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| WorldWar2.ro Forum > WW2 in General > Operation "Market Garden" |
| Posted by: Dani September 10, 2004 09:25 pm |
| Maybe most of you heard about operation "Market Garden" (mostly - I'm not afraid to said that because even I read and saw - after reading and saw "A Bridge Too Far").
In your point of view "Market Garden" could had any chance of success if... a)Patton could help 30th Core (of Bradley);  On Arnhem 1st Army should been deployed closer to the bridge;
c) On Arnhem Polish Brigade should been deployed together with the First Army; d) If Brits should not stop for 5'o'clock tea and overnight staying; e) You name it.. ? |
| Posted by: dragos September 10, 2004 09:31 pm | ||
2nd SS Panzer Corps did not exist in the area  |
| Posted by: Dani September 10, 2004 09:34 pm | ||||
And Dutch channels too! No channels - no bridges! |
| Posted by: dragos September 10, 2004 09:38 pm |
| I remember a documentary on Discovery about this operation. The conclusion was: could this operation have succeeded with better planning? The answer was no. |
| Posted by: Dani September 10, 2004 09:46 pm |
| I saw as well that documentary. Anyway col. Frost and his men fought a bloody battle up there on Arnhem Bridge! Hail and honours to him and to all who fought in that battles (1st Army, 101st, 82nd, 30th Core, Polish Brigade and also to Germans - there are too many units on the German side to remember here :wink: ). |
| Posted by: Chandernagore September 11, 2004 01:09 am |
| Well it's easy to dump the operation after the facts because you've got hindsight that Montgomery did not have.
I don't like Montgomery. His fame is undeserved IMO. He was much more like a McClellan than a Sherman.... expept in the Market Garden operation 8) But let's say this in his defence : - You don't know which bridge is too far until you fail to reach it. - Your intelligence services sometimes fails to locates the refit areas of SS Pz divisions. - It would have taken Merlin to predict what it would be (and how much time it would take) to drive on Dutch roads under artillery fire right to the Rhine. - It was not the first (and last) time the Allies fucked up an intelligence task or a military operation. Much the same as everybody else, no surprise. |
| Posted by: Carol I September 11, 2004 02:38 am |
| My opinion is that Operation Market Garden was a long-shot operation. It implied an 150 km offensive on a front line only a few meters wide (basically the width of the road). Not that much chances of success unfortunately. If I remember correctly the operation was criticised from the very beginning, with some even considering it some sort of an ego-boosting activity for Montgomery who was sidelined during Operation Overlord. But I guess they eventually thought: "It's a crazy idea, but let's try it and see what will come out of it!".
On the other hand, the planning of the operation was not as bad as its practical implementation. Errors in deploying the troops, bad luck with weather that delayed the re-supplying of the paratroopers, faulty intelligence information etc., they all contributed to the eventual failure of the operation. But nothing said above minimises the bravery, heroism and sacrifices of those who took part to the operation. |
| Posted by: Carol I September 11, 2004 03:02 am |
| I have done a search in http://www.google.com/ for Operation Market Garden and I have found these two sites that seem quite interesting:
http://www.marketgarden.com/ http://www.rememberseptember44.com/ |
| Posted by: PanzerKing September 11, 2004 04:46 pm |
| Well the British knew that German tank units were there...they had pics of them and just flat out neglected to care about it.
Also, it doesn't make matters any better when the enemy has found an exact copy of the plans too. |
| Posted by: Dani September 11, 2004 08:26 pm | ||
I wonder why that allied officer was in that glider with all plans? What he is supposed to do? |
| Posted by: PanzerKing September 13, 2004 07:24 pm |
| If I remember correctly, the plans were left accidently in one of the empty gliders. |
| Posted by: C-2 September 13, 2004 09:13 pm |
| Market Garden,in my opinion ,sort of a "ww2 Galipoli".Soldiers sent to death without much of inteligence information. |
| Posted by: Dani September 14, 2004 08:42 am | ||
By whom? They used to walk across all the airbases with top secret plans in their pockets? :loool: |
| Posted by: johnny_bi September 14, 2004 09:52 pm | ||
The episode is presented in Cornelius Ryan's book "A bridge too far". Some German officers disregarded the plan considering that the document was too perfect to be real... But many others did believe that the documents were not fake... Among them, if I am correct, was Bittrich (I hope that my spell is correct) - the commander of the 2nd SS Panzer Corps. An other officer that was sure that the plan was not a fake was Student, whose troops were scattered along the allied "highway" to Arnhem... |
| Posted by: Dani September 15, 2004 09:15 am | ||||
johnny_bi, the Ryan's book doesn't mention how it comes that the plans were in that glider but mention only what you said already. That's why I am wondering about. |
| Posted by: johnny_bi September 15, 2004 09:37 pm | ||
You are right... No one knows exactely how those plans were in that glider... But I might say also that many German officers guessed that the final point of the Market-Garden plan was the bridge from Arnhem... Either without or with those plans, the Germans would have defeated the British paras in Arnhem - IMHO. |
| Posted by: Dani September 16, 2004 06:34 am | ||
Yep, in the circumstances that we all know already. |
| Posted by: johnny_bi September 16, 2004 01:38 pm | ||
I was reffering only to those plans... not to all the circumstances... |
| Posted by: Dani September 16, 2004 01:41 pm | ||
Germans had in Arnhem area 2nd SS Panzer Core
I think that this circumstance could be take in the account, don't you? |
| Posted by: johnny_bi September 16, 2004 04:05 pm | ||
You mist my point... I was reffering only to this particular issue: plans... With or without those plans, the issue of the battle wouldn't have changed (again IMHO). I think that those plans didn't bring any revelation on the German side, but confirmed the Germans' own later assumptions. |
| Posted by: Carol I September 18, 2004 09:44 pm |
| http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3644356.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/3668856.stm |
| Posted by: Abu El Banat September 19, 2004 01:16 pm |
| Elements of 2nd SS Panzer Corps were in the general area of operations under the Op.Market Garden plan. |
| Posted by: C-2 September 19, 2004 01:25 pm |
| Amaizing! 3 Guys 83 years old jumped by themselves from a Dakota and others with another paratrooper !  Great selebrations |
| Posted by: Dani September 20, 2004 07:04 am | ||
Indeed! I saw on BBC. Very touchy moments! |
| Posted by: Iamandi September 20, 2004 11:32 am |
| Those mans have eliminated notion of fear from his brain from more decades ago... Nice thing - nobody brake legs or arms... Iama |