earlier thread but not sure if he ever saw it, so I'm re-posting it here. History often 'turns on a dime' and Market Garden was unravelled by a single Colonel at Nijmegen on the first afternoon... Put Us Down In Hell - A Combat History of the 508th PIR in WW2, Phil Nordyke 2012, Chapter 9 - 'Put Us Down In Hell' Captain Chet Graham was assigned as the regimental liaison officer with division headquarters. "I sat in on a high level briefing at division headquarters. Colonel Lindquist was told by General Gavin to move to the Nijmegen bridge as soon as Lindquist thought practical after the jump. Gavin stressed that speed was important. He was also told to stay out of the city and to avoid city streets. He told Lindquist to use the west farm area to get to the bridge as quickly as possible as the bridge was the key to the division's contribution to the success of the operation." On September 13, the 508th headquarters issued Field Order Number 1: ... "seize, organize, and hold key terrain features in sector of responsibility, be prepared to seize Waal River crossing at Nijmegen on Division order and prevent all hostile movement south of the line Hatert - Klooster." Chapter 10 - 'Use Trench Knives And Bayonets' Captain Jonathan Adams... "Within half an hour after the jump, A Company had two patrols on their way to the objective as planned. Lieutenant Colonel Shields Warren... "The objective was unoccupied by any German troops and [the patrol] was organizing a roadblock on the main road from Nijmegen leading south to Groesbeek. The battalion S-2 [Lieutenant Lee Frigo], who had accompanied the platoon, stated that Dutch civilians asserted that no German troops were in the area, except for a few labor troops." Captain Adams and Company A increased the pace of the advance... "Everyone had the idea that the rest of the job would be as easy as it had been up to that point. That was somewhat my own impression and I still believe if we had marched straight to the [highway] bridge [in Nijmegen] we would have it without a fight." Lieutenant Colonel Warren's 1st Battalion arrived at De Ploeg at around 6:30 p.m., about five hours after landing, without encountering any significant resistance. Warren ordered his troopers to dig in and strengthen the roadblock..." Captain Ben Delamater, the battalion's executive officer... "The Regimental Commanding Officer [Colonel Roy Lindquist], with his radio operator and two Dutch interpreters from the British Army soon followed us onto our first objective... when several civilians wearing arm bands and carrying Underground credentials of some sort told the colonel that the Germans had deserted Nijmegen, that the town and the highway bridge were lightly held. "The regimental CO had been instructed that if the initial mission were accomplished to 'go ahead and take the highway bridge if you can.' This division order was perfectly understood in relation to the primary missions and was not a weak, conditional order as might be supposed offhand. "The regimental and battalion COs then planned to send... a reconnaissance patrol to approach the bridge from the south..." At 6:30 p.m., the patrol moved along the Groesbeek-Nijmegen highway to the edge of Nijmegen, where it knocked out a German machine-gun position with Tommy guns." That afternoon, Captain Chet Graham, the regimental liaison officer with division headquarters, decided to obtain a status of the progress toward the capture of the Nijmegen highway bridge. "I went to the 508th regimental CP and asked Colonel Lindquist when he planned to send the 3rd Battalion to the bridge. His answer was, 'As soon as the DZ is cleared and secured. Tell General Gavin that.' "So I went through Indian country to the division CP and relayed Lindquist's message to Gavin. I never saw Gavin so mad. As he climbed into his jeep, he told me, 'Come with me - let's get him moving.' On arriving at the 508th regimental CP, Gavin told Lindquist, 'I told you to move with speed.'" The 508th Connection, Zig Boroughs 2013, Chapter 6 - Holland, Operation Market Garden Nijmegen bridge A battalion S-2 patrol led the way and reached the Nijmegen Bridge during daylight hours. Trooper Joe Atkins, Headquarters First, told that story: "I was called on to take the point going into Nijmegen. As we entered the city, a crowd of people gathered around us, and we had to push our way through. Three of us in the lead became separated from the other troopers behind us by the crowds of Dutch people. We continued to make our way into the city until we came to the bridge. At the bridge, only a few German soldiers were standing around a small artillery weapon. I had a Thompson sub and a .45 pistol. The other two were armed with M1 rifles. They covered me as I jumped up and yelled 'Hande hock!' (Hands up!) The Germans were so surprised, the six or seven defenders of the bridge gave up without resisting. We held the prisoners at the entrance to the bridge for about an hour. It began to get dark, and none of our other troops showed up. We decided to pull back away from the bridge, knowing we could not hold off a German attack. The German prisoners asked to come with us, but we refused, having no way to guard them. As we were leaving, we could hear heavy equipment approaching the bridge."
@@nickdanger3802 XXX Corps meet up with 82nd AB @ 08:20 on the morning of the 19th Sept, less than 42 hours after setting off. If Nijmegen is in US hands already, then XXX Corps has 8 miles to travel to get to Arnhem before the first of the German reinforcements arrive. The first of the German reinforcements didn't start to arrive until late 20th Sept, with most being deployed on the 21st Sept. The only exception was with regards to two Tiger I tanks that arrived at 20:00 on the 19th Sept. So XXX Corps had from before 9am until 20:00 on the 19th to get to Arnhem. Even allowing for delays, they would have achieved that. Also keep in mind that there would have been a clear delineation between the lines of XXX Corps and the German defenders - anything in front of XXX Corps on "the island" was going to be the enemy and 2TAC could have been called in. The main reason Williams and Brereton had forbidden the use of the TAC was to avoid blue-on-blue, which is understandable where there are no clear lines, but on "the Island", that was not the case.
So what you're saying is, the only crossing not captured by the allies on the first day was the one at Nijmegen, and that single failure doomed the whole operation.
4:54 - "General James Gavin, commander of the American forces at Nijmegen, prioritised capturing the Groesbeek Heights that overlooks Nijmegen. This was to guard against the danger of a German counter-attack from the forest that bordered the heights. Subsequently, there weren't sufficient troops to capture Nijmegen bridge and in fact, attempts to take it were repelled by the Germans." This is not a correct statement. There are at least four sources that explain what was intended to happen: Letter General Gavin to Historical Officer Captain Westover, 17 July 1945 - "About 48 hours prior to take-off, when the entire plan appeared to be shaping up well, I personally directed Colonel Lindquist, commanding the 508th Parachute Infantry, to commit his first battalion against the Nijmegen bridge without delay after landing, but to keep a very close watch on it in the event he needed it to protect himself against the Reichswald. So I personally directed him to commit his first battalion to this task. He was cautioned to send the battalion via the flat ground east of the city." James Maurice Gavin, Box 101 Folder 10, Cornelius Ryan Collection, Ohio State University. Notes on meeting with J.M. Gavin, Boston, January 20, 1967 - Gavin and Lindquist had been together in Sicily and Normandy and neither Gavin nor Ridgway, the old commander of the 82nd, trusted him in a fight. He did not have a “killer instinct.” In Gavin’s words, “He wouldn’t go for the juggler [jugular].” As an administrative officer he was excellent; his troopers were sharp and snappy and, according to Gavin, “Made great palace guards after the war.” Gavin confirms he ordered Lindquist to commit a battalion to the capture of the Nijmegen bridge before the jump. He also confirms he told Lindquist not to go to the bridge by way of the town but to approach it along some mud flats to the east. We discussed also objectives. Gavin’s main objectives were the heights at Groesbeek and the Grave bridge; he expected and intelligence confirmed “a helluva reaction from the Reichswald area.” Therefore he had to control the Groesbeek heights. The Grave bridge was essential to the link up with the British 2nd Army. He had three days to capture the Nijmegen bridge and, although he was concerned about it, he felt certain he could get it within three days. The British wanted him, he said, to drop a battalion on the northern end of the bridge and take it by coup de main. Gavin toyed with the idea and then discarded it because of his experience in Sicily. There, his units had been scattered and he found himself commanding four or five men on the first day. For days afterward, the division was completely disorganized. September Hope - The American Side of a Bridge Too Far, John C McManus (2012), Chapter 3: ‘Foreboding’ - As Gavin finished his briefing, the British General [Browning] cautioned him: “Although every effort should be made to effect the capture of the Grave and Nijmegen bridges, it is essential that you capture the Groesbeek ridge and hold it.” General Browning’s order, of course, made perfect sense. It was of paramount importance to hold the high ground. Any commander worth his salt understood that. Even so, the purpose of Market Garden was to seize the bridges in order to speedily unleash a major armored thrust into northern Germany, toward Berlin. High ground notwithstanding, the only way for the Allies to accomplish this ambitious objective was to take the bridges, and these were, after all, perishable assets, because the Germans could destroy them (and might well be likely to do so the longer it took the Allies to take the bridges). By contrast, the Groesbeek ridge spur wasn’t going anywhere. If the 82nd had trouble holding it, and German artillery or counterattacks became a problem, the Allies could always employ air strikes and artillery of their own to parry such enemy harassment. Also, ground troops from Dempsey’s Second Army could join with the paratroopers to retake Groesbeek from the Germans. So, in other words, given the unpleasant choice between the bridges and the hills, the bridges had to come first. General Gavin did have some appreciation of this. At an earlier meeting with his regimental commanders, he [Gavin] had told Colonel Roy Lindquist of the 508th Parachute Infantry that even though his primary mission was to hold the high ground at Berg en Dal near Groesbeek, he was also to send his 1st Battalion into Nijmegen to take the key road bridge. Gavin told Lindquist to push for the bridge via "the flatland to the east of the city and approach it over the farms without going through the built-up area." Gavin considered this so important that he stood with Lindquist over a map and showed him this route of advance. At the same time, Colonel Lindquist had trouble reconciling Gavin's priorities for the two ambitious objectives of holding Berg en Dal and grabbing the bridge. He believed that Gavin wanted him to push for the bridge only when he had secured the critical glider landing zones and other high ground. According to Lindquist, his impression was that "we must first accomplish our main mission before sending any sizeable force to the bridge." Actually, General Gavin wanted the 508th to do both at the same time, but somehow this did not sink into the 508th's leadership. "If General Gavin wanted Col Lindquist to send a battalion for the bridge immediately after the drop, he certainly did not make that clear to him," Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Shanley, the executive officer of the 508th, later wrote. Perhaps this was a miscommunication on Gavin's part, probably not. Lieutenant Colonel Norton, the G-3, was present for the conversation (Shanley was not) and recorded Gavin's clear instructions to Lindquist: "Seize the high ground in the vicinity of Berg en Dal as his primary mission and ... attempt to seize the Nijmegen bridge with a small force, not to exceed a battalion." Put Us Down In Hell - A Combat History of the 508th PIR in WW2, Phil Nordyke (2012), Chapter 9: 'Put Us Down In Hell' - Captain Chet Graham was assigned as the regimental liaison officer with division headquarters. "I sat in on a high level briefing at division headquarters. Colonel Lindquist was told by General Gavin to move to the Nijmegen bridge as soon as Lindquist thought practical after the jump. Gavin stressed that speed was important. He was also told to stay out of the city and to avoid city streets. He told Lindquist to use the west farm area to get to the bridge as quickly as possible as the bridge was the key to the division's contribution to the success of the operation."
@@ITSREALLYNOTYOURFAULT - it's interesting that Gavin seems to have been pretty honourable and did tell the truth to the US Army Historical officer and to Cornelius Ryan, accepting that he made mistakes with the benefit of hindsight. I think a big part of the problem with the conventional narrative established by the book A Bridge Too Far is that Ryan himself was from Dublin and was working as a war correspondent for the Daily Telegraph embedded with Patton's US 3rd Army during the war. Dublin and Patton are both premiere anti-British (or certainly anti-Montgomery) colleges, so it's hardly surprising the book comes across in the way it does. Director Richard Attenborough was one of the most anti-establishment leftist filmmakers you could find in 1970s Britain, so A Bridge Too Far was a perfect vehicle for his "anti-war film" in which to attack the British 'officer class'. This is how myths are created.
The troops wasted on Operation Market Garden were to have been used to clean the entrance to Rotterdam of German troops so that the port could be used to bring in supplies rather than all the way from the Normadiget operation, the operation was a waste of some of the best troops in the Allied armies and extended the war in the west to Soviet advantage in the postwar period.
I think you mean the port of Antwerp? I don't think there were any plans to attack 'fortress Holland', which includes Rotterdam. This Antwerp instead of MARKET GARDEN idea is a question of sequencing, not priorities. The rationale for going for a Rhine crossing before clearing the Scheldt estuary to open Antwerp was that the Germans were still recovering from their withdrawal from Normandy and it would be easier to secure a Rhine crossing sooner, before they could complete and reinforce their canal and river defence lines in the Netherlands, than it would be if it had to wait until after Antwerp was opened. The fact was that Antwerp's port capacity was needed to supply advances of Eisenhower's 'broad front' policy into Germany, not a limited advance to the Rhine. The Scheldt on the other hand, was already occupied by the German 15.Armee on the southern bank and started ferrying operations to cross over to the north side on 7/8 September, the original date planned for the first Arnhem airborne operation, COMET. The troops involved in MARKET GARDEN would not have been "wasted" if the operation had been successful, as it would have cut off not only the 15.Armee west of Antwerp but most of the WBN (military command Netherlands) and 1.Fallschirm-Armee in a wider envelopment - the secondary objective of MARKET GARDEN, as well as gaining a Rhine crossing - the primary objective. Cuttting the V-2 supply lines to the launch sites on the Dutch coast also became a tertiary objective after 9 September. None of that would have been achieved, except possibly trapping the 15.Armee, if the Scheldt operation had been given priority. Even Eisenhower, whose strategic thinking was questionable, saw the sense in this and after the publication of Cornelius Ryan's incomplete and misleading book, A Bridge Too Far (1974), he felt he had to put the record straight in public: “I not only approved Market-Garden, I insisted upon it. We needed a bridgehead over the Rhine. If that could be accomplished I was quite willing to wait on all other operations.” (Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life, Carlo D'Este, 2015) The whole Antwerp argument is an exercise in hindsight.
Market Garden was a well planned beautifully placed Domino road to Arnhem …. But if one Domino fell … everything would fall. That is the flaw in Montgomerys Market Garden. He didn’t count on Murphy ( Murphy Law ) ‼️
Actually he did, that's why it got expanded in airborne troop numbers from Comet to Market Garden. He wanted even more resources but they were not forthcoming, but the chance was still there to strike for a quick dash across the Rhine.... so they went for it rather than wait and lose the opportunity. As it happened, the Rhine wasn't crossed until 6 months later, so that reasoning was correct.
There werent two ss divisions. The 9th and 10th combined barely made a battalion in strength, according to the 10th SS commander that conducted the battle from Nijmegen. The allies were not wrong about the strength of german forces, they were extremely weak, but they responded amazingly well and won a victory.
The main reason was that expecting troops to capture and hold against counter-attacks multiple bridges at multiple locations was expecting too much. Also, the corridor was very narrow and open to German counterattack. Montgomery was the person who developed the plan. Montgomery was very good at planning an initial attach such as El Alamein and Overlord. He was not as strong in making plans in the middle of an attack to deal with the unexpected. Probably the biggest reason it failed, is that the German Army was still willing to fight.
The Germans were, sadly, the best soldiers in WW2 which is why they were able to hold on so long before being beaten. But... Market-Garden was worth a go. Had it not been for Nijmegen, it might have been successful - see TIK’s Battlestorm presentation, his points have a lot going for them and the detail is excellent.
@@mikereger1186 TIK's video is good for details of events but his conclusions that it was not Monty's fault are just stupid. The success was dependant on every single detail going as imagened by Montgomery. Any delay on the way and the operation fails. That is sole fault of Montgomery and his planning and not anyone else in the field.
@@mikereger1186 while that would increase market garden's chances we don't know how exactly it would turn out otherwise. One end of Arnhem bridge was held by the Germans for a long time, and they could just blow it if XXX corps arrived. And the Germans did counterattack at several areas along the highway, which did delay the corps' advance and threaten to cut the corps off.
Il Maresciallo Montgomery , ottimo comandante non brillava però certo in azzardo . ha sempre privilegiato la tattica con una certa sicurezza . dubito che un operazione così rischiosa venisse solo dalla sua mente , a meno che non avesse in mano rapporti di intelligence completamente errati.
The greatest flaw appears to have been the reliance on only one road for the ground forces to advance on. Any issues on the one road, then problems escalate as actually happened.
Sounds like a nice argument, exept that the British Army had been using main supply routes on 'single roads' to supply its divisions since the breakout from Normandy and continued them into Germany all the way to Bremen. The 'Club Route' used by Guards Armoured Division did not start and end for Market Garden. The flanking VIII and XII Corps were using designated 'Spade' and 'Diamond' routes respectively, and there were alternative crossings for XXX Corps on the 'Heart Route' in case a bridge was blown. There was also a 'Triangle Route' between Eindhoven and Uden opened up during one of the instances when 'Club Route' was cut by the Germans, but of course you never hear about these things unless you do a lot of reading on the subject. The appearance of reliance on just one road is just that - appearance.
My thoughts, ignoring what is /now/ known, what was known at the time? 1. D-Day had already had to be postponed for a day /due to the weather/. Also in 1940 Hitler had called off Sealion /because of the weather/. Not accounting for it in a /three day //airborne// operation in the autumn was a catastrophic error. 2. The whole operation was flawed in concept. Instead of an incremental bite and hold strategy, the operation took one huge bite and failed to hold it. 3. Why was XXX Corp sent second? They should have been sent /first/ and when they passed a certain point /then/ launch the airborne to take the first bridge. Then XXX Corps race across, get to a second point, launch second wave of airborne, take and hold second bridge. Repeat for last wave. The airborne troops would have had to hold for much less time. 4. Poor use of 2 TAF. Ground suppression e.g. Typhoons should have been used to suppress resistance on the landing grounds. None of this was especially Monty's fault as the detailed planing was done by others - although as Caen had taken much longer to take than planned he should have anticipated problems at Nijmegen. However the overall strategy was IMHO flawed.
The operation failed because one Regiment did not follow its operational orders to seize its bridge objectives at Nijmegen on the first day. Taking your points in turn: 1. The critical phase of the operation was the first two days, the time it was estimated for the tanks to reach Arnhem, and the weather was forecast to be guaranteed clear the first two days and unpredicatble after that. 2. You have to seize all the bridges you need on the first day and hold them against counter-attacks. If you try to operate incrementally, the enemy will reinforce the unoccupied bridges as soon as you telegraph your intended route. 3. Because the 2nd TAF air support had to be deconflicted from the Airborne transports and escorts. That is why Operation Garden commenced at 1430 hrs, after the Operation Market airlift timed at 1300 hrs was complete. Sebastian Ritchie's book Arnhem: Myth And Reality: Airborne Warfare, Air Power and the Failure of Operation Market Garden (2011, updated 2019), is the best work on the air plan and the reasons why it had to be done the way it was carried out. 4. There was little to no resistance on the landing grounds on the first day and Flak suppression during the airlifts were the responsibility of the escorts and not 2nd TAF, which had to be grounded for deconfliction reasons when the airlifts were scheduled. Flak suppression was effective and transport losses were minimised. Montgomery was let down at Nijmegen by one of the units loaned to him for the operation. He is often accused of "hubris", but it's not hubris to overestimate your ally.
@@davemac1197 1. How often are weather forecasts wrong? Very often. 2. So you send all the airborne forces on the same day. By your own logic you don't send them over three days. You assume there would be enough time for the enemy to prepare defences between increments. That would depend on the speed XXX Corps moved.
@@julianmhall 1. The forecast was correct because they got two clear days and then it started to deteriorate, delaying the 3rd Lift by two days. 2. There's an argument for going with what you can airlift in one go, so at Arnhem they would have had six battalions with which to strike at Arnhem instead of holding three back to defend the landing zones. The idea behind feeding more Airborne troops in by air was to reinforce the attacking force, hopefully faster than the defenders can reinforce by land. In the first two days the Airborne operation was doing that successfully, but the initiative went over to the Germans after the airlifts fell behind schedule because of the weather. All the more important that you secure all your bridges on the frist day and get the tanks to Arnhem in two days. That's why I think the crucial error, totally unforced, was at Nijmegen on the first day. All the stuff about weather, intel, the single road, are all excuses to cover the thing that can be controlled but wasn't.
*Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p.108* Never the less Montgomery's plan required 100% mission success something unkown in large scale Airborne operations. Failure to capture a single objective would jeopardize the entire XXX Corp offensive *Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p131 Montgomery altered his assesments from his obvious desire that the offensive should proceed as planned. He persuaded himself that any threat from the Germans was off set by the large number of Airborne troops. *Despite warnings from the head of intelligence and Bedell-Smith suggested that the operation be revised or halted Monty dismissed the objections out of hand* *Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p.138 Brereton was not in a position to exploit strategic intelligence,and he would also have known that Montgomery alone had access to ULTRA and had never the less decided that Market Garden should proceed* First Allied Airborne depended very heavily on Mongomery's 21st Army Group for their supply of intelligence. *1st Parachute Brigade summary by Capt. W.A. Taylor that appeared on September 13th which pointed out that "the whole Market area was being feverishly prepared for defense" - a statement entirely in accord with Dempsey's diary notes of September 9th & 10th* *Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p.160 By September 1944 Air Force Planners were unable to see a happy outcome. More over it was documented that because Arnhem lay so far in land they did not expect to attain outright tactical surprise. The previous Comet Operation air warning stated "Surprise is extremely unlikely and the enemy will undoubtedly have knowledge of the approach of Troop Carrier formations by radar alert or visual reconnaissance."*
Poor planning, poor intelligence, accurate intelligence that was ignored, an assumption that old men & boys was all that was left of the German army in the west, radio's that simply did not work...The list is a long one..
The 10th SS panzer division and thrown together units early fought hard early on. Useless communication and no anti tank weapons of any substance the German army was expected to collapse. As normal it didnt and fought hard.
How is a bunch of 17pdrs "no anti tank weapons"? 9th & 10th SS divisions presence and strength were known, and the Airborne units had plenty of AT to deal with whatever came.
No tanks, right? I think they've been trying to include heavier weapons ever since. This was a classic case of trying to do too much at once. If they had gone in steps, reinforcing as they went, they might have succeeded despite the delay and loss of some surprise.
Moving in steps would have immediately telegraphed the main axis of the advance to the enemy. The reason the operation failed was because the Nijmegen highway bridge was left in German hands on the first day, when it was planned to be quickly seized. The failure was a failure to carry out a vital part of the plan, not a failure in the planning.
That was well done but it left out a lot of the details of all the things the Airborne Units had to do. One thing No one mentions - is that when 1st Airborne failed to capture BOTH ends of the Arnhem Bridge - the operation was lost. Since the Germans ALWAYS held the South End of Arnhem Highway Bridge - they could blow it any time they wanted. The reason they didn't - is because they wanted to re-capture the Northern End of the Bridge - and use it themselves. IF it had ever looked like XXX Corps was going to take the South end while Frost held the North End - the Germans could have just blown the bridge - the way they had blown the Railway Bridge. The Biggest problem with the Operation -was that the Allies had not made the adjustment to their thinking needed by the fact that the Germans had recovered from their head long flight - and were now resisting again. Conceived of during the days of German flight - the operation didn't seem so bad - but - because the Germans HAD gotten themselves sorted - it was - as Browning said - A Bridge To Far. .
The biggest problem was Montys ego. He couldnt stand patton getting press for Cobra. He threw together this asinine plan which called for him to move faster than he has ever moved before. Capturing a bridge in an airborne assault is tricky. Anything more than 3 is moronic.
I'm a little more generous, I typically say that the operation changed from an attempted breakthrough to a rescue mission for the first airborne somewhere between the third day, when Frost was completely isolated and the first airborne immobilized in place, and in the early hours of the fifth day before the infamous "out of ammo God save the King" message. Frost probably could have kept engineers from blowing the bridge through some of the fourth day. But the dreamed of breakthrough was unrealistic and would have required flawless execution from every group.
@@johnschmidt1262 How would he have kept the German Engineers from Blowing up THEIR end of the Bridge? One thing about that - was that Frost didn't capture the Railway Bridge - because it was ALREADY mined and the Germans blew it up in their faces. If the Germans ALREADY had the Railway Bridge mined - wouldn't they have ALSO - ALREADY have had the Highway Bridge mined? It's not a question of the Germans having to set the explosives and fuse them - this was ALREADY done. All the Germans had to do - whenever they wanted - was set them off. If it had ever looked like Frost was going to take the South end of the bridge - they might have blown it then - but he was never close to being able to take the South end. The other thing about that - is that when the Germans blew the Railway Bridge - it was early in the operation and they may have been more concerned with 1st Airborne's ability to capture both Bridges. Once they had Frost isolated from the rest of the Division - they may - have figured that they would eventually take the Northern end of the bridge back - and then THEY could use it. Given Models attitude towards blowing the Nijemegen Bridge that is likely. Here - the Germans already had those bridges mined too. So the big failure here - was on the part of the Germans in failing to destroy them - which can be blamed on Model. One thing about the 82nd - was it had 7 bridges to take. There was the Grave Bridge across the Maas. There were 4 Bridges over the Maas/Waal Canal (connecting the two rivers) of which they needed to take at least one that would support tanks. The Germans blew several of those Bridges - so - THEY were already mined too. Then there was the Highway and Railroad Bridges over the Waal. The 82nd also had to defend the East and West Flanks of the Nijmegan area, and Corps HQ where Browning was. Plus - there were already Germans IN Nijmegen. They also had to defend their drop zones - which the Germans did take - but the 82nd took them back before the next drop. Initially - Gavin and Browning didn't think they had the strength to take the Waal Bridges and their priority was to take the Grave and Canal Bridges, defend Nijmegan and hold their drop zones - or - XXX Corps would never get to THEM - much less Arnhem. Later on - Gavin decided they did have enough strength to send some men to the Highway Bridge - and he verbally ordered one of his Regimental Commanders to do so - but the Regimental Commander didn't understand the priority of that - and was waiting until he had accomplished all his other tasks (they were being attacked by the Germans) before sending those men. It was only when Gavin checked with him to make sure he had done it - that Gavin realized he hadn't and THEN sent the men to take the bridge. By that time it was to late - but - under the guidance of a Resistance Operator they took the phone exchange where all the wiring was that led to the the charges on the bridge. They then cut those charges. There were also others who cut wires as well at other points - so they all claimed that THEY were the ones who stopped the mine on the bridge from going off. Since the Germans waited until the last second before trying to detonate the mine - they had no time to check why it wouldn't blow. All in all - there were just to many things that could go wrong - and ALL the Airborne Units needed XXX Corps help to accomplish their objectives - and then - hold the road open between them. 1st Airborne was supposed to capture the Ferry at Driel, the Railway Bridge, the Highway Bridge, a pontoon bridge, capture Arnhem, capture the airfield at Deelen so the 52n Air Landing Division could be flown in and 1st Airborne had to hold their drop zones. They had the most Germans to deal with and were farthest away from XXX Corps help so they weren't able to accomplish any of that and lost most of their number before they could be pulled out. The basic idea of the plan was conceived of when the Germans were still retreating faster than the Allies could catch them - but - once the Germans stopped and got themselves sorted - it was just to much. And - I think they threw the whole thing together in a week. It's a testament to the people involved that they got as much accomplished as they did but they should have been concentrating on securing the Scheldt and cutting off the German 15th Army. Monty did assign the Canadians to do it - but they weren't strong enough. The 15th Army escaped (to join the fight against M/G) and Antwerp couldn't be used until the Scheldt was cleared. .
@@BobSmith-dk8nw I don't think that's correct about the explosives, I know the Germans set explosives but I still think they had to be wired and set with primers. They certainly didn't have a hair triggered plunger on each side of every bridge. That really doesn't sound right, even in the case of the bridge at Nimegan they had to do a little prep work after the attack to ready the bridge for demolition. I think it's set up so it doesn't take long, but you still need engineers out on the bridge doing work. I agree with you about the 82nd, I definitely noticed and have said elsewhere that no airborne unit achieved all its objectives, but all of them achieved at least some. I really don't see how the operation could have gone much better than it had. Now maybe with the right set of circumstances the first airborne could have been saved, but that is about as good as it could have gotten.
"Mass glider landings can be a hazardous business to say the least. As men unloaded equipment from their gliders and began to move off the landing zone, they had to keep a wary eye behind them for gliders that were still landing. The prospect of such accidents appeared to be the only cause for concern, because although the standard procedure for disembarking from a glider calls for a rapid and defensive exit, there was such a lack of enemy activity that men calmly left their craft and went about their business as if they were on a training exercise in England." Pegasus Archive Arnhem 5. The First Lift (Sunday 17th September)
Too ambitious a plan for a general who had never done anything creative. He had used WW1 tactics - frontal assault, masses of infantry and huge amounts of artillery, consistently, in North Africa, Sicilia, Italy and again in Normandy in front of Caen. And after the 82nd risked everything to take the Nijmegen bridge, the tankers of 30 Corps were too afraid to advance, in the dark, towards Arnhem to save their countrymen of the 1st Paras.
@rrl4245 At Second Alamein and in Normandy he faced the most formidable defences encountered anywhere during the war, and yet proved capable of attacking without suffering excessive losses. Michael Kenny over on Axis History Forum has posted a composite map showing Kursk and Normandy to the same scale and the density of forces in France would have given the Soviet commanders a heart-attack if they'd had to face them. Montgomery's tactics were basically a refinement of those developed on the Somme in 1916; a carefully-prepared offensive barrage would silence the German guns and suppress their infantry, allowing the British to seize their objectives. Then, instead of attempting to push on beyond the range of supporting artillery, the troops would stand on the defensive and massacre the German counter-attacks. Montgomery was overall a complete commander who could do both equally-well, as he proved in both North Africa and during the break-out from Normandy. In addition to your 2nd point, the tankers of 30 Corps had less than 4 tanks and a handful of 82nd air borne Paratroopers remaining, the rest of the Corps was still involved in the fighting in the town, so the idea that 4 British tanks on there own in the dark advancing the several miles to Arnhem could have altered the situation is far fetched to say the least. However, it was already too late. The German's from late afternoon of the same day were already advancing down the road from Arnhem with a couple of battalions of Panzer Grenadiers and several Tiger tanks. If the 82nd had just captured the Nijmegen Waal bridge on day one on September 19th as ordered both 30 Corps and the 82nd air borne would have raced into Arnhem together to save the 1st Air Borne division.
@@Bullet-Tooth-Tony- Sorry Tony, but you’re wrong on far too many points, I’ll only address a couple. At El Alamein, he faced an exhausted Axis force, who were low on supplies and seriously outnumbered. Monty simply steam-rolled Rommel. At Normandy, he (as you said) used WW1 tactics - in the US Army we disdainfully called that tactic: ‘hey diddle, diddle; straight up the middle’. At Ft Benning we were flunked for employing that approach. Monty was disliked by all his peers and superiors for being egotistical, petty and unimaginative. Market Garden, the one time he tried to get creative, he failed miserably, and the men of the 1st Airborne, and the entire Airborne corps paid the price.
You mean after the 82nd screwed up taking the Nijmegen bridge while it was undefended on D-Day (17 September) and it had to be taken by the Grenadier Guards, the tanks could not be moved after dark on the night of 20 September. WW2 tanks could not fight at night, except for an experimental infra-red system trialled by the Germans on some Panther units in 1944 and 45, but the technology didn't really work that well. Reconnaissance was done that night by 2nd Household Cavalry Regiment and they established the Germans had a substantial blocking line between Oosterhout and Ressen, which was met by the Irish Guards the following day.
@@davemac1197 Really? “The 82nd screwed up” You really don’t understand that battle. The 82nd was overtasked by the British planners with taking several bridges as well as protecting the right flank, from what those same planners expected to be counterattacks coming out of Germany, those did materialize. The entire plan was impossible and incompetent. Thirty Corps had no chance of moving rapidly down that one silly road. The 1st Airborne, dropped so far from their objective had no chance, and both the 82nd and the 101st had no chance of successfully accomplishing all their missions - take all those bridges in the time allowed and with the resources available. Like the 1st Para, the 82nd fought bravely and took that bridge with that heroic river crossing. Turns out they shouldn’t have bothered, as the tankers didn’t have the courage to take advantage of their sacrifices. Nor did they have the desire to save their countrymen. Tanks did attack at night, throughout the war. Germans, Americans and Russians did, anyway…
@@rrl4245 I wouldn't class it as seriously outnumbered, a two to one advantage in armour and heavy weapons, and 85 British Commonwealth infantry battalions against 60 Axis infantry battalions, that's not even 10 to 1 odds, plus the Axis had the advantage of being well dug in on a strong defensive position protected by millions of mines. You do realise that the US army fought their battles in the same way as Monty right? Using their material and firepower superiority to wear down the enemy before any attack. He was barely even involved in Market Garden so I don't agree with that, go and read up on the Order of Battle for Market Garden to see who was calling the shots in that operation, I think you'll find that it wasn't Monty.
Great presentation! I still wonder what happened to the overwhelming allied air support that had helped clinch the German defeat and route from Normandy. Holland should have been a shooting gallery for the masses of fighter bombers and twin engine medium bombers that the allies had available to them.
@Salvador Vizcarra Korea is an interesting case. The UN air forces ran out of what they considered to be "viable targets" within the first few months (neither of the Koreas was heavily industrialized and the road network on that hilly and mountainous peninsula was a joke as the heavily mechanized UN ground forces soon found out) but they continued to bomb with impunity every day of every month of every year until the war ended and still only achieved a stalemate. The allied air forces never paralyzed the opposing communist armies as they had those of Germany in 1944-1945.
Poor weather is one answer. Another is that the Allied advance across France had outrun the air support infrastructure, to a degree. Ground/Air liaison was also very patchy during Market Garden, with a lot of equipment failures.
You have to smile at all the experts giving us the benefit of their wisdom, with 77 years of hindsight. Monty knew the risks full well, but calculated they were outweighed by the fruits of success, should he succeed. Any commander not prepared to take risks is a bad commander.
A worthwhile gamble that didn't pay off. Ultimately it could well have worked and ended the war before Christmas so it was a chance worth taking. That it didn't was largely a matter of luck and no detriment to Monty. For those who question the Allies not listening to the Dutch resistance remember it had been throughly penetrated by the Gestapo so that is hardly surprising 🤷♂
Ok I finished watching n Listening too the Prior Video 📷📸, it was Impressive, informative, and Enjoyable as well as Complete. Thank You for Sharing it with me and the Many Others out There? In retrospect there were many Aspects about the Offensive, I wasn't aware of Apparently. Please Forgive any out of Line BS, or improper Comment's by Me. Thank You again.
The ENTIRE plan was wrong-headed. It had too many unknowns going in; and way WAY too many critical points of (possible) failure (i.e. if it goes wrong "here" the entire plan fails). Why this plan was followed, when it was proposed/pushed by the SAME MAN that promised Caan would be in British hands by the end of D-Day is a lesson in politics NOT military tactics.
And you have to ask, what if it had succeeded? What then? Did Montgomery think the Germans would just throw up their hands and say, game over? Antwerp would still have been in German hands, the supply line still would have been coming up from Normandy, and there would have been a long thin salient through Holland into Germany. The Allies couldn’t have supported a push any further. And we know from the next seven months of the war that the Germans fought tenaciously against both the Soviets and the Western Allies, even when it was hopeless. Montgomery’s idea of a bold strike to finish the war was never going to happen. There is a saying credited to Omar Bradley, “Amateurs talk strategy. Professionals talk logistics.” Montgomery ignored logistics.
@@timmotz2827 The main objective of Market Garden was to cut off the German forces in the Scheldt and free up Antwerp - only then to push south into the Rhur valley
i live in arnhem, so im well aware of what went down here. after the war the US army enigeers built a new permanent bridge at the exact posistion of the old one, wich is called the John Frost bridge, every year theres a huge memorial ceremony, followed by a re-enactment of the mass parachutist drop at the Ginkelse Heide. back in the day there would be a boat load of actual market garden veterans, but he number is declining each year, wich is absolutely heartbreaking.
I had the privilege of attending the 1986 and 87 memorial. There were still many of the Vets attending back then. I even met a couple of them that attended the same British Legion club I did 10 years before. The way the citizens treated these men and the children placing flowers on the graves at the service in Oosterbeek CWGS Cemetery was heart-warming
🙏🙏🙏🌹🌹🌹🌹
Shame.. Hi from 🇳🇿.., I have known this story from childhood, our was ww2 RNZAF.., what an absolute example stupendous poor management… nearly saved by the absolute courage and guts of the worker/ the “do er” in the situation…
The selflessness, I remember reading how the men of 30 corp.., having fought to Nijmegen… were in absolute awe of the commanders of men of the 82nd and their painfully slow crossing of the Waal.. in open boats.. under heavy fire.., many wrote of the 82nd as hero’s
@@tigertiger1699 Did you know that 30 Corps tanks were already across the river and watched this crossing in amazement?
From R G Poulussen's book "Lost at Nijmegen"
@@patrickkelly6691
Sorry but I have read it so manual times so many years ago.. I can’t remember..
I remember the reported comments from the British commanders.. at the length of knife carried by the 82nd airborne commanders…, as in 1- they were no gentlemanly lot (like British).., they wore a blade on their thighs.. it ran near the full length of their thighs… & to.. it was clear they were there to take Europe from the Nazi at all costs…
Brad pits character in inglorious bastards reminds me of the description of these airborne commanders ..
and for them to have left that impression on men as tough as what 30 corp had been through to get to Nijmegen…🤯🌹
I'll never forget reading A Bridge Too Far by Cornelius Ryan. My father was a glider pilot. He flew 5 invasion missions. He was one of only 50 Americans who flew copilot with the Brits into Sicily, he flew the Pathfinders into Normandy, first wave into Southern France where they got in to a hell of a dust up in Le Muy..and 2 flights in Market-Garden, he fought at the Waal crossing. About 3/4s of the way through the book, I'm going "wait a minute, this doesn't look good, when do we win?" and the Dad goes "Oh, you didn't know?, nah, that one didn't work out too well..."
That's quite a service record! Which unit was he with?
My father was a "flying bus driver". He was shot down dropping pathfinders of the 82nd in Normandy. He had an inner ear disorder in mid-Sept and missed being shot down again...this time his replacement pilot was killed. He was shot down a 2nd time over Bastogne dropping supplies to the 101st.
"Didn't work out too well"
That's putting it mildly.
Cornelius Ryan took part in a whitewashing and character assassinations in order to deflect the blame. Still, he knew the audience would be in the US and where the dollars were going to be made. It wouldn't do to allow the truth stand between himself and a best seller eh!?
Thank you for sharing, very much appreciated. Total respect and God Bless 🙏 🇺🇸
as a Polish I can't stand the way Montgomery treated Sosabowski as the scape goat for the failure of this operation where in fact this plan was ill fated from the start. It was so disgraceful for the people who lost their lives in there
I don't understand what happened there. Montgomery intially wrote to Sosabowski a letter of praise for his unit's actions and asked him for 10 nominations for decorations. Sometime later he changed his tune. I can only wonder if it was for Sosabowski's insubordination to Horrocks, but that doesn't seem a sufficient reason to me. In any case, the Polish Brigade had nothing to do with the operation's failure, it was another allied unit at Nijmegen that was responsible, but I'm afraid politics prevented that truth from being aired until the last 10 years, with the publication of a number of books going back to primary sources again.
@@davemac1197 both Browning and Horrocks clashed with Sosabowski. It was on the strength of those complaints that Montgomery changed his tune. As you say, it doesn't seem to have been sufficient reason and the Poles were definitely NOT the reason it failed.
While I think this gets most of the facts right, it is guilty of downplaying the part of Gavin's decision to prioritise the Heights over his primary objectives, as ordered by Brereton, which was to take the bridges with "thunderclap surprise".
Contrary to what the IWM has stated, the air intelligence was not ignored. If it was, then Operation Comet would have gone ahead. That Comet was cancelled and Market done instead, but with significantly more resources allocated illustrates quite clearly that the intelligence was absolutely taken into consideration.
Neither 9th SS Panzer nor 10th SS Panzer had anything of note to fight with, and were not deemed sufficient reason to cancel the operation. In fact, the tanks that turned the battle were not even in The Netherlands until the 21st Sept, although two Tiger 1s did arrive at about 20:00 on the 19th Sept. Had Gavin taken his primary objective, then XXX Corps would have been in Arnhem before those reinforcements turned up.
Some blame Browning for the decision, but in Gavin's own book "On to Berlin", he states quite clearly that it was his plan that was presented to Browning and on the strength of that plan, was "ordered" to put the Heights first. He stated that the taking of the major bridge presented him with a problem if it left his LZ exposed.
as a Dutch I can't stand the way Montgomery treated Sosabowski as scape goat either. Nor the enormous time it took to honour Sosabowski and the Polish para's who fought in the Netherlands while their own country was being occupied for a second time in the war. Fortunately they were finally honoured by Queen Beatrix on behalf of the Dutch government and people in 2005 when they received the highest military honour.
@@martijnb5887 - I agree, but I don't think Montgomery was the source. He initially praised Sosabowski and his Brigade, but then changed his tune. I have yet to discover why that was. The only marks against the Poles I can see are Sosabowski's insubordination to Horrocks during the Valburg conference, but he backed down and accepted Horrocks' authority, and the German complaints about the Poles not respecting the Red Cross and firing on their medics. The Germans complained the British always allowed them to collect their wounded, but the Poles did not. Both incidents are understandable, given the Poles' history with the Germans, and if I was a British officer at the Valburg conference I would forget Sosabowski's outburst, it's of little consequence. I don't understand why Montgomery changed his attitude. There has to be a story behind that somewhere.
I'm English and writing this from Cracow in Poland this evening. The reason we entered WWII was to defend Poland. If we had got to Berlin in 1944 - as we could and should have done - we might have been able to save Poland from 44 wasted years under Communism. Over-rated generals like Montgomery - and poor decision making by Churchill - are responsible for us letting the Poles down. If Churchill hadn't gone on his insane Greek adventure in 1941 (echoes of the Dardanelles in WWI), we would have cleared the Axis out of North Africa in 1941 and not 1943. The invasion of Italy was a strategic error - should have been France in 1943.
by 1944 the Germans had become exceptionally good at defensive responses. The troops in Holland were shattered and regrouping from the France disaster. The moment they realized what was happening, every German in Holland, from the Heer and Waffen-SS troops to Luftwaffe auxiliary personal, the railway workers and members of the RAD labor services were organized into mixed Kampfgruppes and deployed to counter the attack with great success. This sort of flexibility can counter just about everything a top down chain of command can throw together.
Yeah, a while back I read a review of the German reaction to M/G; one of the personal tales was how a regular German landser was trying to get to his unit and was shanghaied into an SS unit. An SS officer handwrote his new SS rank in his 'soldbuch', he was given those famous SS Cammies and a pair of "Runes", and Voila= Instant SS soldier.
I always remembered that story because of the constant 'squealing' from the wereabos about there not being 'Poles in the SS' (or the other one: ALL SS were top quality volunteers!) in reaction to the famous 'crossroads' episode in Band of Brothers.
Apparently any darned warm body would be used.
@@nickmitsialis Yeah the Waffen- SS had far looser restrictions on recruitment than the Heer after getting decimated in the winter of 1941-42. They learned a lot of lessons during that winter and emerged a far more effective fighting force.
I cycle across the John Frost bridge here in Arnhem twice a day, and often think about what happened all those years ago…
Very respectful of you to still think about it. Cheers from England ✌️
It's not the original bridge but the end supports were used to build the new bridge.
Thank you for keeping those young mens sacrifice on your memory. Truly noble.
Under the road bridge you can still see evidence on the stonework of the German attacks that came down the road from the east and also the germans shooting from the south side of the river. I visited in 1989. I think the little enclosure with the plaque in it on the bridge is where the pillbox was (?)
My father flew paratroopers into Operation Market Garden. He talked very little about his experiences during the war, but he did speak about watching paratroopers cut down in the air or tangling in their chutes. He was shot down behind enemy lines close to Grave and was picked up by the Dutch Underground, spending eight days hiding by day and moving at night. He remembers hiding in a ditch and watching German troops march by. He said he could have touched their boots. At one point a little brass band greeted them at a barn where they were hiding. The local people thought they had been liberated. He finally made it back to friendly territory, at the very end finding himself and his driver running through a tank battle, and was reunited with his crew. Amazingly none had died. My father could never speak highly enough of the Dutch people who saved so many at such risk to themselves. He never knew the names of the people who sheltered him or the Underground operators who guided him, but he always told me that I owed my life to the Dutch people because without them, I never would have been born.
Sounds like one of many similar stories researched by Dutch author Hans den Brok in his volumes of books called Market Flights. If you know which unit he was in I might be able to find if he's mentioned and identify the specific volume.
@@Ancient_War that's almost a movie
I was lucky enough to jump at the 30th anniversary of the Bruneval Raid, the first battle honour of the Parachute Regiment. John Frost commanded there as well and we were honoured to have him give us a talk through/walk through of that raid, a truly living legend.
Thank you for sharing, just total respect 🙏🇬🇧
@@rickyb5499 Thank you, I hasten to say I never saw combat though.
I live in Arnhem (and drive on the bridge everyday) and this operation is still a very important thing in the history of Arnhem. The name of the bridge is the John Frost bridge now, and in the north there is a memorial (airborne plein).
I listened to an interview of an American Colonel who was on the ground in Operation Market Garden . His answer was the poms where dropped 8 miles away from their objective, as a result cost the lives of 10, 000 men.The Colonel was if l remember correctly was 96 years old . To stand up and give a talk for about an hour and have audience enthralled, fantastic.
Don't suppose you remember his name?
@@davemac1197 Give me a day l will find his name. Cheers Laurie
@@lauriemattila5936 - not if it's too much trouble, but it would be interesting if you can. Cheers, Laurie!
@@lauriemattila5936 The total number of dead suffered by the Allies in Operation Market Garden was around 2,000, of which the number killed in the airborne force which attacked Arnhem was 1,485, with another 6,414 being taken prisoner.
@@davemac1197 Colonel Edward Shames, There are several speeches and interviews with him on American Veterans Center.
Market Garden needed too many elements to go right to be successful. Too complex and not enough transports/troops. The Germans put up more of a defense than expected, which should have been expected.
Advancing up one road didnt seem like the greatest idea either
So true, yet another Montgomery failure. I am a retired FDNY Captain, 1980-2003. My series Fatal Flaws traces 9/11 back to WWI. Fatal Flaws Book 1 1914-1945 traces the mistakes of those days and how it affected the future. I found Monty was the best ally Germany had. Everything he did after Africa failed, prolonging the war.
The Germans were usually brilliant in defence... as well as attack ! Able to mount superb counter attacks in the worst possible conditions and situations.
And the notion today that the war would be over by Christmas, like have the British ever been right when they say that?
@@lastguy8613 There wasn't one main road of advance, there were two.
And despite attempts by the Germans to cut the road, they did not manage to delay the British advance or attack it in any meaningful way, which arrived at Nijmegen on schedule.
It was"A Bridge Too Far", I love that movie. Gene Hackman playing the Polish Paratroop General, Great cast.
"No plan survives initial contact with the enemy." The more complicated a plan, the more a single point of failure can doom the operation, the more rigid or lacking of options there are in the plan, the more the plan is likely to fail.
To me the worst part of the plan was deciding to move the 50,000 men and their vehicles mainly up a single track. The tip of that spear is going to become mighty dull mighty soon. Yes, they were able to fan out in certain areas but then they still needed to concentrate as they crossed the numerous waterways. Any delays, such as the need to rebuild a bridge, the need to defend against stronger than expected counter attacks, the delay in taking a major crossing, combined with the sheer size of XXX Corps just adds to the likelihood of failure.
The worst part of Operation Market Garden was that Montgomery's idiotic plan was approved. His plan delayed the Allied advance by at least two months
And yet it was working until they got to Nijmegen.
@@davemac1197 Map Nijmegen day one i.pinimg.com/originals/6a/5c/de/6a5cde8f149179bb749b61c2b92bb3e3.jpg
the issue of the single road is absolutely over-played. Only on "the island" was it really an issue, and had the bridge at Nijmegen been taken by 82nd AB when they first dropped, then XXX Corps would have been across the island on the 19th Sept before the German reinforcements arrived on the 21st Sept!
@@sean640307 Have you been driving along that road? I drove to Arnhem on my way to Calais and then followed the same road south that XXX corps would have used going north. It was of course a modern road now but still only two lanes one northward and one southward. Having 50.000 men in trucks and transportvehilces and armor on that road, that surely looked different then, must have been a chokepoint.
My great uncle was a glider pilot and died at Arnhem on the 18th of September 1944.
He was one of the 6 glider pilots who flew into France late on the 5th June to take Pegasus Bridge before D DAY.
May he rest in peace. My cousin was in the 401st Glider regiment. He died in Holland on September 30.
Respect.
I went out with a girl in the '60's, her father was a glider pilot at Arnhem and he was still serving in the AAC at Middle Wallop at that time. A grand older man whom I should have picked the brains of and paid more attention to rather than having a one track mind about his daughter. Especiall as I joined the army that year! Shame on me.
My cousin was killed in Holland in Operation Market Garden. He was just 24 years old. Rest in peace, Noah.
You know a battle isn't going right when you even have a Major General, running around shooting at Germans.
He must've been the very model of a modern Major General.
"I understood that reference" -Captain America
Yes, but then he ran away!
@@dieselfan7406 He had to get back to his command post, to run the battle.
My wife's dad was in this battle in the 82nd. He managed to survive the war unscathed.
This past August 12th I experienced an abbreviated land tour of the operation. I was duly impressed with the size of the 82nd’s LZ in the Groesbeek Heights used for both paratroopers and gliders. For those interested, Market Garden provides a fertile field for additional study. Currently reading an after action report on Jedbough Teams that liaised with Dutch resistance during Market Garden. A lot of moving pieces!
I'm jealous! That area is a lot more built up around Groesbeek than it was in 1944, but it still must have given a good impression of the terrain. I only recently learned that the entire block of woodland to the southwest of Groesbeek was a Luftwaffe ammunition dump called 'Feld-Luftmunitionslager 15/VI Mook', and the Mooksebaan between Groesbeek and the Restaurant 't Zwaantje ran through the middle of it, closed off at both ends with security checkpoints. It was an MG position guarding the perimeter of this installation that nearly killed General Gavin on his way to his Division CP location on the Rijlaan.
Dave
Now you got me interested! I am going to check with my guide to see what he knows about the ammo dump. I did not realize how close Germany and the Siegfried line were till my guide pointed it the green hills in the distance (SSE).
Prior to Amsterdam, I was on a Rhine River boat and saw the remnants of the Ludendorff Bridge. I mentioned this to my son, an Army Combat Engineer,and the bridging of the Rhine. He stated that people have no idea of the planning required to bridge a river like the Rhine
@@patrickmorrissey8754 - See what your guide thinks of this:
I kept hearing about the ammo dump in first-hand accounts but couldn't pin down the location until I got some volumes from Hans den Brok's series on Market Flights - the IX Troop Carrier Command units that transported the Airborne in Operation Market. I was keen to figure out how the American glider pilots operated, so his books on their first hand accounts of their experiences was invaluable. The unexpected bonus was photos of the front or back gate to the Munitionslager opposite the 't Zwaantje restaurant, so that explained they closed the public road (Mooksebaan) running through the dump. Also, a 1945 edition of the military AMS GSGS map for Groesbeek shows the rail spur line from Groesbeek that loops around the south side of town and goes into the Munitionslager from the east, but doesn't indicate the perimeter fence or the extent of the facility, but it's most of that block of woodland as I found on a German document with a map online.
The glider pilots also referred to a work camp they used for accommodation, previously a Dutch labour camp (search 'N.A.D. Kamp de Mookerheide') before the war, and after the occupation the German R.A.D. (Reich Arbeits Dienst - State Labour Service) took over the camp for their own purposes. A RAD unit there was digging trenches and anti-tank defences along the Maas-Waalkanaal at the time of Market Garden, and because it was feared it might be a military barracks it was a target for 2nd Battalion 505th PIR before going into Divisional reserve. Hans said in his book the location was unknown, but I was able to help him out with it - it's gone now, replaced with private homes, but visible on RAF aerial photos. The location is next to the railway and bounded by the streets Oude Bovensteweg, Heumensebaan, Lindenlaan, and Stationstraat.
The Westwall technically ran through the Reichswald and terminated in the Nütterden village area with a few bunkers. There were bunkers in the Grunewald area on the south side of the Reichswald, and this was the battalion HQ for the Füsilier-Ersatz-Bataillon 39, part of the River Maas defence line. The road through the forest to Frasselt was the line of the Westwall, but I think in this section it was only a trench system and dugouts constructed out of logs. 505th PIR patrols that explored the western end of the Reichswald reported it 'empty' and unsuitable for tanks, which relieved Gavin of one his major concerns on the first day.
Another local HQ was for Landesschützen-Ausbildungs-Bataillon I./6, consisting of WW1 rear echelon troops deemed unsuitable for combat when they were young men, based in the Haus Kreuzfuhrt near Kranenbourg, and this unit had three of its five companies detached to defend the Maas-Waalkanaal bridges.
Patrick Morrissey
Have you read "Abundance of Valor" by Will Irwin? It's about the Jedburgh teams that led the way into the Netherlands and during Market-Garden. Embarrassingly, I had studied Market-Garden for decades, and had never noticed anything about the Jedburgh teams until I found this book.
@@dongilleo9743
Don! I found an after-action report about the four Jedbough teams deployed for Market-Garden on the internet after coming back to Albuquerque. I will check-out the book you mentioned. Than you for the info!
Patrick Morrissey
"Sir! the allies are advancing along highway 69!"
"Nice"
Fascinating, thank you for uploading this. Greetings from ‘The Island’, I cross the John Frost Bridge in Arnhem every day as I go to work. These images pass through my mind regularly as I make my way across the Rhine.
My dad's tank was the first one over one of the bridges. As a recovery tank, it had no turret so it was lighter and was sent over to test the weight
I'm guessing it was either the weakened bridge at Honinghutje after the Germans tried to demolish it, or the temporary wooden crossing alongside the inadequate drawbridge at Veghel?
@@davemac1197 he didnt remember
@@michaelwear2252 - bless him! A lot of people are unaware that the Airborne operation involved about 24 target bridges, not counting the Westervoort bridges at Arnhem that couldn't be occupied, and minor bridges that were ancilliary crossings, such as the ones either side of the Son bridge that were demolished before the operation. The rail bridge at Ravenstein was also demolished by the Germans when they saw an American patrol on the riverbank, and it wasn't even a target for the operation. Thanks for the reply.
We shall honour and remember them all. The bravery and heroism of all that took part in this ill-fated mission will always stand as a testament and example to all that follow them.
Amen.
Pity the paras threw all honour away less than 30 years later by murdering 22 innocent civilians in the UK.
One element not mentioned here is that Market Garden delayed the capture of the approaches of Antwerp. When Monty came round to capturing them, he found that during the delay, the Germans had heavily fortified them, meaning Antwerp was useless for many more months.
One of Montgomery's few serious blunders was not taking the Antwerp approaches when they were undefended, before M-G. Forgetting to take a port is not easily dismissed.
The need to employ a large, idle, gliry-hungry force, not landing on the bridges directly, and a lack of serious close air support were big factors in the failure (I'm not saying many others have not already).
@@lllordllloyd One of many!!
Exactly!
@@phillipnagle9651 Not really that many.
Caen???
I’m from the Netherlands and my family remember Market Garden. We still remember the sacrifice that those soldiers made.
The British and Polish soldiers who took and, for a time, held that bridge fought like absolute legends. Too bad they were dropped too far away, in separate groups and their radios were not up to par for the mission.
To have your country occupied hy far left terrorists...
@@derekweiland1857 my grandad was one of them. A lot of his colleagues are buried in Driel. Za naszą i waszą wolność
Thank you 🙏 👍
What did they sacrifice for? Look around you.
9th SS was close to decimated! 10th SS was, intentionally, dismantling their armour to prevent them from being handed over to other units! Neither unit was combat ready when MG began. 10th SS was ferrying over dismantled Sturmgeschütze, which had to be both repaired and then ferried back again.
What greatly hampered the advance was the vast, VAST amount of artillery and their near limitless supply of ammunition. This artillery was also perfectly placed in relation to the corridor and able to pound beyond Nijmegen to the south and well north of the Rhine. This cut the corridor several times.
While the weather did play a role, finding the complete plans in a crashed Horsa glider provided the German troops around Arnhem and Oosterbeek with all the data they needed to engage the further coming droppings.
A very good book on the German immediate response as well as the prior preparations by Field Marshall Walter Model is Een Andere Kijk op de Slag om Arnhem: De Snelle Duitse Reactie - Peter Berends from 2002. This is only available in Dutch though.
Other way round - 9.SS handed over heavy equipment and some units to 10.SS, but had held some vehicles back by removing tracks and guns.
The SS panzer division was still in the area and had not completely dismantled their armour, which contributed to the demise of the British paratroopers at Arnhem bridge. Yes, they were dismantling, but they were still an in tact division that had tanks at the moment when the operation began, and was responsible for the coup de grace at Arnhem. The dutch resistance tried warning Montgomery about this iirc
@Herbert Ackermans: I have never heard of this before. Only of the "surprise" presence of panzers. Where did all of the artillery come from? Very little German equipment made it out of Normandy, so it must have come from units which had not been deployed in Normandy.
@@str2010 - Absolutely not an intact division by any stretch of the imagination. The remnants of SS-Panzer-Regiment 9 under an SS-Lieutenant based at the Saksen-Weimarkazerne (barracks) in northern Arnhem had exactly three Mark V 'Panther' tanks and two Flakpanzer IV 'Möbelwagen' on 17 September. 100 Panther crewmen were grouped into an 'alarm' company acting as infantry, and the Werkstatt (workshop Company) formed another. All other tanks (Mark IV) had been handed over to II./SS-Panzer-Regiment 10 at Vorden, bringing their total to 16 concentrated in the 5.Kompanie.
The remaining five 9.SS tanks had been moved out of the barracks (presumably having their tracks and guns refitted in the workshops after removing them to record them as 'non-operational' to avoid handover) on Friday 15 September, to be hidden under trees on Heijenoordseweg (according to Dutch residents in a house at the end of Callunastraat who were asked for milk by the panzer crews).
During the battle, two of the three Panthers of Kampfgruppe Harder were dealt with by a PIAT and a Gammon bomb dropped from an upstairs window by Major Peter Waddy (Commander 'B' Company, 3rd Para Battalion) in the western outskirts of Arnhem on 18 September. The Flakpanzers were in action on the Dreyenscheweg against 4th Parachute Brigade, their 3.7cm Flak guns proving to be devastating against infantry. The remaining Panther was in action throughout the seige of the Oosterbeek perimeter, but wary of anti-tank weapons the Germans avoided getting too close and used their tanks as SP guns to shell houses from a distance.
Also during the battle, the 10.SS received deliveries of 8 and then 12 brand new Panthers direct from the factory, and they were crewed by the 100 Panther crewmen transferred from the SS-Panzer-Regiment 9 alarm company. Some of the Panthers were lost in the area of Elst after the Arnhem bridge was retaken. They were still in the overall desert yellow factory paint finish, having no time for camouflage colours or tactical numbers to be applied.
The Dutch resistance reports were taken seriously, but could not be confirmed. A plan for the 82nd Airborne to be dropped at Arnhem and the 1st Airborne at Nijmegen was switched, because the British Airborne had far more anti-tank guns, including 17-pounders, while the American Airborne units had more field artillery. The Dutch had identified SS units between Arnhem-Apeldoorn-Zutphen as belonging to the 'H' (9.SS Hohenstaufen) Division, but there was no information on the location of the 10.SS at all. There was concern they may have been in Nijmegen and drawing new tanks from a depot thought to be in the Kleve area (SHAEF Intel Summary #26 dated 16 September 1944), which led to a silly rumour the Reichswald forest could be hiding up to 1000 tanks!
It's quite wrong to suggest Montgomery knew two Panzer-Divisions were at Arnhem. It wasn't even true, both in terms of strength or location, and the intelligence picture was more complex in both reality and perception at the time.
@@dpeasehead - you're right about the equipment not coming from Normandy. The 10.SS-Panzer-Division became 'over establishment' in artillery as the commander of their 4./Flak-Abteilung battery discovered 40 brand new 10.5cm leFH 18/40 guns on a freight train at Arras station in northern France during the retreat. The escorting troops had abandoned the train in the panic. Since 10.SS had lost most of their artillery and the prime movers (heavy half-tracks), arrangements were made to find enough trucks from the logistics trains in the Division to move them. They absorbed the guns by having six guns instead of the establishment four in each leFH battery, although they somehow ended up with two '10.Batterie' listed on strength.
"My county can never again afford the luxury of another Montgomery success..."
Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands
He was clearly not aware the operation was compromised by the American 82nd Airborne at Nijmegen and that had nothing to do with Montgomery.
@@davemac1197 In military strategy, a choke point (or chokepoint), or sometimes bottleneck, is a geographical feature on land such as a valley, defile or bridge, or maritime passage through a critical waterway such as a strait, which an armed force is forced to pass through in order to reach its objective, sometimes on a substantially narrowed front and therefore greatly decreasing its combat effectiveness by making it harder to bring superior numbers to bear. A choke point can allow a numerically inferior defending force to use the terrain as a force multiplier to thwart or ambush a much larger opponent, as the attacker cannot advance any further without first securing passage through the choke point.
The Nazi Party member, and SS man Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands was shown door by both British, and US intelligence organizations due his supect loyalties.
Only his royal connections kept him out prison in the 1970s, due to the Lockheed scandal that engulfed the Dutch Royal family.
HQ blaming Montgomery
*Alan Brooke's own words with Adml Ramsay chiming in*
*"Triumph in the West, by Arthur Bryant, From the diary of Field Marshal Lord Alan Brooke, entry for 5 October 1944:Page 219" During the whole discussion one fact stood out clearly, that access to Antwerp must be captured with the least possible delay. I feel that Monty's strategy for once is at fault, Instead of carrying out the advance on Arnhem he ought to have made certain of Antwerp in the first place. Admiral Ramsay brought this out as well in the discussion and criticized Monty freely....."*
Monty later admitting it
*The Guns at Last Light, by Rick Atkinson, page 303 In his diary Admiral Ramsey wrote and warned that clearing the Scheldt of mines would take weeks, even after the German defenders were flicked away from the banks of the waterway" Monty made the startling announcement that he would take the Ruhr without Antwerp this afforded me the cue I needed to lambaste him.......I let fly with all my guns at the faulty strategy we had allowed Montgomery. Who would acknowledge as much after the war, conceding "a bad mistake on my part"*
Watching this from my living room with a view over the Nijmegen bridge. Always nice to see such a good summary of what happened.
Almost every bridge over the rhine or waal rivers at Nijmegen and Arnhem is named in honour of the brave hero's of this operation
Great video with great image material. I live in Arnhem so I love seeing the old images
A very succinct description of the timeline of the operation. I understand the events much better now. Thank you.
This is not a very accurate depiction of the events though.
"That's not the worst of it. See this part here, it's the WIDE part."
Most airborne assaults in WW2 failed badly. This last big one here was the worst. “Coins in the pocket that had to be spent” as Rick Atkinson said.
The biggest problem was Montgomery's ego.
Monty:. Remember that Polish guy who said it was a bad plan? Let's blame him for the whole mess.
Let's have Tea.
"Lieutenant-General Browning specified to their commander, Brigadier-General Gavin, who gave his approval, that the 82nd Airborne's priorities were, first, the large area of high ground known as the Groesbeek Heights, second, the bridge over the River Maas at Grave, then three bridges over the Maas-Waal Canal, and finally Nijmegen Bridge."
Pegasus Archive Arnhem 30. Reasons for the Failure
Tik History does an interesting video covering this. From what I remember some of these sources were written years after the battle and contradict what Gavin said at the time where he states it was his decision to de-prioritise the Nijmegen bridge.
@@CB-fz3li Tik did about a dozen vids on MG including one on Beevors book because he didn't like it because it did not lay all of the blame on the US.
@@nickdanger3802 I don't get that impression from Tik. I know one of the sources he referenced was Poulussen who is Dutch so not likely to have an axe to grind either way. Personally I think with the heavy hitters like Beevor and Hastings, although they should be respected they aren't infallible and there can be a sense of a chumocracy at play. I think it is healthy that they be challenged where the evidence supports it.
@Stephen Jackson Bridges were captured in the order they would be needed by XXX Corps which was supposed to be in the area on day two.
@@CB-fz3li Tik did a vid on supply vs demand economy in WWII so he could bitch about the NHS.
The Dutch told the British the plan was a bad idea due to the terrain.
There were no German forces in the Reichswald that Gavin was shelling and the Groesbeek heights secured and taken with little force and did not need the whole of the 82nd to do so . The landing zone for the second wave between Groesbeek and Reichswald had been quickleynsecured and HQ established .The delay in sending elements led by Warren under Lindquist on day 1 , allowed 10 Panzer at Arnhem to speed south to Nijmegen and occupy the town on the south bank of the Waal . Time lost at the Son had been made up by 30 Corps after intercepting radio messages that the bridge was lost and fotwarded Bailey equipment which was in place overnight . The 101st under Maxwell-Taylor had done an excellent job of achieving and maintaining their objectives throughout . On reaching Nijmegen on schedule , 30 Corps was now facing 10 Panzer that was not there before . The delay that resulted was insufferable.
The force eventually sent against the Groesbeek Heights on day 4 was an ad hoc KG made up of a hospital unit and injured infantry that were easily beaten back with very few casualties taken by the 82nd .
The orders for Lindquist to take the Bridge were clear on the 15th September and reinforced on the 17th . The report from Gavin stating Browning had agreed to prioritise the Heights was not produced by Gavin and was dated 5th October after the event and must be considered unreliable. In any case Gavin has subsequently blamed Lindquist for the failure . Regardless of what had ensued Gavin was in command and had failed to correctly allocate troops to achieve the directive.
The IWM has a responsibility to ensure history is correctly presented regardless of sensibilities.
It was the British AO so where did the intel on the Reichswald come from ?
Browning with his HQ brought in by 38 of first AB's gliders was in command of all airborne.
"He (Browning) became anxious on the same day as he watched the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment and the Grenadier Guards making their attempt to capture Nijmegen Bridge, and when it fell he said to Horrocks of the American crossing, "I have never seen a more gallant action."
Pegasus Archive Browning
I agree with what you say except for the 82nd having more resources than they needed. That was how it worked out on the Groesbeek heights on the first day, but they didn't know that going in because the intelligence picture was not complete. The Dutch resistance had not positively located or identified the 10.SS-Panzer-Division, so there was a possibility the division (reduced to a regimental battlegroup in Normandy) could be in Nijmegen. The only firm intelligence was Ultra, placing the II.SS-Panzerkorps (with the 9.'Hohenstaufen' and presumably the 10.'Frundsberg' divisions) in the eastern Netherlands, but even the existence of Ultra was not made known to commanders at Corps and Division level, or below the rank of (four-star) General (so Montgomery and Dempsey knew it existed, but Brereton of 1st Allied Airborne Army did not).
Gavin was given a vague 'santitised' estimate that "a regiment of SS" may be located in the excellent Dutch army barrack facilities in Nijmegen, and possibly drawing new tanks from a depot thought to be in the Kleve area just behind the Reichswald (it was actually near Münster deeper into Germany), so the Reichswald may be a tank laager. This certainly influenced Gavin's divisonal plan. Having decided his best regiment, the 504th PIR, would be assigned the capture of the Maas highway bridge at Grave to secure his division's supply line to XXX Corps, he seemed to decide his next priority was to defend the division from a potential armoured attack from the Reichswald, so the very experienced and aggressive 505th Regiment was assigned to the Reichswald sector, and to secure a secondary Maas bridge - the rail bridge at Mook. This left the 508th PIR, on only its second combat operation and with a commander that had not performed well in Normandy, to secure the Groesbeek ridge (potentially defended by an SS regiment), and if at all possible to send a battalion directly to the highway bridge over the Waal.
Gavin made no coup de main plan for the Nijmegen highway bridge, as at Arnhem with Urquhart's Reconnaissance Squadron, but Colonel Reuben Tucker of the 504th had the experience and grit to demand a special drop zone for one company to drop near the southern end of the Grave bridge so it could be taken from both ends, and he got it. Gavin instead only ensured Colonel Lindquist was given what he thought was a clear instruction to send a battalion to the bridge in the final divisional briefing before the operation, and one source says he even stood with Lindquist over a map to show him the exact route he wanted the 1st Battalion to take to the bridge. When this did not happen and Lindquist had sent only a small recon force, Gavin was as "mad" as the 508th liaison officer (the unfortunate messenger) had ever seen him, and they went immediately to the 508th CP to get Lindquist moving. By this time it was too late. Most of the patrol had got lost in the city and the 10.SS-Panzer-Division (which had been in the Achterhoek region northeast of Arnhem) won the race to reinforce the bridge and the city centre.
Unfortunately for historians, this story does not seem to have come out until 2012 and 82nd Airborne historian Phil Nordykes' combat history of the 508th PIR in WW2 - Put Us Down In Hell, and American historian John C McManus' September Hope - The American Side of a Bridge Too Far, who both rely on junior officers coming forward to speak out now that all the senior figures in this drama have passed away. All Gavin said to Cornelius Ryan in his interview in 1967 was that Ridgeway (82nd CO in Normandy) did not trust Lindquist and would not promote him - presumably meaning when Ridgway was given command of the US XVIII Airborne Corps in August, and in fact Ridgway had a problem in that he could not promote any other Colonel in the Division over him because Lindquist had seniority in the grade. Gavin said no more and Ryan did no further digging, because the whole Nijmegen blunder did not appear in his book and unknown to the many other historians who relied on Ryan's primary research. Gavin may also have had the same problem with promotions, because after he inherited the division from Ridgway he failed to replace himself as Assistant Division Commander, so he was running himself ragged doing both jobs during Market Garden.
As far as I know, Gavin has never thrown Lindquist under the bus and he seems to have taken responsibility for the failure on his own shoulders by conflating the relative priorities of bridge and ridge, with support from Browning in their post-war correspondence. Gavin also wrote in a report for the US Army suggesting a change in doctrine that senior commanders making mistakes be given a second chance to learn from their mistakes instead of the current policy of immediate removal. Many may have thought he was referring to himself, but I think he may have been referring to Lindquist as well and had already been applying his own doctrine, since Lindquist remained in post for the remainder of the war. Having caused unnecessary casualties in the battle for Hill 95 (Sainte Catherine) near La Hay in Normandy on 4 July, and then failed to move on a key objective at Nijmegen in September, Lindquist seemed to perform without further incident duing the battle of the bulge.
Band of brothers brought me here...
Respect to all our brave heroes..
Always astonished by the short view about Market Garden.
Of course the 3 days long planned airborne deployment was the major flaw.
But what about "most secret" plans, not to be brought, in ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, on the battle ground, featuring all the operation plans fell in germans hands ?
What about Browning landing with his staff in the Nijmegen area with more than 18 gliders on the FIRST day, that could have been more useful elsewhere (Arnhem area?) and he, be as useful in a rear area or England ?
What about Browning subscribing to Gavin's concern about the "10000 german tanks lurking in the Reichwald" SSW Groosbeeh heights thus delaying the advance on the capital targets that were Nimjegen rail and road bridges ?
On a further note, what about appointing an infantry officer to lead an airborne division ? He lacked almost all support a regular british ID could expect at this time in WWII.
And why the Polish Ind Bde was assigned LZ an DZ that were not suitable for 1st AIR, since taking a bridge from two sides should seem more efficient than on only one ?
I know a youtuber that tried to face some of these questions In very lengnth.. He has currently heavy real life matters to deal with. Then not available to enquire, I gess..
You IWM, should have many more and deeper to provide than a quickie such as this.
My regards, anyway.
True the headquarters element of British First Airborne did base themselves in Nijmegen.
Yeah, it seems the IWM doesn't really wish to point names (hint: Gavin and Browning). At least not blaming the Polish, that is a positive move...
This. Had Gavin taken Nijmegen on schedule the plan may have worked complex though it was.
Even if Nijmegen bridge had been captured and held on day one, a difficult and not sure thing, Market-Garden would have still come to a dead stop at Arnhem. The tiny bridgehead at the Arnhem bridge wasn't sufficient for 30th Corps to cross, turn right, and sweep into Germany to end the war by Christmas. The leading elements of 30th Corps would have been bunched up at Arnhem just in time for the German counterattack to cut the corridor further south for a day and a half.
Then there's the problem of supplies. British supply lines stretch all the way back to Normandy. The 1st Canadian Army and a bunch of British divisions are spread out halfway back to Normandy; some of them deliberately halted so their transportation assets could be used to try to keep other divisions supplied. Without the docks at Antwerp to fully supply the Allied armies, they weren't going to cross the Rhine in strength until Spring of 1945.
@@dongilleo9743 Fair point and it would be hard to hold the airfield to the north which was one of the objectives as well. Arnhem could have turned into another Caen. But even if there was time to evacuate civilians south imagine the traffic jam.
My great uncle took part in Operation Market Garden..... Tommy Scullion from Ballymena Northern Ireland. He had a part in a film about it playing himself. Oddly in the film he gets captured but in reality as far as I'm aware he fought his way back to his own lines
Sounds like he might have been in Theirs is the Glory released in 1946
@@neilholmes8200 that's the one
I saw the ‘Theirs is the glory’ fairly recently, I believe his character actually died? Himself and Peter Holt were very memorable in that film
It failed because 1) It was commanded by Montgomery who just wasn’t up to this type of operation. 2) Lack of sufficient transport aircraft 3) Gen Gavin delayed taking the Waal Bridge at Nijmegen. 4) Poor choice of landing zones at Arnhem. 5) Inadequate radios. But it was marked by incredibly heroic action by all the forces involved. The British paratroopers at Arnhem in particular fought like lions and held on despite strong German attacks.
Number 3) was the only problem actually fatal to the operation, but it was the 508th Regiment Commander, not Gavin, that delayed. When Gavin found out they were diggin-in on the Groesbeek ridge, he was as angry as the 508th's Liaison Officer had ever seen him. This was NOT Gavin's divisional plan being carried out at all. The limitation on transport aircraft was taken into account by the planners (what else could they do?), choice of landing zones were dictated by Flak and terrain (what alternatives did they have?), terrain effects on radio communications were not known about (they affected the Germans as well), and Montgomery's plan was brilliant and audacious, but he only made the mistake of thinking his allies were just as capable as his own troops. He gave the Americans too much credit. Why the Americans would blame Montgomery is an emotional response and not a rational one based on the facts.
@@davemac1197 What could they do about not having enough transport aircraft and not having a landing zone close enough to the bridge at Arnhem especially given the German forces available near Arnhem? Well they could not attempt the operation for one thing. The fact that they went ahead given those limitations is the fault of the planners. And the fault of the Commander who insisted it go forward.
Eisenhower wrote a note taking all the blame for the failure of D Day had it gone wrong and he relied on his British and Canadian and French Allies. It’s the nature of command.
But Montgomery was well known for being cautious and methodical and insisting on large material advantages before launching operations. He failed to take Caen according to the Overlord time table, whose fault was that? He failed to close the Falaise (sp) gap during the end stage of the battle of the bulge, whose fault was that?
Montgomery was a great general, but he was not capable of making rapid advances, it wasn’t in his nature.
He also wisely realized that the British people were down to their manpower limits and that he could not afford to lose men by being too aggressive but then he planned a too aggressive attack and didn’t account for the change in intelligence when they learned of the German forces that had been moved into the Arnhem area.
All commanders have their strengths and weaknesses, British, American, German and Soviet alike. Montgomery was not good in a rapid advance he was his best in a methodical set piece battle and Market Garden was as much a race as any battle of WW2.
@@Whitpusmc - obviously you enjoy having a joke! The operation almost succeeded (according even to the Germans) and would have done so if the Nijmegen bridges had been secured on the first afternoon. The fact they weren't cannot be placed at Montgomery's door.
@@davemac1197 He was both the planner and in overall command and insisted on a plan where a series of subsidiary operations all had to succeed or it failed with no “plan b.” The Germans could have blown the Arnhem bridge at any time and that fact alone meant that it didn’t have a significant chance of success. Furthermore as other posters have pointed out Gen Gavin did secure the Waal bridge when 30 Corps got to them and even then they had to turn around and recapture part of the road behind them. Securing the bridge before 30 corps got there would not have done anything. Monty was the overall commander and insisted on an overly complex operation and didn’t change it when new intelligence on German forces made the chance of success significantly less. He’s to blame, no joke especially given the casualties taken.
@@Whitpusmc - Gavin's Divisonal plan for Nijmegen did not 'fail'. It simply wasn't carried out. This was the fault of the Regimental commander, who had also exhibited very questionable decision-making in Normandy. Reading Phil Nordyke's combat history of the 508th - Put Us Down In Hell (2012) is very illuminating in this respect. Gavin inherited a Division from Matthew Ridgway with a problem Parachute Regiment and two excellent combat veteren units (three, if you include the Glider Infantry).
Gavin entrusted the 508th with securing the Groesbeek ridge and then proceeding into Nijmegen to grab the bridges. The reason for the initial ridge objective is clear if you study a map. The German strength in Nijmegen was unknown and it was feared the 10.SS-Panzer-Division (reduced to a regimental battlegroup) might be in the city - its whereabouts were unknown at the time. If the ridge was occupied, it would be a significant defensive position blocking access to the city and its bridges. In the event, the city was evacuated of its rear echelon units and the available combat units were all deployed defending the Maas-Waalkanaal bridges west of the city.
The 508th's commander, having secured the ridge without any opposition, then started digging-in, against orders, while sending only recon patrols into the city. The patrol from the 1st Battalion, consisted of the S-2 (Intelligence) Section, the 3rd Platoon from 'C' Company, an LMG Section from HQ Company, and equipped with 'C' Company's SCR-300 radio (on the battalion net). The patrol got separated in the city due to the Dutch citizens coming out onto the streets and celebrating their 'liberation' (source: Chapter 10, Put Us Down In Hell, Phil Nordyke, 2012).
Only three lead Scouts from the S-2 Section got to the highway bridge. They surprised 6/7 Germans, taking them prisoner and capturing a "small artillery weapon". They waited for reinforcements that never arrived, until at dusk they decided to release their prisoners and withdraw. As they did so, they could hear "heavy equipment" arriving at the other end of the bridge (source: 'Nijmegen Bridge', Chapter 6, The 508th Connection, Zig Boroughs, 2013).
Montgomery wrote after the war that he made a mistake in thinking the Canadian 1st Army would be able to clear the approaches to Antwerp on their own (it was in their sector), while he was going for the Ruhr with British 2nd Army. He made a similar mistake in Market Garden when he obviously thought the American units he was loaned for the operation were at least as capable as his own troops. In this case he was too polite to write that about his allies (probably another mistake), but it's very clear he was wrong to trust them. The result was the failure of the entire operation and the virtual destruction of 1st Airborne Division. The Parachute Infantry Regiment at Nijmegen had an easier job to do than the Parachute Brigade at Arnhem. They landed 30 minutes earlier, had 3 Km less to march to their main objective, and had less opposition than even Frost's battalion at Arnhem (he had MGs and armoured cars on his route). Frost held his bridge for four days, as Browning had promised, against a reduced SS-Panzer-Division and reinforcements from Germany. The 508th got three men to their bridge, and then had to withdraw.
Blaming Montgomery is an emotional response, not a rational one based on the facts.
This operation is a textbook example of underestimating an enemy when victory seems within sight to the commanders. All that Montgomery had built his successes on at that point, particularly from his time in Africa, where he bided his time until he knew he had superiority in every way, suddenly went out the window with Market Garden.
Still, if it hadn't been for the borderline suicidal bravery of Major Robert Caine VC, the situation afterwards would have been far worse
MG was not Monty..he had planned COMET which was cancelled on the 10th of sep, COMETS plans were then Ike gave them to Brereton and Williams who came up with MARKET and GARDEN..a good plan sadly Gavin messed it up by not taking the Waal bridge on landing.
Monty cancelled the original plan when Intel showed increased enemy strength. He then requested a postponement until the supplies that had been promised arrived. Ike ordered the Operation go ahead when it did.
One of the bitterly sad consequences of this failure was the summary execution of the many Dutch civilians who were suspected of assisting the allied effort during Market Garden. No POW camps for them. Also, the Germans exacted further retribution by demolishing much unscathed housing after the Arnhem battle....as a warning to the population. As a Brit who lived in Holland, I can tell you that the Dutch respect and appreciation of allied sacrifice, allied graves etc is overwhelming and incredibly moving. The German occupation of Holland (and other European countries) during WW2 has left deep psychological scars throughout mainland Europe that will (and should) linger for hundreds of years.
I was expecting a revisionist version of history; pleasantly suprised that this was not the case. Any commander today that would deploy troops into a conflict with defective communications (non-working radios) and deliberately hide the intelligence reports of heavy armour would and should face time behind bars. It was mainly through the tenacity of the individual soldier that the operation was partially successful; despite the incompetence of those of higher office.
You were lucky if Army radios in the 1940s worked at all, especially after jumping out of a plane and four days in the field.
@@spoddie The fact is; they were known to be defective and inoperable prior to take-off (how's that for incompetence - check with the Imperial Museum if you don't believe me).
You are so correct. Monty refused to allow the Intel about the SS Panzer Units to affect "His Grandiose Plan.) He was actually the best ally Germany had. Every one of his operations after Africa failed. I am a retired FDNY Captain, 1980-2003. My series Fatal Flaws traces 9/11 back to WWI. Fatal Flaws Book 1 1914-1945 goes in depth to examine all of the failures from that war as it related to world events. Especially Monty's.
@@richardmeo2503 Another brainwashed yank... Monty was a very good commander. Why dont you write about the bloody incompetence at hurtgen forest or pattons failures in the lorraine campaign. In Normandy while Monty fought the majority of german armour, Bradley couldnt overcome a few understrength german divisions. Had General Gavin captured Nijmegan bridge and had brereton not altered the plans for dropping paratroopers Market Garden wouldnt have ended so badly. Both American generals who evade criticism. Monty was the best the western allies had.
@Stephen Jackson Not true. They were discovered because overflights took photos of their tanks trying to stay under cover. Monty and company were warned of the tanks, but they never cancelled the plan nor did they warn their Paras.
Montgomery failed to uphold take Caen on D-Day or shortly thereafter.
He Finally took Antwerp but not the estuary.
And Failed with Market Garden.
Not taking the estuary of Antwerp was a failure of epic proportions. He shouldn't have been allowed to command anymore after that blunder. Instead he was given another chance with disastrous consequences. Not only did Market Garden fail, but it led to reprisals against the Dutch and this in turn made the situation for the Dutch in the following winter worse as well.
B A, let's just overlook his successes in Africa then and the fact that he was Commander in Chief of all allied land forces on D Day and for many weeks after and devised the plan for the ground forces. What an idiot he clearly was.
Market Garden was not Monty's plan. It was his idea, he did not do the planning. At Caen, there was more German armour per square mile than there was at Kursk.
@@CIMAmotor and the weather was garbage. Its amazing that the Americans get cut some slack in south where they faced minimal opposition because of the poor weather but Montgomery gets chastised for not being able to steamroll the largest concentration of armor assembled on the western front in a day.
@@bushyfromoz8834 Yeah, and the reason that the Americans faced minimal opposition is that Monty's attack sucked in German reserves
Great one
Advanced on too narrow of a front. Easily ambushed
Everyone has different views, and having studied it for years I still think it was very close to success, and if the plan had gone accordingly at Nijmegen, it might indeed have succeeded. I don't have the depth of knowledge of many though. But here goes.........firstly it all depends whether you assess the time they took against the 'hoped for' 48 hour (2 day) limit to reach Arnhem, or the outer time limit of 96 hours and 4 days.
There were contributing factors, such as complexity, too many objectives for Paratroopers, distance of drops from objectives, drops carried out over different days rather than the single day intended, communication difficulties between air and ground, supply drop issues, weather, and critically speed and quality of German response, but still, it nearly succeeded. They knew of the presence of 10th SS Panzer Division, though there is debate whether they knew about 9th as well, totalling around 6,000 men near Arnhem, a depleted but still very capable force, but felt they could be overcome. So intelligence wasn't ignored, it was just under-estimated. Indeed, perhaps the biggest criticism is that they under-estimated the organisation and remaining strength of the German Army overall following their rout at Normandy, and under-estimated the effect of strong direct supply links between Germany and Arnhem, especially by rail. They also had excellent Commanders like Model, Student, Hemel, and Bittrich who knew the area like the back of their hand.
But we cannot ignore the fundamental fact that Brereton reiterated that all Paratroopers must go for the bridges with 'thunderclap speed', so quite why the Waal bridge at Nijmegen was demoted to 4th priority by a combination of Boy Browning and US 82nd Commander Gavin (ultimately Gavin states this was his decision) remains a mystery, especially as Dutch intelligence told arriving US troops that there were no German tanks in the nearby Reichswold Heights or adjacent forest, which was instead given top priority. But holding landing zones and the Heights was given top priority by Gavin, and Browning was perfectly happy to authorise this battle order. In simple terms, too little priority was given by Gavin or Browning to take the Waal road bridge, though there is further internal 82nd debate whether Gavin's own Colonel's misinterpreted his own orders. The US Army official enquiry admonished Lindquist in this respect.
As shock-troops, the lightly-armed British, US, and Polish Paratroopers all performed superbly, that is without question, as they were dropped at three different strategic locations along the route. The British only took the northern end of Arnhem Bridge however, with others bogged down on the outskirts at Oosterbeek, and the Poles were belatedly dropped into a 'hornets nest' but at least they helped relieve the encircled Brits there. 101st US did well to attain most objectives with relatively little initial opposition but later coming under constant attack, but as highlighted, 82nd delayed attacking the main Waal bridge, allowing 10th SS Panzer Division based near Arnhem to make the short journey and bed in strongly at the bridge later the same day, and also create strong defences on the elevated ground just south of the bridge, facing the adjacent town centre itself. They also bedded in within the town. This delay was critical as a window of opportunity was missed.
30 Corps (2nd British Army), containing 50,000 men, are often criticised, but Route 69 (Hells Highway) was a single-track 64-mile long, often elevated and exposed road that was well-defended at various points by anti-tank traps and 88-mil guns. 9 tanks were knocked out soon after they set off. 30 Corps - the Guards Brigade tanks and 50th Northumbrian Division took Valkenswaard by the evening on their first day, but they had only gained 6 miles. British 8th and 12th Divisions moved slowly forward on either flank. 30 Corps were further slowed by counter-attacks along the route and had to build a bailey bridge at Son on the evening of Day 2, before arriving at Nijmegen on schedule at mid-day on the 19th, only to find Nijmegen and its bridge firmly in the hands of the Germans. 30 Corps and 82nd US Division then spent more than 2 full days fighting in Nijmegen and for the bridge, eventually taking it at 7.30pm-8pm on 20th.
This attack on the Waal bridge chiefly involved the King's Company of the 1st Grenadier Guards (30 Corps), who with 82nd US gradually cleared Nijmegen. The Grenadier's eventually charged the elevated defences at the southern end of the Waal bridge at the heavily-defended 'Valkhof' during heroic hand-to-hand fighting in ditches and defences, whilst the remaining Grenadier Guards and 82nd US Division took the adjacent Hunnerspark. These heroic efforts are little recognised, but these attacks where the Grenadier's lost nearly 100 dead enabled the bridge to be taken, when a few British Guards Brigade tanks rolled across the defended bridge, whilst 504th US Brigade heroically traversed the river under heavy fire, losing 48 men, taking the rail bridge and then meeting up at the northern end of the road bridge and around nearby Lent. A dozen tanks eventually got across despite the ongoing threat that it would be detonated, and formed a defensive semi-circle against counter-attack. Lets be clear, they were at this point only late because of having to take Nijmegen and its Waal bridge over 2 days.
It is alleged that they could have gone on at this point, at 8pm on 20th, but in darkness they stopped to consolidate, with 30 Corps infantry still fighting in Nijmegen and also being pulled back to help 101st US division from counter-attack near Veghel where 107th SS Panzer Division broke the supply line for two full days. The Coldstream Guards were also helping 82nd US Division from an attack that now came from the Reichswold Heights, which was beaten off. On 21 September, the following morning, Guards Brigade set off but tanks were quickly taken out as they traversed along the exposed, raised road, so 43rd infantry (of 30 Corps) were brought forward and over the next few days they and Guards Brigade tanks were involved in heavy fighting between Nijmegen and Arnhem around Elst and what was called 'The Island'. After taking Elst, 30 Corps artillery were able to fire shells at the Germans at Oosterbeek. The brave Poles were dropped in and frantically tried to relieve the encircled British Airborne Paras at Oosterbeek, but separated by the river. The efforts of the British Paras at Arnhem are legendary, but once the bridge there fell totally into German hands late on the 20th, German troops and armaments from nearby Germany poured across the bridge into the region between Arnhem and Nijmegen, and the Allies withdrew over a few days to Nijmegen where both sides eventually settled, drawing a line for a period.
So 30 Corps were involved in fighting backwards and forwards along the whole length of the 64 mile route, as Germans counter-attacked. Could they had moved more quickly at times? Possibly but who knows? Strategically, it was inevitably very difficult to organise and co-ordinate 50,000 troops, tanks and artillery to different, appropriate points of the narrow, littered highway as counter-attacks occurred. If Nijmegen Bridge had been taken when there were only a handful of guards there, on the day of arrival on 17th, and then kept, 30 Corps would have potentially been able to roll on to Arnhem rather than getting bogged down completing a job that was not meant to be their objective.
The one other question that is open to debate is whether they could have gone on to Arnhem after taking Nijmegen Bridge on the evening of the 20th September, just 7-8 miles away. Model later confirmed that there were few defences between Nijmegen and Arnhem that evening, but the British did not know this and were fearing counter-attack. They only had a small contingent of tanks, and 30 Corps infantry were still on the other side of the river fighting in Nijmegen and further back south that night, and they state they were exhausted after 4 days of fighting. But Horracks had seemingly implied that they would do just that to 504th US troops prior to the attack. The situation was so fluid and the following day the German defences along the route were strong, and became stronger still over coming days. For me, this is the only criticism of 30 Corps that is arguable, and even then I think it is only said with the benefit of hindsight, and used as a deflection for 82nds failure to prioritise the Waal bridge. Those leading British tanks had bravely taken the bridge under the fear that it was about to be blown. In my opinion 30 Corps were on a hiding to nothing, and General Horracks always believes they performed very well against strong German defences, in difficult terrain. But yes, after taking the Waal bridge, they may have been overly cautious, but concurrently perhaps for good reason.
The Germans were apparently very close to defeat at Arnhem, but strong supplies were being brought in, so whilst Operation MG, following closely after Normandy, seemed like a gamble worth taking at the time, it failed by a whisker. That marks the difference between post-battle assessment describing its creators as overly-ambitious and unrealistic egoists, to tactically brilliant and innovative leaders.
But perhaps the Allies had severely underestimated the remaining strength of the Germans overall at this point, a justified criticism but of course easy to say after the event. It seemed a risk worth taking at the time, with leaders and planners determined to strike whilst the iron was hot and bring an end to the wretched war.
No plan survives first contact with the enemy... (1871, Helmuth von Moltke)
@@rrl4245 ............but some plans are better than others - so that adage is neither an explanation nor an excuse.
I would say; strategically excellent, operationally doubtful, tactically excellent. And that should have been obvious in the planning stages and steps should have been taken to offset the doubts (disadvantages in Wellington's decision making matrix).
@@graemesydney38 Well, that plan was doomed from the start - an overly-ambitious dream... But I was responding to a previous comment: "if the plan had gone accordingly, it might indeed have succeeded."
@@graemesydney38 I'm sorry sir, but as an X-Army officer, infantry, airborne, had I proposed such a plan at Fort Benning, (The Infantry Officer School) I fear I would have been laughed out of Georgia... Far too many critical path items, (single points of failure), coupled with weak intelligence on enemy dispositions. And on a personal note, as an Airborne officer, I can only feel disgust for the wasteful destruction of the 1st Paras.
my grandfather was I co 3rd battalion 504th pir 82nd airborne. He served with them from North Africa and participated in Sicily Salerno and Anzio prior to market garden. He made that assault in the first wave on the 20th of September across the waal. He helped organize and lead the survivors of the assault to clear the dike on the German side of the bridge. He was severely wounded trying to take out a mg-42 in a barn with a rifle grenade. Suffice to say his war was finally over., and he'd just turned 20 on September 16th of 44. Different breed.
If Market Garden had been a success, the Allied Forces had probably reached the Ruhr Area in October 1944. The Ruhr Area - a heavily industrialised region in Western Germany - was an important part of the German war industry. The loss of this large industry complex might have shortened the war by several months. Possibly the Western Allied Forces would have been the first to reach Berlin. Looking at the benefits, It was worth it IMO.
a successful Market Garden would also have cut off 15th Army Group, and opened up access to the port of Rotterdam, and potentially Amsterdam, too, making Antwerp a bonus port once available. The intention of Eisenhower for Market Garden was to push to the Ziederzee region, in addition to being at the gateway to the Rhur.
Could the Allies been able to capture some Polish territory as to not make it fall into Soviet hands or would it have been too late by then?
@@VeteranR No, the territories was already cut up between the Allies. The Soviet Union received Eastern Europe, including Poland. Some parts of Eastern Germany and Czechoslovakia were liberated by the Americans, but they had those territories given back to the Soviets.
@@sean640307 You mean Zuiderzee region, the Marker Lake and IJssel Lake today.
Capturing Berlin would have a costly affair, it costs the Soviet Army 80.000 men. And Eastern Germany was already promised to Stalin, so no need to take Berlin.
My grandfather was a paratrooper in the British Army and took part in this disaster. He was "lucky" (his words) that he landed in a tree and broke both legs during his jump. He was found by other paratroopers and sent back to Britain, his war over. Many of his mates were not so lucky and joined the glorious dead or were captured.
His only lament was that after signing up in 1940 - he was an Irishman from Tipperary living in London and was told to sign up or go back to Ireland - he spent "4 years marching on f'ing beaches" only to "never see a bloody German".
Ironically, in the decades that followed the war, his best friend was "Fred" (Friedrich) a German man who was captured, was a POW in the UK, and later married an English woman. They became neighbours and then best mates. Fred gave the eulogy at granddad's funeral in 1997.
RIP Grandad.
The plan wasn't merely complex, it was complex and each element was necessary to be successful for the next element to have any chance.
In reality not a single airborne group took all of their objectives, but there wasn't really a good contingency if they failed to do so. Namingen may have been the worst failure (or the luckiest success, by all rights to bridge should have been blown), but the whole plan was susceptible to delays from each failure.
So yeah, it really was a bridge too far.
Namigen, what the heck for name is that? u mean Nijmegen, learn to spell and read for crying out loud
@@commandbrawler9348the grammar Nazis are always watching ;p
@@johnschmidt1262 its a bit important that you know history and learn to spell place names correctly. u didnt even correct your scentence lmfao. and yes they are watching! this time i couldnt stand seeing a city name in the country where i live being spelled wrong, the correct spelling of the name can even be seen in the video many times !
If you look at the history of airborne operations in WW2(American, British, German, and Russian), most of them were flawed, failures, or even near disasters. To plan such an ambitious and complicated operation like Market-Garden, thinking and even depending on everything going absolutely right, was not being realistic.
The planning for Market-Garden also ignored or deliberately violated the hard earned lessons of previous airborne operations.
By spreading the airborne landings out over THREE days, the element of surprise was lost by day two. The airborne divisions were being asked to take and hold their objectives at reduced strength; in the case of the British 1st Airborne with barely a third of it's strength.
Previous operations had shown the importance of landing airborne units on or immediately close to their objective. Landing miles from their main objectives, threw away the the element of surprise. Within a half hour of the landings, any competent German General with a map could see what Market-Garden was about, and take the initiative to oppose it.
Lastly was the need of regular ground forces to quickly link up with airborne units. By necessity, airborne units are lightly armed and have less firepower. Even the overly optimistic expectation of 30th Corps to reach Arnhem in two days was pushing it.
@@dongilleo9743 I read your above conclusion in the book "War as I knew it": by General George Patton. About airborne troops must be close to their objectives and must be relieved by Allied ground troops fast.
The American 82nd never attempted to take the Bridge. And there was no major counterattack from the forest. As for the attack across the river the crews of the canvas boats were British and although the Americans had to cross the river once the boat crews crossed it 14 or more times and suffered 50%+ casualties.
Just to clarify some details, the first attempt to take the Nijmegen bridge was too late, due to a command failure in the 508th PIR on the first afternoon, 17 September. Subsequent attempts on the 19 September by the 505th with support from Guards Armoured Division also failed due to strong opposition by 10.SS-Panzer-Division. The final attacks in co-ordination with the river assualt by the 504th were successful, but the boats were crewed by engineers from C Company of the US 307th Airborne Engineer Battalion, which normally supported the 504th Regimental Combat Team. The first wave carrying H and I Companies 504th suffered 50% casualties, losing half of the 26 boats. Royal Engineers provided rafts for the Jeeps and anti-tank guns in the 504th RCT. Counter-attacks from the Reichswald forest did take place, conducted by myriad infantry units of poor quality from Division 406 of Wehrkreis VI and later II.Fallschirm-korps.
Monty chicken out and Carrington stopped but in Britain that gets you a Fileld Marshall and a LORD
The major and most obvious reason the plan failed was the Allied decision to ignore vital intelligence. Admittedly the Dutch resistance had been infiltrated by the Germans which made any reports from them deemed unreliable but they did have aerial recon that showed tanks and troop build up. Gavin's decision not to prioritise Nijmegen bridge was a huge mistake as that was, after all, what the plan was all about, the bridges. Take them first, hold them, then worry about everything else. It also didn't help that the man in control of the Germans forces defending the front line with 30 corp was General Karl Student, the father of modern parachute tactics. He immediately saw what the Allies intended and used what forces he had to stop them, he knew just where to hurt them thanks to his experience and of course the captured plans from a crashed glider.
With hindsight its easy to suggest ways the plan may have worked. For example use all the planes available to drop the 101st and 82nd on day one so they had full strength to take every bridge and hold it if 30 Corp had issues. The Germans would come south to try and retake Nijmegan and then on day two or 3 drop the entire British and Polish forces on Arnhem and capture the bridge putting the Germans in a vice between Arnhem and Nijmegan.
Even without hindsight, regarding the 82nd Airborne; in a plan to capture bridges, not bothering to even attack the bridge could be seen as a flaw!
@@dannymalone7101 Browning was in command at Nijmegen.
@@nickdanger3802 Not correct. Browning used over thirty invaluable gliders to fly his corps staff into the 82nd Div area with the first lift. These were actually the only people Browning commanded (they holed up in woods in the Groesbeek area under the command of Thomas Firbank, the author). In the Market garden plan the Divisions would retain independent command until reached by the ground forces. They would then come under the control of XXX Corps. It's likely that Browning just wanted to be in the combat area before the4 war ended.
@@dannymalone7101 So there was no reason for Browning to be there with 38 of 1st AB's gliders.
@@nickdanger3802 No reason at all. Even Thomas Firbank, who commanded this motley collection of signallers and clerks, could see no reason for their presence at Groesbeek. He covers it loosely in his book 'I bought a star'
Good plan Monty.
not his plan...Ike had Brereton and Williams make the plans
Montgomery staff didn’t believe the intelligence reports it was getting from the Dutch underground and the reconnaissance photos showing a few tanks were dismissed. In the end British and Polish paratroopers ended up going against an elite Armor division.
It wasn't that they didn't believe them, they just couldn't get confirmation. The Dutch resistance were normally very reliable and usually had good information, but the Germans had some counter-intelligence successes in penetrating Dutch resistance cells. The information could not be relied on without confirmation, but there is evidence the planning of the operation took into account the available information. At one stage the 82nd Airborne were planned to drop on Arnhem and the 1st Airborne at Nijmegen, but this was reversed after the only suggestion of panzer units remained in the Arnhem area and British Airborne Divisions had more anti-tank guns in their establishments. These included the heavy 17-pounder guns capable of taking on Tiger tanks, now air transportable for the first time, much to the surprise of the Germans.
The tanks that were photographed in the Arnhem area were rightly dismissed, as a study conducted in 2015 by the RAF after the original photo came to light has proved. The tanks were obsolete models that did not belong to a 1944 Panzer-Division, and the only unit in Holland with such tanks were a training unit near the 101st Airborne's drop zones on the day the operation started, and were a minimal threat dealt with by the escorting fighter aircraft. The way Browning was portrayed in A Bridge Too Far greatly upset his widow, and also Dirk Bogarde who played him had misgivings, as he served during the war as an RAF Intelligence officer on Dempsey's 2nd Army staff.
Most of the German opposition at Arnhem were from a vast array of training and replacement units mobilised from all over Holland and Germany. The 'elite' SS-Panzer-Divisions had been virtually destroyed by British units in Normandy and were in Holland to refit, although the 9.SS was actually in the process of leaving for Germany to refit.
"didn’t believe the intelligence reports" or chose not to believe them ?
Chose not to present information to Montgomery because they knew he would demote or sack them ?
Actually, they did believe them which is why the operation was upgraded from Operation COMET (British 1st Airborne Division plus 1st Polish Independent Parachute Brigade) to Operation MARKET (adding the US 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions). This meant that Arnhem was assigned 4 brigades in stead of the initial one (1st Parachute Brigade). The two divisions refitting in the vicinity of Arnhem were hardly elite. They were divisions in name alone with very little armour - the only element that was anything close to strength was the 9th SS Panzer Reconnaissance Battalion which headed to Nijmegen initially only to drive into 1st Parachute Brigade’s 6-pounder guns when they returned to Arnhem. So understrength were they, that they were using captured pre-war French tanks in the initial phases of the action. Where the German’s excelled (and which was probably underestimated by the Allies) was their ability to reorganise rapidly (battle group) and to move armour to the area very quickly indeed.
I've studied WWII for over 25 years and have read more books on the subject than I could keep track of. And the inescapable truth is that Market Garden was a terrible waste of elite allied troops and was something that never should have been allowed to take place. In my view, it's a miracle that it got as far as it did and the only reason for that was the extremely fortunate and RARE accuracy of the air drops and the heroic efforts of the troops. Having said all of that, I try to keep my criticism in check because I try to keep in mind the lure of difficult operations that look like short cuts to victory. Everyone is desperate to end the war and as quickly as possible and I think often judgement is clouded by that sincere but desperate desire. The amphibious landings at Inchon during the Korean War comes to mind as an example of a daring operation that was successful. Had it failed, it would have been remembered with Market Garden.
Have you read Phil Nordyke's combat history of the 508th PIR, Put Us Down In Hell (2012), chapters 9 and 10?
I've posted the key points in William Schutter's thread below if you would like to read them. The plan was working, until Nijmegen, and there it wasn't even followed. The operation was undone by a totally unforced error.
Market Garden wasn't that bad of an operation, it almost succeeded but was doomed by the 82nd airbornes inability to take Nijmegen. From what I've read the Germans had about a platoon holding the bridge but the 82nd didn't attack the bridge until the evening and even then it was only a battalion. Had the 82nd taken the bridge and Nijmegen and held it till 30 Corp got there, then 30 Corp would have reached Arnhem, instead the 82nd failed to take Nijmegen and 30 Corp had to clean Nijmegen up.
@@kieranwilliams6277 - Not even a platoon - Dutch resistance sources told the 508th PIR that only 18 Germans were guarding the highway bridge. The three Scouts from the 1/508th S-2 Section that made it to the south end took 6/7 Germans by surprise and captured "a small artillery weapon".
(That would leave 11/12 at the north end, presumably another Flak weapon - I've seen a photo of a quad 2cm Flak gun located there - and probably some guards at the concrete barrier checkpoint).
The Scouts waited until dusk for reinforcements that never arrived then decided to release their prisoners and withdraw. As they did so, they could hear "heavy equipment" arriving at the north end of the bridge (9.SS-Panzer recon battalion). Source: The 508th Connection, Zig Boroughs (2013).
The 1st Battalion attack with two Companies later in the evening bumped elements of 9.SS-Panzer recon at the Keiser Karelplein traffic circle near the railway station, some distance from the bridge. It was far too late.
@@kieranwilliams6277 Right, because 88 and 20mm flak guns could not be used for defense.
How long did it the 740 men who actually made to the last intact bridge in Arnhem take to secure one lightly defended end?
When did the rest of 1st AB get there?
IWM "By 1944 Britain was running out of soldiers. The campaigns in the Mediterranean and Far East, the war at sea and the bomber offensive had all drained her manpower reserves. The army that was sent to Normandy lacked for nothing except adequate reserves of fighting troops. Though well supplied with weapons, vehicles and equipment, Second Army could not afford huge losses, militarily or indeed politically. With vast reserves of US manpower now coming on stream, it was vital for Britain's interests and national standing that her field army was strong enough both to engage and defeat the Germans, and then also provide a sustainable army of occupation. Everything had to be done to minimize casualties and preserve the army's fighting strength.
One who understood this only too well was the land forces commander, General Sir Bernard Montgomery."
Tactics and the Cost of Victory in Normandy
Stretching supply line requirements too far from the beginning as the original plan, doomed Market Garden to failure. Eisenhower should never have agreed to the plan.
I think that is exaggerated. But the picture could have been very different if the RAF and the USAF had cleared the IX and X SS panzer divisions the day before the attack and if the paras were dropped close the the Arnhem bridge.
The idea of crossing the Waal with a Bailey bridge does not show any appreciation of the huge width of this river. But the ferry at Driel could have been very useful had the British not ignored it.
The air generals insisting on dispersed drops over a number of days killed Market Garden.
@@lyndoncmp5751 Indeed, you could argue that Market-Garden was set to fail back in 1942-43, when the Americans and British were setting their production and training priorities. If all three airborne divisions and the Polish brigade had been able to land at full strength at one time on the first day of Market-Garden, the course of the operation would almost certainty have been successful. To have the required number of transport planes, gliders, glider tugs, pilots and crews in September 1944 would have required that they be put in the production and procurement system in the 1942-43 time period.
In 1942-43, American and British procurement people had to plan for what they might need come 1944. Do they build fighters, fighter-bombers, and bombers, which they know will be useful, or do they devote precious and scarce resources to build transport planes and gliders, and train crews to go with them, that might be useful in some unforeseen future large airborne operations? They did the logical thing at the time and built warplanes, not transport planes.
Not having the required number of transports for Market-Garden meant the operation either had to be scaled back to use the available air assets, or that the airborne units had to go in piecemeal over several days. Going in piecemeal meant the divisions were understrength on the crucial first day when it was most important to seize their assigned objectives. After that, the most important element of surprise was lost, and they found themselves increasingly set up on by German reinforcements.
It is strange that both the Americans and British devoted so much to building airborne forces, without devoting the effort, expense, and resources to build the necessary air assets to deploy them; at least not all at once. There was never the expectation that more than one or two divisions would be used at a time. Even by the time of Operation Varsity in March 1945, the Americans and British still only had the air assets to deploy two airborne divisions at once. Originally, an additional American airborne division was planned to participate, but the lesson of the importance of landing airborne units at full strength on day one had been brutally relearned from Market -Garden.
My take on Operation Market Garden was that it was set to a strict schedule which, doesn't always work, this kind of thing was used in WW1 aswell with the "Creeping Barrage" that shielded allied troops, monty also tried this kind of thing during el alamein, but the only reason it worked in the desert/el alamein was because the General before him claude auckinleck already setup 8th armies defences so all monty had to do was train his troops and then beat rommel through attrition.
Now with market garden, if it worked then it would've been the master-stroke of the war, but even i think advancing up a single road is just asking for trouble which ofcourse it was, since it was nicknamed "hells highway", now what they could've done was set 30th corps off first, and then drop the paras from each division as soon as 30th corps reaches each bridge, this would've caught the germans by surprise each time, then maybe instead of going for arnhem, perhaps they could've crossed via Driel instead over into oostbeek and then swung to their right into arnhem.
But i think alot of people will probably say that going for antwerp would've been the better choice , all in all market garden was only successful in creating a sailient , monty then had to help the canadians clear the scheldt estuary of germans, personally i think the broad front strategy was better , either way...theirs so many ways market garden could've worked if it was allowed to be "adapted" depending on the situation , it failed mainly due to sticking to a time-table.
I don't mind if someone corrects me or disagree's , just voicing my take on it.
MARKET GARDEN had three main supply routes for the three Corps of British 2nd Army, and there was nothing unusual about using this system in MARKET GARDEN, which seems to have escaped most historians. The centre line 'Club Route' was the code name used by the Guards Armoured Division all the way from Normandy to Bremen in Germany, 1945.
The US 101st Airborne nicknamed their section of the Highway 69 route as 'Hell's Highway' during MARKET GARDEN, mainly because they were constantly moving up and down the highway fighting fires to keep it open, but I suspect the Americans just like being dramatic and everything is "hell" in one way or another. Only this afternoon I was watching the Hollywood Audie Murphy biopic "To Hell And Back" (1955) - it didn't look that bad to me!
The Guards Armoured Division had previously encountered problems on their traditional 'Club Route' during the advance from the Seine, when they encountered reconnaissance units from the US 2nd Armoured Division ('Hell on Wheels') on their route that had strayed across the inter-divisional/corps/army/army group boundary, and had to be politely redirected.
There was no bridge at Driel and one would have to be built based on the ferry crossing point, which would slow the operation down. The next bridge to the west was a rail bridge at Rhenen, and Horrocks was denied permission to go for it by Montgomery, presumably because it would be too far an extension to the west from the main axis.
Antwerp could not have been opened in mid-September. The Scheldt was in the Canadian sector and they were repositioning themselves around Antwerp during MARKET GARDEN in preparation for commencing their operations to clear the estuary after MARKET GARDEN was successfully concluded and logistics could be prioritised to Canadian 1st Army. Montgomery argued that leaving Antwerp behind on the left flank and cutting off all German forces in the western Netherlands by advancing to the Zuider Zee (Ijsselmeer) coast would ease the operations around Antwerp. Opening Antwerp first would allow the Germans more time to strengthen their river and canal defence lines in the Netherlands and make an eventual Rhine crossing operation more difficult and costly. The port was needed to supply Eisenhower's broad front advance into Germany after multiple Rhine crossings, not the advances to the Rhine. Even Eisenhower saw the sense in this and felt that he had to set the record straight after A Bridge Too Far was published:
'Eisenhower was similarly unapologetic when he declared after the publication of Cornelius Ryan's best-selling account, A Bridge Too Far, “I not only approved Market-Garden, I insisted upon it. We needed a bridgehead over the Rhine. If that could be accomplished I was quite willing to wait on all other operations.” ' (Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life, Carlo D'Este, 2015)
@salvadorvizcarra769 - who kept Russia in the war between 1941 and 1945? I suggest you research US Lend Lease to the Soviet Union - it amounted to $11.3 billion, or $180 billion in today's money.
There is a reason why the Japanese failed in all their overly complex scenarios. Some people never learn.
Montgomery's ego killed so many soldiers. He came up with a plan with no room for anything to go wrong, ignoring the factors that made it impractical. Because, you imagine, he was so busy picturing the accolades and parades people would give him for his brilliant plan, he didn't want to hear that it wouldn't work. That it worked as well as it did was due to almost superhuman effort by the poor soldiers throw into this stupid plan.
All high ranking officers have an ego. Patton and MacArthur were another two and both lost men unnecessarily.
Monty came up with a broad outline, which Ike approved of, but he didn’t plan it.
Far fewer troops were killed in Market Garden than other allied battles at the same time such as the Lorraine, Hurtgen Forest, Operation Queen etc. And those all failed too.
Actually, just about everything went wrong. And they still nearly succeeded.
Love your work 👍
A background factor was that there was infighting over control of the airborne corp and this had to have a detrimental effect on communication/coordination.
Let’s not forget that hindsight is a wonderful thing. With a few different factors in the allies favour it would be heralded as the best manoeuvre ever.
No as they would be on the wrong side of the IJssel. Still not being able to go into the Rurh. It's the river the forget to mention every time...
@@Goulmy86 Agreed. But that small factor:) wouldn’t have stopped the hype.
Agreed and I hate armchair generals, BUT Market Garden could have succeeded using the available resources and what was known /at the time/.
@@Goulmy86 The Rhur was maybe the eventual destination. However the original plans were to secure the airstrip at Driel and swing north first.
This would cut off a large section of German troops and open Antwerp up to supplies.
Michel Goulmy
The Ijssel was irrelevant. Easily Bailey Bridged.
The plan for Market Garden was also for much of Arnhem to be taken not just the bridge. If this was achieved, the Ijssel wouldn't have presented many problems. The Germans possibly would have even pulled back with XXX Corps in Arnhem in great force and allied ground attack aircraft prevalent during consolidation.
Of course, the Americans would have had to get past Aachen and then Cologne for a pincer attack into the Ruhr, and that would have been a bigger problem. They couldn't get much further than Aachen all through the rest of 1944.
Market-Garden was similar to Japanese naval battle plans. Complex and requiring the enemy to act as expected. Disregarding that an enemy may not do as the plan expected them too. The enemy always had a say in how the battle proceeds
The Imperial Japanese Navy was trained by the British, so there's the connection.
@@davemac1197 …. One reason the US Army is said in WW2 to have done well is chaos. As in war is chaos. And the US Army was practiced in chaos. On a daily basis. The US Navy had it’s own traditions separate from the Royal Navy. Before the end of the first year of the Pacific War lessons had been learned and underperforming senior naval officers replaced. As Admiral Yamamoto warned after Pearl Harbor Japan was headed into a war it couldn’t win. However his IJN took a grim toll on the US Fleet that first year
@@Idahoguy10157 - that's a really interesting point. For many years since reading Cornelius Ryan in 1977, I thought all the problems that Market Garden suffered were the reason it failed. It's only in the last 10 years that a number of books have emerged going back to the source material and taking a fresh look at it to arrive at a different conclusion. It's now clear to me that Market Garden failed because of one regimental commander in 82nd Airborne failed to follow the plan at Nijmegen, and that officer was also criticised in his unit's first operation in Normandy and got a lot of men killed.
It's clear that the divisional commander should have taken action to remove that officer from command of the regiment, either during or after Normandy. In fact Matthew Ridgway had an easy way out of the problem, because he was promoted to command the XVIII Airborne Corps in August, and the officer in command of the 508th Parachute Infantry began his Airborne career as a very talented S-1 (Admin officer) to the Airborne forces, so Ridgway could have taken that officer with him to XVIII Airborne Corps as his S-1, and a proven combat officer take over the 508th Regiment. The division was taken over by James Gavin, the Assistant Divisional Commander, and the first mistake he made was not to replace himself, so in Market Garden he was running himself ragged doing both jobs!
@@Idahoguy10157 - to answer your original post, the enemy actually took advantage of an Allied mistake - the failure to secure the Nijmegen bridges on the first afternoon. The Germans correctly identified Nijmegen as their 'schwerpunkt' (point of main effort), and that's where they defeated Market Garden.
@@davemac1197 …. Obviously you’re more well read than I am.
I’ve opined that sending armor and mechanized infantry up one raised exposed two lane road was one fatal flaw.
IMHO Monty should instead have prioritized securing the Schelt estuary to get the port of Antwerp online.
I realize the entire Airborne Army was waiting for a mission. But as Market-Garden showed there was already a lack of C-47’s and gliders to use them all expeditiously in a drop.
Compare that to simply trucking the 101st Division to reinforce Bastogne in December. Where they were invaluable to holding off the Germans
RAF on Market Garden "In their view the right course was to use all available transport aircraft to maintain supplies to Patton's army, which was the furthest forward, so that he could continue his offensive. It was impossible to do both once the Supreme Commander ruled in favour --192-- of airborne operations."
Hyperwar Royal Air Force 1939-1945 Vol III
Iirc, Patton was very unimpressed when he found out his supplies were diverted to Montgomery. He did gain a lot of momentum.
@@str2010 Patton's supplies were never diverted to Montgomery - that's one of the many myths around Market Garden. Patton had already exhausted his own supplies, those he'd captured from a German supply dump, and the extra allocation (proportionately) that Bradley was giving him over Hodges' 1st US Army and yet he was still stuck at Metz before Market Garden had even begun to be planned! Yes again, one of the many myths that surround Market Garden and Patton, himself!!
@@sean640307 the battle of Metz began on 27 September. Operation Market Garden began on 15 September. How exactly was Patton bogged down at a battle well before market garden began to be planned when said battle began after market garden began?
@@str2010 Market Garden started on the 17th September, but the battle for Metz unofficially begins as early as the 2nd Sept, with the capture of Nancy, Verdun, etc, which is the precursor to it and Patton had already over-extended his lines of supply. The biggest issue for Patton was actually not just fuel, but was also heavy ammunition. Patton had run out of fuel on the 2nd of September, when he claimed to have patrols at Metz and on the Moselle. In reality, he didn't, but that was what he told Eisenhower and Bradley in an effort to force them to prioritise his supply chain over Hodges and Montgomery. The claim that Montgomery was responsible for Patton not having fuel was Bradley's work after the war, but it simply wasn't true. Eisenhower's broad front strategy was the issue, and all armies were suffering because of it. They had all moved far quicker than had been planned for, and this meant that none of the armies had what they needed, let alone what they wanted. Bradley unofficially prioritised Patton over Hodges, by allocating resources on a one-for-one basis, but as Patton's 3rd US Army was smaller than Hodges' 1st US Army (having given up units for 9th US Army under Simpson to take Brest!)
The US style of always trying to attack everywhere, all at once, with the same intensity needed to have a logistics chain that could keep up with it. Given that at this stage, Antwerp was still in German hands, Le Havre had only just been captured by the First Canadian Army (and made available to the US for supply) and that the US had failed to take Brest, their allocated deep water port, there simply was no way that any of the armies could continue on like they did.
Patton had moved at break-neck speed across vacant ground, which looked great on a map, but was against no opposition. 21AG had moved at a similar pace through France and Belgium and only had fuel reserves for about another 150 miles, at best. Patton needed about 350,000 gallons per day, but was getting about 200,000 (the Red Ball express was burning a gallon for every gallon it carried!) It was during this period that Patton's forces had their win at Arracourt, destroying many German Panthers for negligible losses of their own, but just after that, he came to a complete stop. The real fight for Metz had begun!
@@sean640307 Source?
I'm going to say something to my friends who have commented on this video that will be controversial, but from my studies of WWII I don't believe Operation Market Garden was ever meat to be, or going to be a total success. However, it was far from a total failure. The Allies were able to secure the port at Antwerp for supplies for the winter & open a huge new front against the Germans which eventually led to the Battle of the Bulge & the end of WWII. The allies & Montgomery made the decision & put mostly British forces in harm's way just as they did on D Day by landing in Caen. Operation Market Garden gave the Allies multiple ways to resupply & keep pouring the pressure on the German High Command. It wasn't a popular battle plan because it led to so many casualties, but it was the right & necessary thing to do to win the war. It had to be done.
"Montgomery later admitted that he was wrong to assume the Canadians could open the approaches to Antwerp while his forces tried to reach Germany. But his timing was off. The Canadians began fighting around Antwerp in early October, after Market Garden had ended. So, our original question prompts another: Why did it take to the middle of October for Montgomery to support the embattled Canadians and make Antwerp a priority?"
Legion magazine Should Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery have tried to clear the Scheldt Estuary in September 1944?
@@nickdanger3802 But if you look at the big picture, Antwerp would have never really been secured as the Germans could have launched a successful counter offensive earlier against that port which failed in December when they finally did launch their final assault against the allies. Personally, I believe the reason the Germans didn't was because they were very concerned that the allies could attack from a myriad of fronts thanks to Market Garden. I'm not in love with Monty as a master strategist, but the operation was far from a total failure.
Actor Dirk Bogarde plays General Browning, who discounts the reports of photo interpreters that detected German tanks in the area. During the War Bogarde actually was a photo interpreter.
05:22 this mostly concurs with TIK’s assessment for his Battlestorm series on Market Garden, BUT... the point is that Gavin ignored his main objective when he could have grabbed it immediately. He needed to go for it, but instead... much as I dislike that egotist Patton, at least *he’d* have gone for it even if he had to charge over there himself.
But what good would holding the Nijmegen bridge do when 30th corps is still several days away? Gavin took the bridge as soon as the bridge was useful. After taking the bridge, 30th corps had to turn around to recapture the road to Nijmegen.
Gavin's operational instructions to the 508th PIR were to go for the bridges as soon as the Groesbeek ridge was secure. They didn't. That's what went wrong, and Gavin was furious when he found out they were digging-in on the ridge.
"Lieutenant-General Browning specified to their commander, Brigadier-General Gavin, who gave his approval, that the 82nd Airborne's priorities were, first, the large area of high ground known as the Groesbeek Heights, second, the bridge over the River Maas at Grave, then three bridges over the Maas-Waal Canal, and finally Nijmegen Bridge."
Pegasus Archive Arnhem 30. Reasons for the Failure
@@morganmcallister2001 no, XXX Corps didn't have to turn around and recapture the road to Nijmegen. Some of the Guards units were sent back down the road, but the rest did not.
@@davemac1197 508PIR written orders state they were to secure the Heights first, then go for the bridge. It's open to interpretation as to what "secure" meant. Clearly, in Lindquist's eyes, his orders were to dig in first before making a move. Gavin also allegedly gave Lindquist verbal orders to go for the bridge immediately upon landing, something Lindquist denied and in the post-Op interview with Capt Westover, Westover concurred with Lindquist's summation of events.
1st airborne division never ran out of 6pdr and 17 pdr ammunition in the final cauldron north of the north rhine-which is why the perimeter wasnt overun
Salvador Vizcarra
Throughout the entire 1939-45 war the Axis didn't put a single soldier into England.
See how that works?
*Historynet Martin van Creveld calculated in his superb study of logistics, Supplying War: Logistics From Wallenstein to Patton Monty’s “40 divisions” realistically would have been quickly reduced to a mere 18 when all logistical and operational requirements were considered. Captured ground could not simply be left in a vacuum, but had to be occupied and defended against the inevitable German counterattacks. Supply lines had to be protected and secured, and as a force advanced, those key “sinews of war” extended longer and longer, requiring the diversion of increasing numbers of combat troops to protect them.*
Ike approved the September 1944 Operation Market-Garden, Monty’s attempt to “jump” the lower Rhine and position his army group to drive on to the Ruhr industrial region. Market-Garden famously and disastrously failed at the “bridge too far” at Arnhem at the same time that German forces supposedly were so depleted and disorganized that Monty’s narrow thrust, it was claimed, would easily slice right through them and capture the Ruhr. Monty’s boast that his single axis advance would quickly win the war was both literally and figuratively “a bridge too far” at that point of the war in Europe.
Moreover, because Monty failed to capture the Scheldt Estuary expeditiously and open the port of Antwerp (closed to Allied shipping until December), Ike’s SHAEF logisticians at the time calculated that only 12 divisions could have been supported in a rapid advance. *Van Creveld weighed all the factors in the “broad front” vs. “narrow thrust” strategy debate and concluded, “In the final account, the question as to whether Montgomery’s plan presented a real alternative to Eisenhower’s strategy must be answered in the negative" Eisenhower actually gave Montgomery a chance to show that his narrow thrust strategy could succeed - and Monty botched it.*
I read that the Dutch Staff College had an exercise that involved an advance up the highway that XXX Corp was supposed to advance. Each time this was tested it failed. I also read that despite the shortage of transports Browning insisted that a large number of planes be used to fly in his staff. His staff, apparently, were not effective in the battle.
Well, it is something of a mandatory item for an officer to have to investigate and assess the Market-Garden operation.
As such this has been undertaken so many times (also by yours truly) that it's almost not funny. What otoh is, is the fact that about 50% came up with a winning scenario in which all major objectives were attained and all of those deviated from historic reality in that 82nd Airborne would have stuck to their original priorities to capture and secure the Nijmegen bridge asap and in force. i.e. NOT the half-hearted and miserly attempt with about a measly company-sized and already combat-spent unit. Whether it had been Gen. 'Boy' Browning or Gen. Gavin who got all worked up about the rumoured threat to Groesbeek Heights from the direction of the Reichswald (that never and could never have materialized) I will leave in the middle but the crucial reason for failure was the failure to Capture the Nijmegen bridge in time.
@@Centurion101B3C "Lieutenant-General Browning specified to their commander, Brigadier-General Gavin, who gave his approval, that the 82nd Airborne's priorities were, first, the large area of high ground known as the Groesbeek Heights, second, the bridge over the River Maas at Grave, then three bridges over the Maas-Waal Canal, and finally Nijmegen Bridge."
Pegasus Archive Arnhem 30. Reasons for the Failure
@@Centurion101B3C At about 0630 on day two 2,300 grade B Germans with five armored cars, three halftracks with quad 20mm guns and 24 medium mortars attacked the Heights.
They were driven off about 1330 by fighters escorting the day two glider landing with the rest of the 82nd and the bulk of 82nd arty.
@@nickdanger3802 Yeas!? That was on Day 2, when it already was WAY too late to do the itchy-bridgy thingy in Nijmegen that should and could have been done immediately after landing on day 1.
30th Corps was already chomping at the bit to get things going in Grave after linking up with 82 Airborne. At which time it became necessary to apply 30th Corps to get into the nitty-gritty of fighting German SS units throughout the Northern urban areas in Nijmegen. Something that the mostly Cavalry units of 30th Corps were not exquisitely suited for. Tanks and urban areas infested with a tenacious opponent defending do not mix overly well and the fighting reflected that.
@@Centurion101B3C "the rumoured threat to Groesbeek Heights"
The irony is that the man who considered it a success was none other than Gen Student, commander of the German Paras.
It wasn't a success for the Germans, they lost 4 bridges and lost a ton of ground, and key position, sure they prevented it from being a total disaster by not losing Arkhem but they were fighting with heavy armor and tanks against a few surrounded and under equipped paratroopers divisions there, obviously would be an embarrassment to lose that fight.
As I understand the situation, a large part of the failure can be laid at the feet of Gen. Gavin. He had one objective and one only: capture of the bridge(s) at Nijmegen. Now I do understand the need to protect your flanks but Gavin seem to have made protecting his flanks a priority which delayed capturing the bridge. By the time the flanks were deemed sufficiently fortified, the Germans had fortified positions at both bridges with a defensive perimeter around it in the town. From that moment on the paratroopers had very little chance of capturing any of the Nijmegen bridges before being reinforced by armoured units that were being held up between Son and Veghel.
That's essentially correct, but just a couple of points.
Of Gavin's three Parachute Regiments, the 504th were assigned to the Maas bridge at Grave and taking the Maas-Waalkanaal bridges from the west, the 505th to assist in taking the canal bridges from the east, clear the town of Groesbeek, take a rail bridge over the Maas at Mook, and patrol the Reichswald forest. The 508th were assigned to first secure the Groesbeek ridge (a possible German defensive position), and once that was secure, to move on the bridges in Nijmegen as soon as possible. The problem was the 508th was the least aggressive unit in the Division, because of its poor leadership. At 1800 hrs on the first day, Gavin learned the 504th had secured his supply line - his top priority, the 505th reported the Reichswald empty and unsuitable for tanks, and the 508th were reported digging-in on the Groesbeek ridge against absolutely no opposition. Gavin was furious and ordered the 508th's Liaison Officer into a Jeep to "get them moving!" It was too late.
The XXX Corps ground forces were still on schedule when they made contact with the 504th at Grave, about 45 hours into the operation, only to find the Nijmegen bridges were still in German hands and heavily reinforced with SS-Panzer troops. There was no delay between Son and Grave, they did that journey in 2.5 hours for the armoured cars and 4 hours for the tanks. In fact there wasn't even really a hold up at Son because the Bailey bridge was constructed overnight when it was doctrine not to operate tanks. They would have to stop overnight in the 101st Airborne's area anyway. The delay that put the operation 36 hours behind the notional schedule happened at Nijmegen, when two combined operations, the first unsuccessful, had to be mounted to finally capture the Waal bridges.
He had four objectives capture the bridges at Nimegan, Waal, Graves and secure the high ground against possible counter attack. Three of them were achieved on schedule. The problem was he needed to take all four for the operation to be considered successful. That was really the underlying problem of operation Market Garden, there were too many things that could go wrong that simply couldn't be worked around.
@@johnschmidt1262 The bridges were the key though, what is the point of holding the heights if you haven't secured the bridges. Gavin has a well deserved good reputation but the delay at Nijmegen was potentially crucial.
@@johnschmidt1262 yet he was to prioritise the bridges and he didn't. He has to take a fair share of the blame like the planners should for ignoring key intelligence.
@@Challis1989 I saw the Tik video also. It's fine to believe Gavin made a mistake, I was simply pointing out it is factually wrong to say that he only had one objective. It's also worth pointing out that none of the airborne groups actually achieved all of their objectives successfully. But most of the fault has to lie with the plan itself, they really didn't ask what would happen if any group fails, a possibility you should always consider. The whole plan was set up in a way such that any one element failing causes the failure of everything further down the line.
Eisenhower gave it an 85% thumbs up once the Nijmegen bridge was secure we moved supplies to Antwerp about 140 k from Nijmegen where we crossed into Germany with all the supplies we needed the Nijmegen bridge was so important the RAF built RAF Laarbruch after the war to defend the Bridge the Furthest northern Airfield built by the British
Once we realised we could not take the Arnhem bridge, we bombed it so it became irrelevant that is where the Mistakes began narrow Road tanks advancing to quickly for the Infantry to catch up and a failure to read the evidence of tanks Located the German side of the Bridge and dropping the Troops off 8 miles away
Note it was the Canadians who Liberated the Nederland's
Monty didnt lead the 30corp himself
Left it to horrocks!
He actually made no tactical desicions during the operation itself
I'm not a fan of Montgomery's plan here but this is a silly comment. Montgomery was an Army Group commander. He didn't lead Corps. He was way above that.
Modern warfare does put commanders in rear echelon positions not like the old days
When even kings rode into battle!
Saul has slain thousands
David tens of thousands!
@@angloaust1575 The Romans smashed army after army of brave warrior kings because by in large their commanders would sit up on commanding terrain, properly see the battlefield, and be able to react to the battle as it unfolded. Save the heroics for the rank and file. Commanders need to lead.
Imagine being a German solider. Fresh off the 3 year Russian front
for a vacation, and these guys decide to drop in, and ruin it for you.
Don't know which German soldiers you're talking about, but 9 and 10.SS-Panzer-Divisions were raised in France in 1943 and trained for counter-airborne operations in preparation for the expected Allied invasion of the continent, but were sent to Ukraine to rescue the 1.Panzerarmee at Tarnopol in April 1944 and therefore missed the D-Day landings for which they were trained to fight in June. They were brought back to Normandy by late June and further reduced by British units in the fighting around Caen and Hill 112. After helping to keep the Falaise gap open as long as possible they conducted a withdrawal to Arnhem to refit in early September. They were in Ukraine on the Eastern Front for barely three months, not years.
Go to the Netherlands. Look at the geography. Then visit the the cemeteries so beautifully kept by the Dutch. Like me, you'll figure it out.
One of the commanders of German forces there was Kurt Student - former commander of German airborne forces,so the trap for allied airborne assault was well-prepared.
There was no trap set for Allied airborne forces on any large scale, the airborne operation was a complete surprise, the Germans were only expecting British 2nd Army to continue their advance from their Neerpelt bridgehead on the Meuse-Escaut canal at any time, but they were not expecting the airborne landings.
The reason General Kurt Student was sent to the Netherlands was because Hermann Göring had completely surprised Hitler's staff during a discussion on how to close the huge gap that had opened up in their lines in Belgium by offering tens of thousands of redundant Luftwaffe ground personnel who were no longer needed because of the parlous state of his air force. These personnel were therefore transferred to the Fallschirmtruppe and used to rebuild the Fallschirmjäger regiments decimated by the fighting in Normandy. Student was in Berlin and available, so he was assigned to command the new 1.Fallschirm-Armee, based at 's-Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands, where there was a collection centre for surviving Fallschirmjäger troops from Normandy forming a cadre for rebuilding the Fallschirmtruppe. Student was also given command of the army's LXXXVIII Korps, which were part of the occupation forces based in the Netherlands and contained a couple of static divisions redeployed from the Dutch coast.
The only officer who predicted an airborne assault specifically in the Arnhem area was Luftwaffe Generalmajor Walter Grabmann, commander of the 3.Jagd-Division at Deelen airbase north of Arnhem. He tried to warn Generalfeldmarschall Walter Model at a dinner hosted by Model at his new headquarters in Oosterbeek that the fields to the west of Oosterbeek around Wolfheze made ideal landing zones and his headquarters might be vulnerable. Model dismissed these concerns as he felt secure so far from the front lines and behind several river barriers, he thought it was unlikely the Allies would try such a deep penetration with an airborne operation.
The one officer present at the dinner who took Grabmann's warning seriously was SS-Sturmbannführer Sepp Krafft, commander of the SS-Panzergrenadier-Ausbildungs-und-Erstaz-Bataillon 16, who decided to remove his two training companies of Hitler Youth, who were finishing their training as replacements for 12.SS-Panzer-Division 'Hitlerjugend', from their barracks in Arnhem and have them camped in the woods just north of Oosterbeek on the Johannahoeve estate. Krafft himself occupied the nearby Villa Waldfriede.
The next day the airborne attack began with the preliminary bombing of the barracks in Arnhem and other towns, followed by glider and parachute landings at Wolfheze. Krafft had his 2.Kompanie on an exercise in the woods near the Hotel Wolfheze at the time, and they were immediately ordered to attack the landing zones with an aggressive reconnaissance, while he brought up his 4.Kompanie and ordered his 7.(Stamm) reception and 8.(Genesenden) convalescent companies in Arnhem and Velp respectively to form a 9.(Marsch) march company to reinforce them. This battalion was the only unit placed in exactly the right location at the right time to cause the most immediate impediment to the airborne deployment at Arnhem, and neither the II.SS-Panzerkorps in the Veluwe and Achterhoek regions or Student's 1.Fallschirm-Armee in the province of Noord-Brabant were anticipating an airborne operation at all.
The Parachute Regiment museum at Arnhem is wonderful as a resource for this. And it tells more of the story, as the Germans afterwards took out their frustrations on the Dutch citizens. But in all of this, Monty's ego shines through. The plan would have been brilliant had it worked, but it was extremely complex and complicated. Everything would have to work perfectly, and of course it didn't. But Monty was so fixated on the plan that he willfully ignored the intelligence of the presence of 2 SS Panzer divisions in Arnhem, which previously was thought to be defended by weak homeguard units that would put up light resistance. He was told, but that didn't fit his plan, so he ignored it, and 7,500 paratroopers were lost. Not to mention all the other units that took casualties during the operation.
It was Monty's idea (which he had presented to Ike) not his plan. The plan was made by USAAF officers.
@@CIMAmotor The driving force behind the creation of Market Garden was Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, who disagreed with the 'broad front' strategy favoured by Eisenhower, in which all Allied armies in North-West Europe advanced simultaneously. The whole operation would not have taken place if it was n´t for Montgomery insisting on having it his way.
@@trident6547 and Eisenhower agreed with Montgomery. then allocated officers in the USAAF to plan it.
Montgomery's objective was to reach eventually even further into the Netherlands; even to the IJsselmeer lake which separates the West part of the Netherlands to the North and East, and in that way cut off the German troops and encircle those in the key provinces of North and South Holland. Isolated they would have been easily forced to surrender. He probably counted on a shock effect too, disorganised defense. Instead he found refitted troops, SS army pantzer groups with veterans that previously fought in Normandy and had a score to settle. I also think he wanted to stop V1 and V2 rockets that were mostly fired from the Netherlands. Although it was an opportunistic, ultimately brazen plan, but I would not call it a complete failure. Even if they did not liberate the Netherlands, they did cut through the German front, in fact the allies made enormous and fast progress to the north and west wards. They fought extremely hard and it was a huge blow to the Germans. It also cost a lot of civilian lives and many cities and towns were left in total ruin. For the Dutch, the price was very high; while expected to be liberated, and you face this destruction instead, let's say it left some bitter and mixed emotions about Montgomery's ambitions. But this is war, you can hardly blame a single general, the tip of the spear always takes the brunt of the impact, but the spear itself lodged deep. The Germans north of the Rhine never managed to cross or wage a significant counter offensive. When the last winter of war turned very harsh in the lowlands, a horrific famine followed, especially hit hard were the big cities, like Amsterdam and Rotterdam, as already scarcely available food was taken mostly by the Germans, thousands of people died. This was the hangover for the Dutch after the high expectations of september 1944.
I agree with every word except the SS-Panzer units (9.SS and 10.SS-Panzer-Divisons of II.SS-Panzerkorps) were not yet "refitted". Your English is obviously very good, but it would be correct to say they were in the area to "refit", but this process had not yet started.
In reality Monty's plan had No Chance of success because of his constant failures. (He was the best ally Germany Had!) Ike had ordered him to clear the Estuary to enable him to get his supplies from Antwerp. Monty refused. He was supposed to form the northern pincer at Falaise to surround the Germans in Normandy with Patton. Monty again failed and over 50,000 escaped. Many of those units were re-equipped and waiting in Belgium and Holland!
@@richardmeo2503 - and yet Market Garden came very close to succeeding - I understand now why an American unit at Nijmegen deliberately had to screw up to ensure Montgomery maintained his perfect record of failure. Thanks for straightening me out, Dick.
By the way, Montgomery wrote after the war that he also made a mistake in thinking the Canadian 1st Army would be able to clear the Scheldt Estuary on their own - it was in their sector after all. Since Montgomery was commander of 21st Army Group, 1st Canadian Army was part of his command. He didn't refuse to do anything. He overestimated the capability of an ally. Seems to be a habit of his, doesn't it?
And at Falaise, Patton's Third Army was under Montgomery's command. Land Forces command did not transfer to Eisenhower until 1st September. So which arm of the pincer was at fault? Dempsey's British 2nd Army, or Patton's US 3rd Army? I would put that one down to the Germans, unless hipocrisy is another hobby of yours?
@@davemac1197 No, MG did not come close to succeeding. It was a ridiculous plan and IKE was wrong in allowng it. Patton was NOT under Monty's command at Falaise, He was under Bradley. And both were under IKE who had taken over in July. Had Monty made it to Caan on DDay as was planned and he boasted he would, Falaise would never have happened. But since Monty took 28 days to reach Caan, just 12 miles from the beaches, and within range of Navy guns, the Americans had to plod through the Bocage getting decimated. The Allies planned on 12 fighter strips, all in Monty's sector. Since he never advanced, they were never built, increasing US losses in the Bocage. You should read my book. It has over 200 footnotes, and the series was written over 12 years. As far as "Monty writing after the war," it was done to cover his failures, which prolonged the war costing hundreds of thousands of casualties, military and civilian, and assisted Stalin in controlling most of Europe. If you can't face my work, read It Never Snows in September, Death of a Nazi Army and The Battle for Mortain. Those works highlight his failures, and what should have been done.
@@richardmeo2503 - and Bradley's 12th Army Group was under Montgomery's command during Falaise - he was Land Forces Commander until Eisenhower took over on 1st September, not 1st July!
'On August 13, 1944, concerned that American troops would clash with Canadian forces advancing from the north-west, Bradley overrode Patton's orders for a further push north towards Falaise, while ordering XV Corps to "concentrate for operations in another direction".[1] Any American troops in the vicinity of Argentan were ordered to withdraw.[2] This order halted the southern pincer movement of General Haislip's XV Corps.[3] Though Patton protested the order, he obeyed it, leaving an exit-a "trap with a gap"-for the remaining German forces.'
[1] Essame, Herbert, Patton: As Military Commander, (1998) p.168
[2] Essame, p.168: Bradley was supported in his decision by Eisenhower.
[3] Essame, p.182
Looks to me like Bradley stopped Patton closing the gap in case he caused Canadian casualties!
Around Caen, British and Canadian Armies had both SS-Panzerkorps and army panzer units in their sector, because the Germans knew how important Caen was. I don't think they received a copy of Montgomery's planned phase lines! After Paris, Allied armies were ahead of schedule, and the Guards Armoured Division's advance to Brussels on 3rd September was a record daily divisional advance that bettered than anything Patton ever achieved.
I'm sure your work is very popular for covering US failures, but it sounds like another American friendly fire incident to me.
For anyone interested, an interesting examination of Market-Garden is "The Last German Victory" by Aaron Bates. The training and tactical doctrine of the German Army, it's emphasis on individual officers and even soldiers exercising personal initiative on every level, gave it a distinct advantage. The British Army , by virtue of it's training, tactical doctrine, and the war fighting techniques it had grown accustomed by this point in the war, was ill suited and unprepared to succeed in an operation of the scope and type of Market-Garden.
I agree with you, thanks to the identical training to all different German troops, SS-men could fight with the Grüne Polizei-men (Green Police) seamlessly. And all other German troops of the Heer (Army) and Luftwaffe.
Great post Don and the truth,of course Monty with the spine of a gummy bear never appeared.Unlike an actual Field Marshall Walter Model directing in person
Actually Garden, the ground part, mostly suceeded. Market, the air part, mostly failed.
In Market Garden, the British Army advanced the fastest against German opposition in the entire September 1944 to February 1945 period.
It wasnt the British Army that failed Market Garden. It was the air forces. The First Allied Airborne Army, USAAF and RAF all made major tactical errors which doomed the operating.
None of the three airborne divisions suceeded in their objectives.
The British Army, without any airborne input, went on to further push the Germans back in Operation Aintree in October, taking Overloon and Venray etc.
Ah another of Monty's apologists pokes his head out of Monty's backside to explain why Monty was not responsible for the failure of Monty's plan. Actually it was Monty who admitted it - and like you he LIES, MONGTOMERY lied to IKE stating the Air Marshalls Ageed when in fact they were not even consulted.They had the the hard part of the planning.1,600 flights over 300 miles with less and less daylight. There is a lot of logistics involved, try removing your head from Monty's backside and read *Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality* The pinhead Monty just pointed toward Arnhem and told the tanks to go that way. He was nothing more than a shady sargeant doing a poor private's job and did not have the decency to show up and command
I think it’s unfair to say the British Airborne performed poorly against SS panzer divisions. I think it should be respected that they held the north end of the Bridge till they ran out of Ammunition. I think it comes down to poor planning from the higher ups and them underestimating German strength in the area
The main issue as far as I’m concerned is the dismissal of intelligence reports of Panzers in the immediate area,particularly with a concise description of the makeup of forces and the order of battle from Dutch sources, including the fact that the II SS Panzer Corps was refitting in the vicinity….thus laying the groundwork for failure even before a single paratrooper left the ground or a single British tank rolled forward…
@54blewis The actual strength of the II SS Panzer Corps was in reality less than that of a single understrength motorized division.
At the start of the battle the 9th SS Panzer Division had no tanks, just a few assault guns and a number of armoured half tracks, it also only had about 6,000 men, of whom only 3,000 were combat troops.
10th SS Panzer wasn't much better with just 8 Panthers, 16 Panzer VI's and 4 Stug III's.
That is approximately it for armour around Arnhem, of course, thanks to the closeness of Germany, armoured reinforcements were rushed to the area.
Knowing this the Allies took 83 anti tank guns into the Operation.
@@Bullet-Tooth-Tony- true, I was merely mentioning the beginning of a whole series of lapses,plus paras v panzer (even a depleted Kampf Gruppe as oppose to a full strength division)is not a desirable situation…
Dismissal of intelligence is a myth, apart from Browning's correct dismissal of the aerial photo showing obsolete tanks near Arnhem and that photo came to light in 2015 from a Dutch archive and did show obsolete Mark III and older Mark IV models, ruling out a 1944 panzer division. That story rested entirely on Cornelius Ryan's interview of Browning's Corps Intelligence Officer after Browning had passed away and the photo could not be located. We now know the identity of the unit and those tanks were laagered opposite the 506th PIR's drop zone near Son on D-Day of the operation and shot up by escorting USAAF fighters. Montgomery cancelled the original Operation Comet because the II.SS-Panzerkorps moved into the Netherlands and upgraded it to Market Garden by adding the two US divisions, so he didn't ignore any intelligence.
The Dutch resistance did not have an order of battle, the II.SS-Panzerkorps was only identified from 'Ultra' decryptions known only to exist to Allied headquarters at Army and Army Group level, the Dutch only reported vehicle insignia with an 'H' bisected by a vertical sword on a shield (9.SS-Panzer-Division 'Hohenstaufen') and identified Ruurlo as a division headquarters, but not which division. Gavin was told there may be a regiment of SS in Nijmegen and tank storage in the Reichswald forest, because the location of the 10.SS-Panzer-Division 'Frundsberg' had not been identified.
The operation was only fatally compromised on the ground by the 508th PIR's failure to secure the undefended Nijmegen highway bridge on the first afternoon, contrary to Gavin's instructions, and that was not in Cornelius Ryan's book and would never be contemplated in an American financed Hollywood film. Nor did you see any British anti-tank guns in the film, when in fact the 1st Airborne Division and Polish Brigade combined had exactly the same number (84) as Model had operational tanks in his entire Army Group B front from Aachen to the North Sea in September 1944. 83 anti-tank guns were taken by air to Arnhem, and for context Model was facing Montgomery's 21st Army Group with 2,400 tanks, plus whatever US 1st Army had at Aachen.
The main issue as far as I'm concerned is that Americans believe their own propaganda is gospel and it's getting very old.
@@Bullet-Tooth-Tony- - just to get the numbers right, Tony...
SS-Panzer-Regiment 9 at Arnhem had just 3 Panthers and 2 Flakpanzer IV 'Möbelwagen' off the books and hidden under trees on the Heijenoordseweg in western Arnhem since Friday 15 September, after moving them out of the barracks to avoid bombing, and an 'alarm kompanie' of 100 Panther crewmen acting as infantry in the Saksen-Weimar barracks in northern Arnhem, having lost their tanks in Normandy. All Mark IVs previously laagered on the Rozendaal Golf Links near the barracks had been handed over to the 'Frundsberg' Division.
SS-Panzerjäger-Abteilung 9 at Apeldoorn had 2 surviving Jagdpanzer IV/L48 tank destroyers having only become operational in time for the retreat from Normandy and lost the other 19 vehicles covering the division's withdrawal.
I./SS-Panzer-Regiment 10 (Panther abteilung) were still training at Grafenwöhr in Germany and would not be ready until operation 'Nordwind' in January 1945.
II./SS-Panzer-Regiment 10 at Kranenburg monastery in Vorden had 16 Panzer IV (most transferred from the 'Hohenstaufen') concentrated in 5.Kompanie, and 4 StuG IIIG assault guns concentrated in 7.Kompanie. The StuGs were ferried across the Pannerden canal to Nijmegen on 18 September, but the Mark IV tanks were too heavy for the raft and had to be held back until the Arnhem bridge was cleared on 21 September.
When Model sent 20 new Panthers to Arnhem direct from the factory during the battle in a batch of 8 and another of 12, they were crewed by the 100 men from the 9.SS-Panzer-Regiment alarm kompanie and transferred to the 10.SS-Panzer-Regiment as the 8.Kompanie, but they were deployed to Elst after the Arnhem bridge was retaken and operated under the army Kampfgruppe Knaust.
@@davemac1197 👍
Never underestimate your enemy.
Montgomery OVERESTIMATED his allies at Nijmegen - they failed to secure an undefended bridge in a city evacuated by the Germans on the first afternoon of the operation.
The Germans did it all the time. Battle of Britain, Barbarossa, Ardennes etc.
Pretty good video and good summation of the reasons for failure. There's a number of British historical revisionists in the comments of every video discussing Market Garden who desperately want to pin the entire failure of the operation on MG Gavin and the 82nd Airborne's failure to take Nijmegen road bridge on the first day. Without going into all the particulars of why that notion is silly, this video appropriately takes the macro view and points out the structural shortcomings of the operational design. What's amazing is that the operation did as well as it did.
Fact of the matter though, is it wasn't as close as we like to imagine. We like to pretend that if XXX Corps had been able to link up with Frost's battalion at Arnhem bridge they would have been able to cross in force and take Arnhem. That's a rather ridiculous notion. As this video points out well, the terrain between Nijmegen and Arnhem was not conducive to XXX Corps getting into battle formation and massing it's fires for a penetration. They were sitting ducks on that elevated highway and the terrain on either side of the road were wet lowlands tanks couldn't move in. They would have been dismantled in detail trying to cross that bridge with the Germans in Arnhem even with Frost's men on the far side of the bridge.
1st Airborne, just like the 82nd and 101st had more to do than just take the bridges themselves. They also had to take and retain the terrain that commanded them. Not one of the Airborne Divisions successfully did both. 1st Airborne took the bridge (sort of) but couldn't hold the commanding terrain. The 82nd took the terrain (sort of) but not the bridges until very late in the game, and the 101st lost the bridge entirely, took the terrain, then lost it again. Also XXX Corps was simultaneously being engaged up and down the entire line of advance, which again, prevented them from being able to mass a sufficient force at the decisive point of Arnhem.
This whole plan breaks one of the oldest rules of land warfare. That being you need interior lines of supply which run perpendicular to your front so they aren't vulnerable to being cut by the enemy. This supply line ran parallel to the front and was too close to it, allowing the Germans to do what they did, and ending what hope for the operation's success might have remained.
Gavin was a Brigadier General during Market Garden and revisionism is a valid historical process when new information becomes available. The TIK history channel did a whole video on that point and is also across the real reasons for Market Garden's failure. There's too many Americans here guilty of the very things of which they accuse the British - arrogance and ignorance. It's about time they looked at the evidence and revised their own attitudes.
@@davemac1197 and as I pointed out to Beau D elsewhere, had 82nd AB taken their bridge, then XXX Corps would have rolled right over it, like they did with the one at Grave and had been onto and across the "island", before any of the reinforcements had arrived and the Germans lacked the critical mass to have stopped XXX Corps.
I originally posted this for Sean in an earlier thread but not sure if he ever saw it, so I'm re-posting it here. History often 'turns on a dime' and Market Garden was unravelled by a single Colonel at Nijmegen on the first afternoon...
Put Us Down In Hell - A Combat History of the 508th PIR in WW2, Phil Nordyke 2012,
Chapter 9 - 'Put Us Down In Hell'
Captain Chet Graham was assigned as the regimental liaison officer with division headquarters. "I sat in on a high level briefing at division headquarters. Colonel Lindquist was told by General Gavin to move to the Nijmegen bridge as soon as Lindquist thought practical after the jump. Gavin stressed that speed was important. He was also told to stay out of the city and to avoid city streets. He told Lindquist to use the west farm area to get to the bridge as quickly as possible as the bridge was the key to the division's contribution to the success of the operation."
On September 13, the 508th headquarters issued Field Order Number 1:
... "seize, organize, and hold key terrain features in sector of responsibility, be prepared to seize Waal River crossing at Nijmegen on Division order and prevent all hostile movement south of the line Hatert - Klooster."
Chapter 10 - 'Use Trench Knives And Bayonets'
Captain Jonathan Adams... "Within half an hour after the jump, A Company had two patrols on their way to the objective as planned.
Lieutenant Colonel Shields Warren... "The objective was unoccupied by any German troops and [the patrol] was organizing a roadblock on the main road from Nijmegen leading south to Groesbeek. The battalion S-2 [Lieutenant Lee Frigo], who had accompanied the platoon, stated that Dutch civilians asserted that no German troops were in the area, except for a few labor troops."
Captain Adams and Company A increased the pace of the advance... "Everyone had the idea that the rest of the job would be as easy as it had been up to that point. That was somewhat my own impression and I still believe if we had marched straight to the [highway] bridge [in Nijmegen] we would have it without a fight."
Lieutenant Colonel Warren's 1st Battalion arrived at De Ploeg at around 6:30 p.m., about five hours after landing, without encountering any significant resistance. Warren ordered his troopers to dig in and strengthen the roadblock..."
Captain Ben Delamater, the battalion's executive officer... "The Regimental Commanding Officer [Colonel Roy Lindquist], with his radio operator and two Dutch interpreters from the British Army soon followed us onto our first objective... when several civilians wearing arm bands and carrying Underground credentials of some sort told the colonel that the Germans had deserted Nijmegen, that the town and the highway bridge were lightly held.
"The regimental CO had been instructed that if the initial mission were accomplished to 'go ahead and take the highway bridge if you can.' This division order was perfectly understood in relation to the primary missions and was not a weak, conditional order as might be supposed offhand.
"The regimental and battalion COs then planned to send... a reconnaissance patrol to approach the bridge from the south..."
At 6:30 p.m., the patrol moved along the Groesbeek-Nijmegen highway to the edge of Nijmegen, where it knocked out a German machine-gun position with Tommy guns."
That afternoon, Captain Chet Graham, the regimental liaison officer with division headquarters, decided to obtain a status of the progress toward the capture of the Nijmegen highway bridge. "I went to the 508th regimental CP and asked Colonel Lindquist when he planned to send the 3rd Battalion to the bridge. His answer was, 'As soon as the DZ is cleared and secured. Tell General Gavin that.'
"So I went through Indian country to the division CP and relayed Lindquist's message to Gavin. I never saw Gavin so mad. As he climbed into his jeep, he told me, 'Come with me - let's get him moving.' On arriving at the 508th regimental CP, Gavin told Lindquist, 'I told you to move with speed.'"
The 508th Connection, Zig Boroughs 2013,
Chapter 6 - Holland, Operation Market Garden
Nijmegen bridge
A battalion S-2 patrol led the way and reached the Nijmegen Bridge during daylight hours. Trooper Joe Atkins, Headquarters First, told that story:
"I was called on to take the point going into Nijmegen. As we entered the city, a crowd of people gathered around us, and we had to push our way through. Three of us in the lead became separated from the other troopers behind us by the crowds of Dutch people. We continued to make our way into the city until we came to the bridge.
At the bridge, only a few German soldiers were standing around a small artillery weapon. I had a Thompson sub and a .45 pistol. The other two were armed with M1 rifles. They covered me as I jumped up and yelled 'Hande hock!' (Hands up!)
The Germans were so surprised, the six or seven defenders of the bridge gave up without resisting. We held the prisoners at the entrance to the bridge for about an hour. It began to get dark, and none of our other troops showed up. We decided to pull back away from the bridge, knowing we could not hold off a German attack. The German prisoners asked to come with us, but we refused, having no way to guard them. As we were leaving, we could hear heavy equipment approaching the bridge."
@@sean640307 Maths for that hypothesis?
@@nickdanger3802 XXX Corps meet up with 82nd AB @ 08:20 on the morning of the 19th Sept, less than 42 hours after setting off. If Nijmegen is in US hands already, then XXX Corps has 8 miles to travel to get to Arnhem before the first of the German reinforcements arrive. The first of the German reinforcements didn't start to arrive until late 20th Sept, with most being deployed on the 21st Sept. The only exception was with regards to two Tiger I tanks that arrived at 20:00 on the 19th Sept. So XXX Corps had from before 9am until 20:00 on the 19th to get to Arnhem. Even allowing for delays, they would have achieved that. Also keep in mind that there would have been a clear delineation between the lines of XXX Corps and the German defenders - anything in front of XXX Corps on "the island" was going to be the enemy and 2TAC could have been called in. The main reason Williams and Brereton had forbidden the use of the TAC was to avoid blue-on-blue, which is understandable where there are no clear lines, but on "the Island", that was not the case.
So what you're saying is, the only crossing not captured by the allies on the first day was the one at Nijmegen, and that single failure doomed the whole operation.
4:54 - "General James Gavin, commander of the American forces at Nijmegen, prioritised capturing the Groesbeek Heights that overlooks Nijmegen. This was to guard against the danger of a German counter-attack from the forest that bordered the heights. Subsequently, there weren't sufficient troops to capture Nijmegen bridge and in fact, attempts to take it were repelled by the Germans." This is not a correct statement. There are at least four sources that explain what was intended to happen:
Letter General Gavin to Historical Officer Captain Westover, 17 July 1945 -
"About 48 hours prior to take-off, when the entire plan appeared to be shaping up well, I personally directed Colonel Lindquist, commanding the 508th Parachute Infantry, to commit his first battalion against the Nijmegen bridge without delay after landing, but to keep a very close watch on it in the event he needed it to protect himself against the Reichswald. So I personally directed him to commit his first battalion to this task. He was cautioned to send the battalion via the flat ground east of the city."
James Maurice Gavin, Box 101 Folder 10, Cornelius Ryan Collection, Ohio State University.
Notes on meeting with J.M. Gavin, Boston, January 20, 1967 -
Gavin and Lindquist had been together in Sicily and Normandy and neither Gavin nor Ridgway, the old commander of the 82nd, trusted him in a fight.
He did not have a “killer instinct.” In Gavin’s words, “He wouldn’t go for the juggler [jugular].” As an administrative officer he was excellent; his troopers were sharp and snappy and, according to Gavin, “Made great palace guards after the war.”
Gavin confirms he ordered Lindquist to commit a battalion to the capture of the Nijmegen bridge before the jump. He also confirms he told Lindquist not to go to the bridge by way of the town but to approach it along some mud flats to the east.
We discussed also objectives. Gavin’s main objectives were the heights at Groesbeek and the Grave bridge; he expected and intelligence confirmed “a helluva reaction from the Reichswald area.” Therefore he had to control the Groesbeek heights. The Grave bridge was essential to the link up with the British 2nd Army. He had three days to capture the Nijmegen bridge and, although he was concerned about it, he felt certain he could get it within three days.
The British wanted him, he said, to drop a battalion on the northern end of the bridge and take it by coup de main. Gavin toyed with the idea and then discarded it because of his experience in Sicily. There, his units had been scattered and he found himself commanding four or five men on the first day. For days afterward, the division was completely disorganized.
September Hope - The American Side of a Bridge Too Far, John C McManus (2012), Chapter 3: ‘Foreboding’ -
As Gavin finished his briefing, the British General [Browning] cautioned him: “Although every effort should be made to effect the capture of the Grave and Nijmegen bridges, it is essential that you capture the Groesbeek ridge and hold it.”
General Browning’s order, of course, made perfect sense. It was of paramount importance to hold the high ground. Any commander worth his salt understood that. Even so, the purpose of Market Garden was to seize the bridges in order to speedily unleash a major armored thrust into northern Germany, toward Berlin. High ground notwithstanding, the only way for the Allies to accomplish this ambitious objective was to take the bridges, and these were, after all, perishable assets, because the Germans could destroy them (and might well be likely to do so the longer it took the Allies to take the bridges). By contrast, the Groesbeek ridge spur wasn’t going anywhere. If the 82nd had trouble holding it, and German artillery or counterattacks became a problem, the Allies could always employ air strikes and artillery of their own to parry such enemy harassment. Also, ground troops from Dempsey’s Second Army could join with the paratroopers to retake Groesbeek from the Germans. So, in other words, given the unpleasant choice between the bridges and the hills, the bridges had to come first.
General Gavin did have some appreciation of this. At an earlier meeting with his regimental commanders, he [Gavin] had told Colonel Roy Lindquist of the 508th Parachute Infantry that even though his primary mission was to hold the high ground at Berg en Dal near Groesbeek, he was also to send his 1st Battalion into Nijmegen to take the key road bridge. Gavin told Lindquist to push for the bridge via "the flatland to the east of the city and approach it over the farms without going through the built-up area." Gavin considered this so important that he stood with Lindquist over a map and showed him this route of advance.
At the same time, Colonel Lindquist had trouble reconciling Gavin's priorities for the two ambitious objectives of holding Berg en Dal and grabbing the bridge. He believed that Gavin wanted him to push for the bridge only when he had secured the critical glider landing zones and other high ground. According to Lindquist, his impression was that "we must first accomplish our main mission before sending any sizeable force to the bridge." Actually, General Gavin wanted the 508th to do both at the same time, but somehow this did not sink into the 508th's leadership. "If General Gavin wanted Col Lindquist to send a battalion for the bridge immediately after the drop, he certainly did not make that clear to him," Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Shanley, the executive officer of the 508th, later wrote.
Perhaps this was a miscommunication on Gavin's part, probably not. Lieutenant Colonel Norton, the G-3, was present for the conversation (Shanley was not) and recorded Gavin's clear instructions to Lindquist: "Seize the high ground in the vicinity of Berg en Dal as his primary mission and ... attempt to seize the Nijmegen bridge with a small force, not to exceed a battalion."
Put Us Down In Hell - A Combat History of the 508th PIR in WW2, Phil Nordyke (2012), Chapter 9: 'Put Us Down In Hell' -
Captain Chet Graham was assigned as the regimental liaison officer with division headquarters. "I sat in on a high level briefing at division headquarters. Colonel Lindquist was told by General Gavin to move to the Nijmegen bridge as soon as Lindquist thought practical after the jump. Gavin stressed that speed was important. He was also told to stay out of the city and to avoid city streets. He told Lindquist to use the west farm area to get to the bridge as quickly as possible as the bridge was the key to the division's contribution to the success of the operation."
How many bridges did 1st AB capture (that means both ends) during the entire op ?
@@davemac1197 People lie, especially after an event.
@@nickdanger3802 Not capturing the crossing at Nijmegen, not even bothering to try until XXX corps arrived, doomed the whole operation.
@@ITSREALLYNOTYOURFAULT - it's interesting that Gavin seems to have been pretty honourable and did tell the truth to the US Army Historical officer and to Cornelius Ryan, accepting that he made mistakes with the benefit of hindsight. I think a big part of the problem with the conventional narrative established by the book A Bridge Too Far is that Ryan himself was from Dublin and was working as a war correspondent for the Daily Telegraph embedded with Patton's US 3rd Army during the war. Dublin and Patton are both premiere anti-British (or certainly anti-Montgomery) colleges, so it's hardly surprising the book comes across in the way it does. Director Richard Attenborough was one of the most anti-establishment leftist filmmakers you could find in 1970s Britain, so A Bridge Too Far was a perfect vehicle for his "anti-war film" in which to attack the British 'officer class'. This is how myths are created.
The troops wasted on Operation Market Garden were to have been used to clean the entrance to Rotterdam of German troops so that the port could be used to bring in supplies rather than all the way from the Normadiget operation, the operation was a waste of some of the best troops in the Allied armies and extended the war in the west to Soviet advantage in the postwar period.
I think you mean the port of Antwerp? I don't think there were any plans to attack 'fortress Holland', which includes Rotterdam.
This Antwerp instead of MARKET GARDEN idea is a question of sequencing, not priorities. The rationale for going for a Rhine crossing before clearing the Scheldt estuary to open Antwerp was that the Germans were still recovering from their withdrawal from Normandy and it would be easier to secure a Rhine crossing sooner, before they could complete and reinforce their canal and river defence lines in the Netherlands, than it would be if it had to wait until after Antwerp was opened.
The fact was that Antwerp's port capacity was needed to supply advances of Eisenhower's 'broad front' policy into Germany, not a limited advance to the Rhine. The Scheldt on the other hand, was already occupied by the German 15.Armee on the southern bank and started ferrying operations to cross over to the north side on 7/8 September, the original date planned for the first Arnhem airborne operation, COMET.
The troops involved in MARKET GARDEN would not have been "wasted" if the operation had been successful, as it would have cut off not only the 15.Armee west of Antwerp but most of the WBN (military command Netherlands) and 1.Fallschirm-Armee in a wider envelopment - the secondary objective of MARKET GARDEN, as well as gaining a Rhine crossing - the primary objective. Cuttting the V-2 supply lines to the launch sites on the Dutch coast also became a tertiary objective after 9 September. None of that would have been achieved, except possibly trapping the 15.Armee, if the Scheldt operation had been given priority.
Even Eisenhower, whose strategic thinking was questionable, saw the sense in this and after the publication of Cornelius Ryan's incomplete and misleading book, A Bridge Too Far (1974), he felt he had to put the record straight in public:
“I not only approved Market-Garden, I insisted upon it. We needed a bridgehead over the Rhine. If that could be accomplished I was quite willing to wait on all other operations.” (Eisenhower: A Soldier's Life, Carlo D'Este, 2015)
The whole Antwerp argument is an exercise in hindsight.
Market Garden was a well planned beautifully placed Domino road to Arnhem …. But if one Domino fell … everything would fall. That is the flaw in Montgomerys Market Garden. He didn’t count on Murphy ( Murphy Law ) ‼️
Actually he did, that's why it got expanded in airborne troop numbers from Comet to Market Garden. He wanted even more resources but they were not forthcoming, but the chance was still there to strike for a quick dash across the Rhine.... so they went for it rather than wait and lose the opportunity.
As it happened, the Rhine wasn't crossed until 6 months later, so that reasoning was correct.
Intel: “There may be two SS-Panzerdivisions in the drop zone.” General: “Nah, we gonna be fine.”
There werent two ss divisions. The 9th and 10th combined barely made a battalion in strength, according to the 10th SS commander that conducted the battle from Nijmegen. The allies were not wrong about the strength of german forces, they were extremely weak, but they responded amazingly well and won a victory.
The main reason was that expecting troops to capture and hold against counter-attacks multiple bridges at multiple locations was expecting too much. Also, the corridor was very narrow and open to German counterattack. Montgomery was the person who developed the plan. Montgomery was very good at planning an initial attach such as El Alamein and Overlord. He was not as strong in making plans in the middle of an attack to deal with the unexpected. Probably the biggest reason it failed, is that the German Army was still willing to fight.
The Germans were, sadly, the best soldiers in WW2 which is why they were able to hold on so long before being beaten.
But... Market-Garden was worth a go. Had it not been for Nijmegen, it might have been successful - see TIK’s Battlestorm presentation, his points have a lot going for them and the detail is excellent.
@@mikereger1186 TIK's video is good for details of events but his conclusions that it was not Monty's fault are just stupid. The success was dependant on every single detail going as imagened by Montgomery. Any delay on the way and the operation fails. That is sole fault of Montgomery and his planning and not anyone else in the field.
@@mikereger1186 while that would increase market garden's chances we don't know how exactly it would turn out otherwise. One end of Arnhem bridge was held by the Germans for a long time, and they could just blow it if XXX corps arrived. And the Germans did counterattack at several areas along the highway, which did delay the corps' advance and threaten to cut the corps off.
Il Maresciallo Montgomery , ottimo comandante non brillava però certo in azzardo . ha sempre privilegiato la tattica con una certa sicurezza . dubito che un operazione così rischiosa venisse solo dalla sua mente , a meno che non avesse in mano rapporti di intelligence completamente errati.
Overlord? Monty didn't plan Overlord. Lieutenant-General Frederick E. Morgan and a substantial staff planned Overlord.
The greatest flaw appears to have been the reliance on only one road for the ground forces to advance on. Any issues on the one road, then problems escalate as actually happened.
Sounds like a nice argument, exept that the British Army had been using main supply routes on 'single roads' to supply its divisions since the breakout from Normandy and continued them into Germany all the way to Bremen. The 'Club Route' used by Guards Armoured Division did not start and end for Market Garden. The flanking VIII and XII Corps were using designated 'Spade' and 'Diamond' routes respectively, and there were alternative crossings for XXX Corps on the 'Heart Route' in case a bridge was blown. There was also a 'Triangle Route' between Eindhoven and Uden opened up during one of the instances when 'Club Route' was cut by the Germans, but of course you never hear about these things unless you do a lot of reading on the subject. The appearance of reliance on just one road is just that - appearance.
My thoughts, ignoring what is /now/ known, what was known at the time?
1. D-Day had already had to be postponed for a day /due to the weather/. Also in 1940 Hitler had called off Sealion /because of the weather/. Not accounting for it in a /three day //airborne// operation in the autumn was a catastrophic error.
2. The whole operation was flawed in concept. Instead of an incremental bite and hold strategy, the operation took one huge bite and failed to hold it.
3. Why was XXX Corp sent second? They should have been sent /first/ and when they passed a certain point /then/ launch the airborne to take the first bridge. Then XXX Corps race across, get to a second point, launch second wave of airborne, take and hold second bridge. Repeat for last wave. The airborne troops would have had to hold for much less time.
4. Poor use of 2 TAF. Ground suppression e.g. Typhoons should have been used to suppress resistance on the landing grounds.
None of this was especially Monty's fault as the detailed planing was done by others - although as Caen had taken much longer to take than planned he should have anticipated problems at Nijmegen. However the overall strategy was IMHO flawed.
The operation failed because one Regiment did not follow its operational orders to seize its bridge objectives at Nijmegen on the first day. Taking your points in turn:
1. The critical phase of the operation was the first two days, the time it was estimated for the tanks to reach Arnhem, and the weather was forecast to be guaranteed clear the first two days and unpredicatble after that.
2. You have to seize all the bridges you need on the first day and hold them against counter-attacks. If you try to operate incrementally, the enemy will reinforce the unoccupied bridges as soon as you telegraph your intended route.
3. Because the 2nd TAF air support had to be deconflicted from the Airborne transports and escorts. That is why Operation Garden commenced at 1430 hrs, after the Operation Market airlift timed at 1300 hrs was complete. Sebastian Ritchie's book Arnhem: Myth And Reality: Airborne Warfare, Air Power and the Failure of Operation Market Garden (2011, updated 2019), is the best work on the air plan and the reasons why it had to be done the way it was carried out.
4. There was little to no resistance on the landing grounds on the first day and Flak suppression during the airlifts were the responsibility of the escorts and not 2nd TAF, which had to be grounded for deconfliction reasons when the airlifts were scheduled. Flak suppression was effective and transport losses were minimised.
Montgomery was let down at Nijmegen by one of the units loaned to him for the operation. He is often accused of "hubris", but it's not hubris to overestimate your ally.
@@davemac1197
1. How often are weather forecasts wrong? Very often.
2. So you send all the airborne forces on the same day. By your own logic you don't send them over three days. You assume there would be enough time for the enemy to prepare defences between increments. That would depend on the speed XXX Corps moved.
@@julianmhall
1. The forecast was correct because they got two clear days and then it started to deteriorate, delaying the 3rd Lift by two days.
2. There's an argument for going with what you can airlift in one go, so at Arnhem they would have had six battalions with which to strike at Arnhem instead of holding three back to defend the landing zones. The idea behind feeding more Airborne troops in by air was to reinforce the attacking force, hopefully faster than the defenders can reinforce by land. In the first two days the Airborne operation was doing that successfully, but the initiative went over to the Germans after the airlifts fell behind schedule because of the weather. All the more important that you secure all your bridges on the frist day and get the tanks to Arnhem in two days. That's why I think the crucial error, totally unforced, was at Nijmegen on the first day. All the stuff about weather, intel, the single road, are all excuses to cover the thing that can be controlled but wasn't.
*Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p.108*
Never the less Montgomery's plan required 100% mission success something unkown in large scale Airborne operations. Failure to capture a single objective would jeopardize the entire XXX Corp offensive
*Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p131 Montgomery altered his assesments from his obvious desire that the offensive should proceed as planned. He persuaded himself that any threat from the Germans was off set by the large number of Airborne troops. *Despite warnings from the head of intelligence and Bedell-Smith suggested that the operation be revised or halted Monty dismissed the objections out of hand*
*Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p.138 Brereton was not in a position to exploit strategic intelligence,and he would also have known that Montgomery alone had access to ULTRA and had never the less decided that Market Garden should proceed* First Allied Airborne depended very heavily on Mongomery's 21st Army Group for their supply of intelligence. *1st Parachute Brigade summary by Capt. W.A. Taylor that appeared on September 13th which pointed out that "the whole Market area was being feverishly prepared for defense" - a statement entirely in accord with Dempsey's diary notes of September 9th & 10th*
*Sabastian Ritchie's Arnhem Myth and Reality,p.160 By September 1944 Air Force Planners were unable to see a happy outcome. More over it was documented that because Arnhem lay so far in land they did not expect to attain outright tactical surprise. The previous Comet Operation air warning stated "Surprise is extremely unlikely and the enemy will undoubtedly have knowledge of the approach of Troop Carrier formations by radar alert or visual reconnaissance."*
Poor planning, poor intelligence, accurate intelligence that was ignored, an assumption that old men & boys was all that was left of the German army in the west, radio's that simply did not work...The list is a long one..
A good document movie 💪
The 10th SS panzer division and thrown together units early fought hard early on.
Useless communication and no anti tank weapons of any substance the German army was expected to collapse.
As normal it didnt and fought hard.
How is a bunch of 17pdrs "no anti tank weapons"? 9th & 10th SS divisions presence and strength were known, and the Airborne units had plenty of AT to deal with whatever came.
No tanks, right? I think they've been trying to include heavier weapons ever since. This was a classic case of trying to do too much at once. If they had gone in steps, reinforcing as they went, they might have succeeded despite the delay and loss of some surprise.
Moving in steps would have immediately telegraphed the main axis of the advance to the enemy. The reason the operation failed was because the Nijmegen highway bridge was left in German hands on the first day, when it was planned to be quickly seized. The failure was a failure to carry out a vital part of the plan, not a failure in the planning.
That was well done but it left out a lot of the details of all the things the Airborne Units had to do.
One thing No one mentions - is that when 1st Airborne failed to capture BOTH ends of the Arnhem Bridge - the operation was lost. Since the Germans ALWAYS held the South End of Arnhem Highway Bridge - they could blow it any time they wanted. The reason they didn't - is because they wanted to re-capture the Northern End of the Bridge - and use it themselves.
IF it had ever looked like XXX Corps was going to take the South end while Frost held the North End - the Germans could have just blown the bridge - the way they had blown the Railway Bridge.
The Biggest problem with the Operation -was that the Allies had not made the adjustment to their thinking needed by the fact that the Germans had recovered from their head long flight - and were now resisting again. Conceived of during the days of German flight - the operation didn't seem so bad - but - because the Germans HAD gotten themselves sorted - it was - as Browning said - A Bridge To Far.
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The biggest problem was Montys ego. He couldnt stand patton getting press for Cobra. He threw together this asinine plan which called for him to move faster than he has ever moved before. Capturing a bridge in an airborne assault is tricky. Anything more than 3 is moronic.
@@machiavelli061 Well ... it sure didn't work.
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I'm a little more generous, I typically say that the operation changed from an attempted breakthrough to a rescue mission for the first airborne somewhere between the third day, when Frost was completely isolated and the first airborne immobilized in place, and in the early hours of the fifth day before the infamous "out of ammo God save the King" message. Frost probably could have kept engineers from blowing the bridge through some of the fourth day.
But the dreamed of breakthrough was unrealistic and would have required flawless execution from every group.
@@johnschmidt1262 How would he have kept the German Engineers from Blowing up THEIR end of the Bridge?
One thing about that - was that Frost didn't capture the Railway Bridge - because it was ALREADY mined and the Germans blew it up in their faces. If the Germans ALREADY had the Railway Bridge mined - wouldn't they have ALSO - ALREADY have had the Highway Bridge mined?
It's not a question of the Germans having to set the explosives and fuse them - this was ALREADY done. All the Germans had to do - whenever they wanted - was set them off.
If it had ever looked like Frost was going to take the South end of the bridge - they might have blown it then - but he was never close to being able to take the South end.
The other thing about that - is that when the Germans blew the Railway Bridge - it was early in the operation and they may have been more concerned with 1st Airborne's ability to capture both Bridges. Once they had Frost isolated from the rest of the Division - they may - have figured that they would eventually take the Northern end of the bridge back - and then THEY could use it.
Given Models attitude towards blowing the Nijemegen Bridge that is likely. Here - the Germans already had those bridges mined too. So the big failure here - was on the part of the Germans in failing to destroy them - which can be blamed on Model.
One thing about the 82nd - was it had 7 bridges to take.
There was the Grave Bridge across the Maas.
There were 4 Bridges over the Maas/Waal Canal (connecting the two rivers) of which they needed to take at least one that would support tanks. The Germans blew several of those Bridges - so - THEY were already mined too.
Then there was the Highway and Railroad Bridges over the Waal.
The 82nd also had to defend the East and West Flanks of the Nijmegan area, and Corps HQ where Browning was.
Plus - there were already Germans IN Nijmegen.
They also had to defend their drop zones - which the Germans did take - but the 82nd took them back before the next drop.
Initially - Gavin and Browning didn't think they had the strength to take the Waal Bridges and their priority was to take the Grave and Canal Bridges, defend Nijmegan and hold their drop zones - or - XXX Corps would never get to THEM - much less Arnhem.
Later on - Gavin decided they did have enough strength to send some men to the Highway Bridge - and he verbally ordered one of his Regimental Commanders to do so - but the Regimental Commander didn't understand the priority of that - and was waiting until he had accomplished all his other tasks (they were being attacked by the Germans) before sending those men.
It was only when Gavin checked with him to make sure he had done it - that Gavin realized he hadn't and THEN sent the men to take the bridge. By that time it was to late - but - under the guidance of a Resistance Operator they took the phone exchange where all the wiring was that led to the the charges on the bridge. They then cut those charges. There were also others who cut wires as well at other points - so they all claimed that THEY were the ones who stopped the mine on the bridge from going off. Since the Germans waited until the last second before trying to detonate the mine - they had no time to check why it wouldn't blow.
All in all - there were just to many things that could go wrong - and ALL the Airborne Units needed XXX Corps help to accomplish their objectives - and then - hold the road open between them.
1st Airborne was supposed to capture the Ferry at Driel, the Railway Bridge, the Highway Bridge, a pontoon bridge, capture Arnhem, capture the airfield at Deelen so the 52n Air Landing Division could be flown in and 1st Airborne had to hold their drop zones. They had the most Germans to deal with and were farthest away from XXX Corps help so they weren't able to accomplish any of that and lost most of their number before they could be pulled out.
The basic idea of the plan was conceived of when the Germans were still retreating faster than the Allies could catch them - but - once the Germans stopped and got themselves sorted - it was just to much.
And - I think they threw the whole thing together in a week.
It's a testament to the people involved that they got as much accomplished as they did but they should have been concentrating on securing the Scheldt and cutting off the German 15th Army. Monty did assign the Canadians to do it - but they weren't strong enough. The 15th Army escaped (to join the fight against M/G) and Antwerp couldn't be used until the Scheldt was cleared.
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@@BobSmith-dk8nw I don't think that's correct about the explosives, I know the Germans set explosives but I still think they had to be wired and set with primers. They certainly didn't have a hair triggered plunger on each side of every bridge. That really doesn't sound right, even in the case of the bridge at Nimegan they had to do a little prep work after the attack to ready the bridge for demolition. I think it's set up so it doesn't take long, but you still need engineers out on the bridge doing work.
I agree with you about the 82nd, I definitely noticed and have said elsewhere that no airborne unit achieved all its objectives, but all of them achieved at least some. I really don't see how the operation could have gone much better than it had.
Now maybe with the right set of circumstances the first airborne could have been saved, but that is about as good as it could have gotten.
"Mass glider landings can be a hazardous business to say the least. As men unloaded equipment from their gliders and began to move off the landing zone, they had to keep a wary eye behind them for gliders that were still landing. The prospect of such accidents appeared to be the only cause for concern, because although the standard procedure for disembarking from a glider calls for a rapid and defensive exit, there was such a lack of enemy activity that men calmly left their craft and went about their business as if they were on a training exercise in England."
Pegasus Archive Arnhem 5. The First Lift (Sunday 17th September)
Too ambitious a plan for a general who had never done anything creative. He had used WW1 tactics - frontal assault, masses of infantry and huge amounts of artillery, consistently, in North Africa, Sicilia, Italy and again in Normandy in front of Caen.
And after the 82nd risked everything to take the Nijmegen bridge, the tankers of 30 Corps were too afraid to advance, in the dark, towards Arnhem to save their countrymen of the 1st Paras.
@rrl4245 At Second Alamein and in Normandy he faced the most formidable defences encountered anywhere during the war, and yet proved capable of attacking without suffering excessive losses. Michael Kenny over on Axis History Forum has posted a composite map showing Kursk and Normandy to the same scale and the density of forces in France would have given the Soviet commanders a heart-attack if they'd had to face them.
Montgomery's tactics were basically a refinement of those developed on the Somme in 1916; a carefully-prepared offensive barrage would silence the German guns and suppress their infantry, allowing the British to seize their objectives. Then, instead of attempting to push on beyond the range of supporting artillery, the troops would stand on the defensive and massacre the German counter-attacks.
Montgomery was overall a complete commander who could do both equally-well, as he proved in both North Africa and during the break-out from Normandy.
In addition to your 2nd point, the tankers of 30 Corps had less than 4 tanks and a handful of 82nd air borne Paratroopers remaining, the rest of the Corps was still involved in the fighting in the town, so the idea that 4 British tanks on there own in the dark advancing the several miles to Arnhem could have altered the situation is far fetched to say the least. However, it was already too late. The German's from late afternoon of the same day were already advancing down the road from Arnhem with a couple of battalions of Panzer Grenadiers and several Tiger tanks.
If the 82nd had just captured the Nijmegen Waal bridge on day one on September 19th as ordered both 30 Corps and the 82nd air borne would have raced into Arnhem together to save the 1st Air Borne division.
@@Bullet-Tooth-Tony- Sorry Tony, but you’re wrong on far too many points, I’ll only address a couple. At El Alamein, he faced an exhausted Axis force, who were low on supplies and seriously outnumbered. Monty simply steam-rolled Rommel.
At Normandy, he (as you said) used WW1 tactics - in the US Army we disdainfully called that tactic: ‘hey diddle, diddle; straight up the middle’. At Ft Benning we were flunked for employing that approach.
Monty was disliked by all his peers and superiors for being egotistical, petty and unimaginative. Market Garden, the one time he tried to get creative, he failed miserably, and the men of the 1st Airborne, and the entire Airborne corps paid the price.
You mean after the 82nd screwed up taking the Nijmegen bridge while it was undefended on D-Day (17 September) and it had to be taken by the Grenadier Guards, the tanks could not be moved after dark on the night of 20 September. WW2 tanks could not fight at night, except for an experimental infra-red system trialled by the Germans on some Panther units in 1944 and 45, but the technology didn't really work that well. Reconnaissance was done that night by 2nd Household Cavalry Regiment and they established the Germans had a substantial blocking line between Oosterhout and Ressen, which was met by the Irish Guards the following day.
@@davemac1197 Really? “The 82nd screwed up” You really don’t understand that battle. The 82nd was overtasked by the British planners with taking several bridges as well as protecting the right flank, from what those same planners expected to be counterattacks coming out of Germany, those did materialize.
The entire plan was impossible and incompetent. Thirty Corps had no chance of moving rapidly down that one silly road. The 1st Airborne, dropped so far from their objective had no chance, and both the 82nd and the 101st had no chance of successfully accomplishing all their missions - take all those bridges in the time allowed and with the resources available.
Like the 1st Para, the 82nd fought bravely and took that bridge with that heroic river crossing. Turns out they shouldn’t have bothered, as the tankers didn’t have the courage to take advantage of their sacrifices. Nor did they have the desire to save their countrymen.
Tanks did attack at night, throughout the war. Germans, Americans and Russians did, anyway…
@@rrl4245 I wouldn't class it as seriously outnumbered, a two to one advantage in armour and heavy weapons, and 85 British Commonwealth infantry battalions against 60 Axis infantry battalions, that's not even 10 to 1 odds, plus the Axis had the advantage of being well dug in on a strong defensive position protected by millions of mines.
You do realise that the US army fought their battles in the same way as Monty right? Using their material and firepower superiority to wear down the enemy before any attack.
He was barely even involved in Market Garden so I don't agree with that, go and read up on the Order of Battle for Market Garden to see who was calling the shots in that operation, I think you'll find that it wasn't Monty.
Great presentation! I still wonder what happened to the overwhelming allied air support that had helped clinch the German defeat and route from Normandy. Holland should have been a shooting gallery for the masses of fighter bombers and twin engine medium bombers that the allies had available to them.
@Salvador Vizcarra Korea is an interesting case. The UN air forces ran out of what they considered to be "viable targets" within the first few months (neither of the Koreas was heavily industrialized and the road network on that hilly and mountainous peninsula was a joke as the heavily mechanized UN ground forces soon found out) but they continued to bomb with impunity every day of every month of every year until the war ended and still only achieved a stalemate. The allied air forces never paralyzed the opposing communist armies as they had those of Germany in 1944-1945.
Poor weather is one answer. Another is that the Allied advance across France had outrun the air support infrastructure, to a degree. Ground/Air liaison was also very patchy during Market Garden, with a lot of equipment failures.
Blame Brereton for that. He didn't want allied ground attack air support interfering with the FAAA flight routes.
@Salvador Vizcarra you are forgetting Dieppe, St Nazaire etc..1942
A question I have frequently asked also. It was there in the early stages then for whatever reason it was not.
You have to smile at all the experts giving us the benefit of their wisdom, with 77 years of hindsight. Monty knew the risks full well, but calculated they were outweighed by the fruits of success, should he succeed. Any commander not prepared to take risks is a bad commander.
If you mean in the comments then please don't call a small number of Americans with big mouths 'experts' it's insulting to genuine masters.
A worthwhile gamble that didn't pay off. Ultimately it could well have worked and ended the war before Christmas so it was a chance worth taking. That it didn't was largely a matter of luck and no detriment to Monty. For those who question the Allies not listening to the Dutch resistance remember it had been throughly penetrated by the Gestapo so that is hardly surprising 🤷♂
Defend Monty all you want you know it was Montys ego that propelled this operation to be one the allies largest blunders
PERIOD...
Ahhh captain hindsight..
@@krashd What are you the master of?
Ok I finished watching n Listening too the Prior Video 📷📸, it was Impressive, informative, and Enjoyable as well as Complete.
Thank You for Sharing it with me and the Many Others out There?
In retrospect there were many Aspects about the Offensive, I wasn't aware of Apparently. Please Forgive any out of Line BS, or improper Comment's by Me. Thank You again.
The ENTIRE plan was wrong-headed. It had too many unknowns going in; and way WAY too many critical points of (possible) failure (i.e. if it goes wrong "here" the entire plan fails). Why this plan was followed, when it was proposed/pushed by the SAME MAN that promised Caan would be in British hands by the end of D-Day is a lesson in politics NOT military tactics.
And you have to ask, what if it had succeeded? What then? Did Montgomery think the Germans would just throw up their hands and say, game over? Antwerp would still have been in German hands, the supply line still would have been coming up from Normandy, and there would have been a long thin salient through Holland into Germany. The Allies couldn’t have supported a push any further. And we know from the next seven months of the war that the Germans fought tenaciously against both the Soviets and the Western Allies, even when it was hopeless. Montgomery’s idea of a bold strike to finish the war was never going to happen. There is a saying credited to Omar Bradley, “Amateurs talk strategy. Professionals talk logistics.” Montgomery ignored logistics.
@@timmotz2827 The main objective of Market Garden was to cut off the German forces in the Scheldt and free up Antwerp - only then to push south into the Rhur valley