Market Garden

[sburke]

Based on some of the discussion back and forth about Market Garden on the PzV vs Sherman thread I figured I'd open it as it's own thread. I found some of the thoughts being tossed around on there intriguing and didn't want to see the thought process interrupted when that other thread gets closed.

So Magpie I understand you were saying General Gavin was your personal hero and the very model of a modern major general?

[sburke]

I guess I have to say something even more obnoxious or controversial to get a rise out of you guys.

Okay here is my personal assessment of Market Garden - be forewarned, the following is a paid editorial not suitable for small children, cute furry animals or vegans.

So my personal hero Bernard Law Montgomery was apparently feeling the heat of allegations of not being aggressive enough in closing the Falaise gap and losing headlines to the headlong rush by Third Army. In order to bolster his feeling that a thrust across the North German plain was the correct strategy and he coincidentally placed to command it he came up with an uncharacteristically bold and risky plan to get the allies across the Maas. In doing so he ignored one of the most basic tenets of war in that strategists plan logistics. Montgomery apparently felt clearing Antwerp and the Scheldt estuary were somehow going to be less important with his army strung out hundreds of miles past it. So we have a fundamentally flawed, hastily drawn up plan that rumor has it also ignored ultra warnings of German Armor concentrated in his path.

As to Gen Gavin taking responsibility for the failures at Nijmegen - if one is to insist that a commander takes responsibility for the failures of those beneath him, then ultimately it is Montgomery who is responsible for the failure at Nijmegen.

Okay is that obnoxious enough, I throw down the gauntlet and fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!

[Magpie_Oz]

Generally it is best to wait until I wake up. There is only one person who gets a rise out of me late at night or in the morning

Inevitably discussions on MG end up being discussions on Monty. One could ague, and I probably will, that Monty was the architect of the Western Allied victory in WW2. Alamein, Tunisia, Sicily, lodgement in Italy, Normandy, MG, Battle of the Bulge, Crossing of the Rhine, advance to the Elbe and finally the German surrender at Lundberg Heath.

Airborne ops, in particular the British Airborne have captured my imagination from a very young age, largely because of the borderline treasonous of the movie. So I have read a great deal of accounts of all of the various actions in particular MG.

Sometime ago my opinion diverged from the generally held view that - "Monty was a toss pot who tried to do too much and just goes to show that the US won the war despite his fumbling."

[Magpie_Oz]

For those of you not wishing to read further detail or re-quote the longer posts, please use this post to quote when calling me a idiot, f***tard or know nothing Aussie git.

[Blackcat]

OK, Mr. Burke, even though this thread has bugger all to do with CMBN, I'll bite.

Montgomery was feeling no heat over the Falaise Pocket affair - he and Patton wanted to do the long envlopment to avoid the problems that led to it happening in the first place and, if successful would have netted a much bigger catch. It was Bradley's lack of bottle that led to the Falaise battle and Bradley got it wrong.

Everybody wanted the war to be over ASAP and there this airborne corps hanging around in England doing nothing. Lots of schemes had been cooked up for them, but none had come to anything. Everyone, including the airborne, thought this was a waste.

Along comes a bright young staff officer with an idea that could unite these two threads - give the airborne something to do and finish the war quickly. For reasons that will never now be known Montgomery buys into the idea even though it goes against everything he had done in WW2 to date and went against the lessons he learned from WWI.

Eisenhower, desperate to finish the war sees it as a gamble which if it comes off would save many lives and finish the war, of which he was heartedly sick, earlier than anything else on the table. So he goes for it.

Intelligence comes in that suggests it might not work because of German units re-fitting near Arnhem. However the airborne (especially 1st Airborne Div) are desperate not to have another mission cancelled and the top brass still see this as a gamble with a good pay off and nothing serious to be lost. So the intel is ignored.

It goes ahead and ends up as a cluster f*ck. Nevermind it was worth a try, revert to Plan A.

Now if someone could explain any sort of reasonable logic behind the Hurtgen Forest Campaign, I'd be grateful. That has always struck me as a war crime committed by the US army against its own troops.

[mjkerner]

I'll bite, but only a little. Mistakes were made.

If successful, Monty's a hero. If a failure, the blame game begins. Ike was enthusiastic as were many others eager to use the newly-minted Airborne Army. And we all know that many factors contributed, including the weather, and of course blind (bad) luck.

Maybe the biggest factor was, as "It Never Snows in September" very convincingly argued, the capabilities of the German General Staff in pulling together so many disparate training units, beat up units from France, etc., continually assigning and re-assigning them to different commands as events dictated, and still pulling off a win.

[Magpie_Oz]

Here goes:

I guess I have to say something even more obnoxious or controversial to get a rise out of you guys.

In the Peng challenge thread I would just say, no just you being here is obnoxious enough but it isn't so I won't

So my personal hero Bernard Law Montgomery was apparently feeling the heat of allegations of not being aggressive enough in closing the Falaise gap and losing headlines to the headlong rush by Third Army.

No, the issue of closing the Falaise too slowly is a historian thing brought up many years later. At the time it was seen for what it was, the crushing end note to the Normandy campaign, the utter defeat of the German Army in Normandy.

In order to bolster his feeling that a thrust across the North German plain was the correct strategy and he coincidentally placed to command it he came up with an uncharacteristically bold and risky plan to get the allies across the Maas.

A number of plans had been put forward to use the 1st Allied Airborne Army to capture crossings of the Rhine, many more ambitious and many less so. Eisenhower favoured a broad front advance, however attacking Holland presented numerous opportunities to trap large numbers of Germans against the sea. At Monty's insistence, and under pressure from the US to use the 1AAA, Ike agreed to a spearhead thrust as part of the overall advance.

In doing so he ignored one of the most basic tenets of war in that strategists plan logistics. Montgomery apparently felt clearing Antwerp and the Scheldt estuary were somehow going to be less important with his army strung out hundreds of miles past it.

The old "not enough supplies for both" argument is BS. The shortage was transport not supplies. There were remedies put in place to alleviate the supply problem and a fair amount of transport was diverted from the US armies to help with Market Garden but mainly as a support to the 2 US divisions involved. The transport problem would have existed what ever Ike decided to do.

Securing the Schedlt Estuary was going to be a long drawn out exercise and the opportunity to hit the Germans when they were down was slipping away. Isolating it was a good start, which the XXX Corps thrust did.

So we have a fundamentally flawed,

No

hastily drawn up plan

Yes

that rumor has it

You forgot the U and rumours are for sewing circles.

also ignored ultra warnings of German Armour concentrated in his path.

Monty had just annihilated 8 Panzer Divisions, the cream of the German Armed Forces, guess he was feeling confident, and rightly so. Remember too there was no "German Armour concentrated in his path". What was left of II SS Panzer Korps was North of Arnhem, putting itself back together. It had not fully done so by the time MG rolled around.

As to Gen Gavin taking responsibility for the failures at Nijmegen - if one is to insist that a commander takes responsibility for the failures of those beneath him, then ultimately it is Montgomery who is responsible for the failure at Nijmegen.

Actually that would mean the whole thing was Ike's fault as the Supreme Allied Commander.

As the commander on the ground Gavin had the direct responsibility to capture the Nijmegen bridge. His orders to is commanders were not clear and he did not ensure that the subordinate responsible carried them out correctly. Not sure what he was doing but up until that point Jumpin' Jim had earned his reputation by performing deeds that were more akin to the role of a platoon commander, I suspect he had difficulty in charge of a division and the hands off approach required at that level.

Okay is that obnoxious enough, I throw down the gauntlet and fart in your general direction. Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!

Actually that last bit is true.

[Sergei]

I have no idea of what all of this is about. I just hope that it doesn't tarnish the good name of M113 Gavin!

[Elmar Bijlsma]

In doing so he ignored one of the most basic tenets of war in that strategists plan logistics. Montgomery apparently felt clearing Antwerp and the Scheldt estuary were somehow going to be less important with his army strung out hundreds of miles past it.

Uh... no.

Montgomery cooked up Market Garden precisely because he had a great appreciation of logistics. Market Garden was pretty much the only war winning plan the allies still had the logistics for.

I think it was worth the risk. Even with all the cock-ups and rotten luck, they damn near got there. And the risk was worth the reward.

A successful thrust would've seen them past the Reichswald and threatening the Ruhr and potentially bagging a load of Germans in Holland and Zeeland.

Clearing the Antwerp/Schelde area was always going to be a tough cookie. That they failed to do it on the first attempt was not through lack of effort or insight into it's importance. It was too much for an advance already reaching its limits.

[Elmar Bijlsma]

I have no idea of what all of this is about. I just hope that it doesn't tarnish the good name of M113 Gavin!

May your testicles drop off merely for upping the Google hits on that nonsense.

[Blackcat]

"... however attacking Holland ..."

Shame on you Mr. OZ. Didn't you read Mr. Springelkamp's post earler this evening. The Market Garden Operation took place in "Brabant (South of the Meuse) and Gelderland (Nijmegen and Arnhem)" not in Holland (which is another part of the Kingdom of the Neatherlands - sort off to the left a bit as you look at the map).

[Michael Emrys]

So my personal hero Bernard Law Montgomery was apparently feeling the heat of allegations of not being aggressive enough in closing the Falaise gap and losing headlines to the headlong rush by Third Army. In order to bolster his feeling that a thrust across the North German plain was the correct strategy and he coincidentally placed to command it he came up with an uncharacteristically bold and risky plan to get the allies across the Maas. In doing so he ignored one of the most basic tenets of war in that strategists plan logistics. Montgomery apparently felt clearing Antwerp and the Scheldt estuary were somehow going to be less important with his army strung out hundreds of miles past it. So we have a fundamentally flawed, hastily drawn up plan that rumor has it also ignored ultra warnings of German Armor concentrated in his path.

I think this, if combined with Blackcat's comments further down the page, is substantially correct.

Now, having said that, I would like to make some general comments re BLM. I think he was a much better general than his harshest critics maintain. He seemed to have a shrewd assessment of the British army and its capabilities and tried to plan his battles and campaigns to operate within those limitations. More often than not, he was correct even if it doesn't always make for sensational reading. Sometimes he erred, but usually not so badly that he was caught out on a limb that had broken off. Not many in the higher echelons of German command could make the same claim, even if that was not always entirely of their own doing.

So Monty was known as essentially a conservative player with his eye always on the odds. OMG was an uncharacteristically bold plan, shot through with opportunities to go wrong, possibly expensively so. Why the change? Well, at this time pretty much the entire Allied high command was intoxicated with optimism. The German army in the west was shattered and on the ropes. Or so it appeared to be. It had just suffered a very heavy and costly defeat in France and the broken bits were fleeing back to the Reich pell mell. It was a classic opportunity for bold action. But the very magnitude of their victory had thrown the Allies off their own balance. The armies had outrun their logistic tails and an army deprived of its supplies is an army robbed of most of its power. Under the then-current set up, there was little they could do to take advantage of all those gleaming opportunities.

With hindsight it is pretty obvious that the correct course would have been to move boldly to isolate and capture the north shore of the Scheldt Estuary before the Germans could move reinforcements in. That would have also bagged the 15th. Armee on the south shore. But mainly it would have probably meant opening Antwerp to shipping as much as two months earlier. This in turn would have made the Allied armies more effective in their autumn campaigns.

But that was not as clear then as it is now. It should have been considered and maybe it was by someone on the planning staffs, but unfortunately that idea did not carry the day. OMG did not succeed in its goals, and much of the responsibility for that failure rests on Montgomery, but many, many others from Eisenhower right on down the line contributed to that failure. They were not unique in history. As Ernest Hemingway once noted, war is also the province of accident and error.

Michael

[Michael Emrys]

The old "not enough supplies for both" argument is BS. The shortage was transport not supplies....The transport problem would have existed what ever Ike decided to do.

Not quite so. Opening Antwerp meant making the most important supply line to the front much shorter, essentially freeing up a lot of transport.

Michael

[sburke]

Here goes:

In the Peng challenge thread I would just say, no just you being here is obnoxious enough but it isn't so I won't

True enough, every time go anywhere near the (p)eng challenge thread the rank odor that makes the mixture of jackfruit and old smelly gym socks..oh wait that's just the jackfruit.. smell appealing.

The old "not enough supplies for both" argument is BS. The shortage was transport not supplies. There were remedies put in place to alleviate the supply problem and a fair amount of transport was diverted from the US armies to help with Market Garden but mainly as a support to the 2 US divisions involved. The transport problem would have existed what ever Ike decided to do.

Securing the Schedlt Estuary was going to be a long drawn out exercise and the opportunity to hit the Germans when they were down was slipping away. Isolating it was a good start, which the XXX Corps thrust did.

This smells distinctly like jackfruit as well. Hmm everything is smelling like...oh wait, dang I need to change my socks.

Opening the port would have reduced the supply line length and that was Montgomery's and 21st Army's area of operations. However before I unfairly rank on Monty too much, yes I'd agree it was really up to Eisenhower to say- opening Antwerp to shipping is your A1 priority and to the extent he did not he owns it. Part of the fun of coalition warfare as it were.

[sburke]

OK, Mr. Burke, even though this thread has bugger all to do with CMBN, I'll bite.

It is umm .. uhh preparation for the MG module, yeah thats it!

Actually it was purely to spark some discussion as I have always felt the info I have used to form opinions of Market Garden is likely biased, subjective and largely incorrect. As an operation that failed in it's ultimate objective and included the tragic bloodletting of 1st AD, there were sure to be plenty of recriminations. Throw in there the anti pathy amongst the US commanders for Montgomery and you have a sure fire mix that it is going to be really hard to form a truly objective outlook.

When I saw some of the discussion on the Pz V thread I figured heck we are already there but running out of room. Some of those comments I had not heard and wanted to hear them explored. Forgot that Magpie's timezone is a bit ahead of us, which is funny as all week I have been dealing with an issue at work that has had me watching AP vs EU vs US time zones trying to resolve. I'm blaming it on lack of sleep.

And no I can't explain the Huertgen campaign, though..and I am working on fading memory here, I believe some of the rationale had to do with the roer river dams, but as I understand it that was only discovered later in the battle and was more a rationale than a reason. I think it just proves the Germans weren't the only ones who could come up with a really botched operational plan.

[Michael Emrys]

And no I can't explain the Huertgen campaign, though..and I am working on fading memory here, I believe some of the rationale had to do with the roer river dams, but as I understand it that was only discovered later in the battle and was more a rationale than a reason.

I think the Roer dams were always a goal. In any event, capturing them would have been worth trying. But what all that comes down to is that beginning the battle was a good idea, but continuing it past its initial failure was a huge mistake.

I think it just proves the Germans weren't the only ones who could come up with a really botched operational plan.

Indeed.

Michael

[MikeyD]

There's some irony that Monty NOT subduing Antwerp was a mistake while to the south Patton et al subduing Brest WAS a mistake. My (ill informed) take on Market Garden was that Monty was under the mistaken impression that Germans west of the Rhine were a spent force by September. Market Garden was going to be his bid for glory with with little risk. Ooops. The mark of an overly-cautious person is when the pendulum swings in the other direction it often swings far-far in the other direction.

[JonS]

Don't forget that at the time MG was mounted, the Allies were playing from a - as strnage as it sounds - position of weakness. The Allies only really had the logistic capacity to mount offensive action with a very limited portion of their force. Yes, opening Antwerp was a great idea, and so was clearing the Scheldt, and so was cutting off 15th Army, and so was clearing the Channel coast, and so was MG, and maybe so was heading towards the Saar. They're all good to great ideas. But the Allies just couldn't do them all. They could barely do one of them. Sequencing them is the obvious answer, which is effectively what Eisenhower did (or tried to do in the face of extraordinary disobedience). But the weather and the German's had a say too which meant that Eisenhower didn't really have the luxury of doing them in the 'logical' order of

1) Open Antwerp

2) secure logistic footing in the Low Countries and Eastern France

3) bounce the Rhine

By the time he'd have gotten to #3 on that list the Germans would have had plenty of time to regroup on the Rhine, and the weather would have been completely tits for mechanised operations. #3 had to come first, or the window for it - which was already closing, or perhaps even closed - would have slammed shut.

Personally, I address most of my WTFWYT!? mail relating to MG to Browning.

[Magpie_Oz]

Personally, I address most of my WTFWYT!? mail relating to MG to Browning.

Good point. I usually play down the Browning aspect because you don't get half the bites and debate if you shift blame from one Englishman (Monty) to another Browning.

I do often wonder why it was that Browning dropped with the 82nd. Of course they were in the middle, sort of, but I often think that he did that so as to look over Gavin's shoulder as he was new to the role.

I have nothing to support this, just a gut feel.

Strangely browning does not figure prominently in most accounts of the Op. Cornelius Ryan just mentions he was married to Daphne Du Maurier and leaves it at that. Other references are limited to the number of gliders he used for the drop. I've not see much else in relation to his command of the op.

[Nidan1]

Generally it is best to wait until I wake up. There is only one person who gets a rise out of me late at night or in the morning

and are you left-handed or right?

[Michael Emrys]

Good point. I usually play down the Browning aspect because you don't get half the bites and debate if you shift blame from one Englishman (Monty) to another Browning.

I do often wonder why it was that Browning dropped with the 82nd. Of course they were in the middle, sort of, but I often think that he did that so as to look over Gavin's shoulder as he was new to the role.

I have nothing to support this, just a gut feel.

Strangely browning does not figure prominently in most accounts of the Op. Cornelius Ryan just mentions he was married to Daphne Du Maurier and leaves it at that. Other references are limited to the number of gliders he used for the drop. I've not see much else in relation to his command of the op.

Let me admit in front that I haven't looked very deeply into Browning's career, but he seems to have been one of those Golden Boys who didn't pan out in the real thing (Mark Clark anyone?). He seems to have been given a few pro forma honors after the war and then swept under the carpet as soon as could be decently done.

Michael

[Magpie_Oz]

and are you left-handed or right?

In my case it takes both

[Magpie_Oz]

Not quite so. Opening Antwerp meant making the most important supply line to the front much shorter, essentially freeing up a lot of transport.

Yep for sure but gaining the Scheldt would still have faced the transport issue that any other offensive in the area would have. Of course once the Schedlt was secured the transport problem went away, more or less

[Gen Von Television]

Good points here, and feel like add one more: of course we are reasoning here with the hindsight so we can only imagine the 'what if' and 'why not so' results and causes.

What seems the most frustrating aspect of MG to me is that the Airborne Army was ready to go since August and had many failed calls; the ground (and air) logistic seems to be the most determining factor of it all. The XXX Corps were facing a Penalty battalion hastily moved forward to block the Hell's Highway to reach Eindhoven; given the fact that Operational Officers from the Netherlands warned the Supreme Allied Command about the dangers of using that path of advance (in the Netherlands Army Academy you failed your exams doin' just that), it seems that if the Allied machine was moving just a merely week before they would have possibly succeeded.

[Magpie_Oz]

Good points here, and feel like add one more: of course we are reasoning here with the hindsight so we can only imagine the 'what if' and 'why not so' results and causes.

What seems the most frustrating aspect of MG to me is that the Airborne Army was ready to go since August and had many failed calls; the ground (and air) logistic seems to be the most determining factor of it all. The XXX Corps were facing a Penalty battalion hastily moved forward to block the Hell's Highway to reach Eindhoven; given the fact that Operational Officers from the Netherlands warned the Supreme Allied Command about the dangers of using that path of advance (in the Netherlands Army Academy you failed your exams doin' just that), it seems that if the Allied machine was moving just a merely week before they would have possibly succeeded.

Picking a non-text book line of advance is kinda what victories are made of, remember the Ardennes anyone? (the first one, not the second one)

And in spite of all that XXX Corps reached Nijmegen ahead of schedule. At that point all of the required bridges were in Allied hands...... except one.

The one that on the first day of the landings was completely unoccupied. The Recon Co from one of the SS Pz divisions rolled into Nijmegen on day 1, saw nothing and turned around to head back to base north of Arnhem. Upon reaching the Arnhem bridge they were torn up by 2 Para.

That is what drives me bonkers about the whole thing, "conventional wisdom" is to say Monty was rash and threw away lives because he was too pig headed.

For me it was the 82nd Airborne .....

"How did you go at the bridge mate? "

"Bridge? which one is that ?"

"The big one, the highway bridge, y'know.. in town ?"

"Oh that one ... yes ummmm goooood ... we're ahh ... we're working on it "

"WHAT ?!"

Instead we are sold some line of crap about British tanks finally crossing the bridge and then stopping to make tea.