Waves of paratroops land in Holland in 'Operation Market Garden'.

Operation Market Garden was an unsuccessful operation fought in Holland from the 17th to 25th September 1944. It was the brainchild of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery and strongly supported by Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt. The aim was to create a bridgehead over the River Rhine creating an Allied invasion route into Northern Germany.

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This was to be achieved by seizing a series of nine bridges with airborne forces, with land forces swiftly following over the bridges. The operation succeeded in liberating the Dutch cities of Eindhoven and Nijmegen along with many towns, creating a 60 mile intrusion into German held territory, limiting V2 rocket launching sites. It failed, however, to secure a bridgehead over the Rhine, with the advance being halted at the river.

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The attack was the largest airborne operation up to that point in WW2. The operation made massive use of airborne forces, whose tactical objectives were to secure the bridges and to allow a rapid advance by armoured ground units to consolidate north of Arnhem. The operation required the seizure of the bridges by airborne troops across the Meuse River, two arms of the Rhine (the Waal River and the Lower Rhine), together with crossings over several smaller canals and tributaries.

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The Allies captured several bridges between Eindhoven and Nijmegen at the beginning of the operation but the ground force advance was delayed by the initial failure of the airborne units to secure bridges at Son en Breugel and Nijmegen. German forces demolished the bridge over the Wilhelmina Canal at Son before it could be captured by the US 101st Airborne Division, and a partly prefabricated Bailey bridge was then built over the canal by British sappers.

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At the northern point of the airborne operation, the British 1st Airborne Division initially encountered strong resistance. The delays in capturing the bridge at Nijmegen and constructing a Bailey bridge at Son gave time for German Panzer Divisions to organize a counter attack. A small British force managed to capture the north end of the Arnhem road bridge, denying use of the intact bridge to German forces. After the ground forces failed to relieve the paratroopers on time, they were overrun on the 21st September. At the same time that the British XXX Corps' tanks moved over the Nijmegen bridge, 36 hours late, after seizing it from the Germans, the British paratroopers at the Arnhem bridge were capitulating, unable to hold on any longer. The remainder of the British 1st Airborne Division was trapped in a small pocket west of the Arnhem bridge, which was evacuated on the 25th September after sustaining heavy casualties.

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The Allies had failed to cross the Rhine. The river remained a barrier to their advance into Germany until offensives at Remagen, Oppenheim, and Rees and Wesel in March 1945.

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The failure of Operation Market Garden to form a foothold over the Rhine

ended Allied hopes of finishing the war by Christmas 1944.

Source: Wikipedia

Captured British soldiers at Arnhem.

Nijmegen after the battle. 28th September 1944.