80 yrs ago; Operation Market Garden
- Thread starter The Spin Meister
- Start date
General Montgomery was the Rich Kotite of his era
One of the top three battles of the war, imho.
Should've just given Patton the men and gas and he'd have shortened the war. This wasn't a crazy plan, but one Ike made because of pressure from politicians on both sides of the pond. This was making the Brits and Montgomery feel good after failures to secure the port of Rotterdam.
Crazy that the Dutch still celebrate the effort.
Crazy that the Dutch still celebrate the effort.
I always liked the line in the movie on Patton, when the Russian General wanted to have a drink with him. Patton told the interpretor " I won't drink with him or any Russian son-of-a-bitch." After hearing the interpretor the Russian General said " tell him he's a SOB too." Upon hearing that Patton said " now I'll drink to that!" Loved that.
in what way?...sure they captured some towns, but they failed in the main goal of securing the bridge over the rhine..it had an inconsequential outcome, almost meaningless....lol, not sure it makes the top 20-30 operations
Two great books, obviously Cornelius Ryan's, but also Antony Beavor's as well.
It was a daring plan, but doomed to fail. The Arnhem drop zones were about 7-10 miles from the main highway bridge. Element of surprise was completely gone. There was a plan to send a squad of machine gun Jeeps directly to the bridge, but many were lost in the drop. The radios also failed the Brits at Arnhem. One thing that surprised me was just how narrow the Rhine was at Arnhem, compared to Nijmegen. The river crossing by the 82nd boys there has to be one of the signature feats of the Western front. The river there is very wide with a strong current. In Arnhem it was considerably narrower.
I visited back in 2018. The museums around Arnhem and Oosterbeek are top notch. The main cemetery was enlightening, but in a different and sad way. In their minds, the Limeys blamed the Polish brigade for the failure, and because their general, Sosabowski, pointed out the plan's folly before the drop. They really shoved the Polish graves toward the fringes of the cemetery. (If there's another reason for this, I'd appreciate hearing it.)
The major mistakes, in my study of the battle, were the lackadaisical advance by XXX Corps, combined with overconfidence. The failure to drop close to all of the bridges was practically begging the Germans to blow one of them, which they did at Son, leading to the first major delay of 30 hours to build a Bailey bridge. For those of you that read Ryan's book, you'll recall the Dutch officer who stormed into an officer's mess for the Irish Guards and laid into them, telling them that the proper way to attack Arnhem from Nijmegen was a question at their war college, and trying to go straight ahead from one city to another was suicide on the elevated highway. Choosing that option led to failure at the college, and it certainly led to failure in real life. Brit intel was another abject failure. They had solid intel of their own, and Dutch intel that they didn't trust (with some reason) about the panzer divisions in the way. But with so many canceled drops, nobody wanted to rock the boat and see another operation canceled.
It truly is a fascinating aspect of the western front, and a very clear lesson on how the winners write the history. I dare say very few Americans were even aware of Market-Garden until Ryan's book and the movie (30 years after the battle). And the poor Dutch, they were the victims of vicious Nazi reprisals after the battle, and then the horrific winter led to mass starvation and famine into the final days of the war in April-May 1945. Monty's insistence of the operation being a 90 percent success led the Dutch Prince Bernhard to quip, "My country can never again afford the luxury of a Montgomery success."
Thanks for this thread. I could talk about this for hours. We all remember June 6, 1944. But September 17 should also be remembered.
It was a daring plan, but doomed to fail. The Arnhem drop zones were about 7-10 miles from the main highway bridge. Element of surprise was completely gone. There was a plan to send a squad of machine gun Jeeps directly to the bridge, but many were lost in the drop. The radios also failed the Brits at Arnhem. One thing that surprised me was just how narrow the Rhine was at Arnhem, compared to Nijmegen. The river crossing by the 82nd boys there has to be one of the signature feats of the Western front. The river there is very wide with a strong current. In Arnhem it was considerably narrower.
I visited back in 2018. The museums around Arnhem and Oosterbeek are top notch. The main cemetery was enlightening, but in a different and sad way. In their minds, the Limeys blamed the Polish brigade for the failure, and because their general, Sosabowski, pointed out the plan's folly before the drop. They really shoved the Polish graves toward the fringes of the cemetery. (If there's another reason for this, I'd appreciate hearing it.)
The major mistakes, in my study of the battle, were the lackadaisical advance by XXX Corps, combined with overconfidence. The failure to drop close to all of the bridges was practically begging the Germans to blow one of them, which they did at Son, leading to the first major delay of 30 hours to build a Bailey bridge. For those of you that read Ryan's book, you'll recall the Dutch officer who stormed into an officer's mess for the Irish Guards and laid into them, telling them that the proper way to attack Arnhem from Nijmegen was a question at their war college, and trying to go straight ahead from one city to another was suicide on the elevated highway. Choosing that option led to failure at the college, and it certainly led to failure in real life. Brit intel was another abject failure. They had solid intel of their own, and Dutch intel that they didn't trust (with some reason) about the panzer divisions in the way. But with so many canceled drops, nobody wanted to rock the boat and see another operation canceled.
It truly is a fascinating aspect of the western front, and a very clear lesson on how the winners write the history. I dare say very few Americans were even aware of Market-Garden until Ryan's book and the movie (30 years after the battle). And the poor Dutch, they were the victims of vicious Nazi reprisals after the battle, and then the horrific winter led to mass starvation and famine into the final days of the war in April-May 1945. Monty's insistence of the operation being a 90 percent success led the Dutch Prince Bernhard to quip, "My country can never again afford the luxury of a Montgomery success."
Thanks for this thread. I could talk about this for hours. We all remember June 6, 1944. But September 17 should also be remembered.
Always thought our side attempted to murder Patton. But then I never just walk past a good conspiracy.
Wow, what a history. Do you have relatives that fought or died there ?
For years, the town of Tidioute in W Pa did a reenactment of the battle for bridge at Remagen. Even had one of the engineers that fought there.
Had lots of actual WWII equipment like tanks and half tracks. Pretty interesting.
Tidioute bridge stands in for WWII battle site at re-enactment
By Ryan Smith MEADVILLE TRIBUNE TIDIOUTE, Warren County — Dog-eared old portraits of World War II soldiers show men uniformly dressed, young, often smiling. But their fresh-faced poses don’t tell
The critics didn't like it much, but I thought the 1977 movie was a pretty good war flick. An array of A-list Brit actors stole the show though.
Monty was a pretty good general but like Patton was a real primadonna.Somehow Monty was unaware that there was a full strength panzer division sent there for r and r.Pretty sure Patton was against this
Poor intell. Arrogance. Poor logistics. A lot of politics. Patton had no time for Monty. A lot was learned frim this at a high cost of lives.
Patton was suffering from a fuel shortage on Moselle (150 miles away) and wasn't involved.
IMHO, market garden was a hail mary to try and end the war but most knew the odds were against success. This is very unlike Monty who is an interesting figure. Monty was shot in WW1 through his lung and expected to die but didn't. He was considered a workaholic and excellent tactician. His beloved wife died before the war and Monty worked every waking hour. He was great at devising a plan, reading maps and overall logistical planning. He was very direct, like Patton, and lacked diplomatic skills. He was also considered to be very conservative which also put him at odds with Patton. That is why the hail mary of market garden was out of character.
Most historians will say that Monty's lack of use of Patton failed Market Garden while Patton's run to relieve Bastone in The Bulge saved his skin. I think that was probably American written history and there is a lot more to the story. While I love Patton, he'd have really alienated many allies and probably would have caused WW3 at the end of WW2 aginst the Soviets. I suspect Market Garden falls into the terms SNAFU, FUBAR and overall wartime groupthink. They didn't do their homework, have enough intel, moved too quickly and lept before they looked. It probably had to do with it being fall and they wanted several months before bad weather set in. But they just didn't have the foundation for this large of an operation. Having said that, if they had just a bit of luck, things may have turned out differently and the war shortened.
Don’t know a lot of the details of the planning or the battle itself. But perhaps this was a case of success leading to failure.
The Allies had been running on success. D Day took longer than planned but was a success. Then once they broke through the hedgerows they went on to Paris.
They were feeling strong and thought the Germans were on their back foot. Germans were slow to respond to D Day and likely the Allies thought they would move quick enough to be successful.
A long way of saying…….over confident?
I think that is exactly correct. The Germans were in retreat and, honestly, their real threat was the Eastern Front. So I think the idea presented itself late in the fighting season. Nobody wants to launch an offensive attack in the Fall. So the idea presented itself and they had to act quickly. That led to lower-than-normal planning, intel, and logistics. Overconfidence probably also played a part in that decision.
One thing to note is that the Nazi reprisals combined with the really horrible early winter that besieged The Battle of the Bulge caused the upper European area a horrible starvation. My old boss participated in this. There is a scene in Masters of the Air where they drop food and the Dutch cut into their early season tulip farms "Thanks Yanks".
Operations Manna and Chowhound - Wikipedia
he also blamed the canadians, typical monty, guy takes all the credit when an op works and shifts the blame when it goes south..
Montgomery was a clown, whipoff, and a lousy tactician. Eisenhower constantly ramming his head up Montgomery azz lead to one disaster after another.
A little history. My father was in the 10th Field Artillery Battalion, caught malaria in N Africa. Came home to recover, then went into Sicily, and Anzio. Later, was involved in the outskirts of Bastogne. This Battalion was called, "The Rock's Support" from WWI from the battle of the Marne.
A bit more history. Originally, a regiment during WWI, then a batallion during WWII. Ended up under Patton and the 3rd Army in WWII. Now, inactivated as of 2015.
My father also marched through, and cleaned up the camps in Germany. I have photos of the ovens with skeletons inside. It is horrific photography. Deeply affected my father throughout his entire life. It also affected me, and the reason I went into history. No man should ever have to witness such atrocities.
My father also marched through, and cleaned up the camps in Germany. I have photos of the ovens with skeletons inside. It is horrific photography. Deeply affected my father throughout his entire life. It also affected me, and the reason I went into history. No man should ever have to witness such atrocities.
