Operation Market Garden | Battlefield S5/E5 | World War Two

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Operation Market Garden was an Allied military operation during the Second World War fought in the German-occupied Netherlands from 17 to 27 September 1944. Its objective was to create a 64 mi (103 km) salient into German territory with a bridgehead over the Nederrijn (Lower Rhine River), creating an Allied invasion route into northern Germany. This was to be achieved by two sub-operations: seizing nine bridges with combined US and British airborne forces ("Market") followed by British land forces swiftly following over the bridges ("Garden").

The airborne operation was undertaken by the First Allied Airborne Army with the land operation by XXX Corps of the British Second Army. The airborne soldiers, numbering more than 41,000, were dropped at sites where they could capture key bridges and hold the terrain until the land forces arrived. The land forces consisted of ten armored and motorized brigades with a similar number of soldiers. The land forces advanced from the south along a single road surrounded by flood plain on both sides. The plan anticipated that they would cover the 103 km (64 mi) from their start to the bridge across the Rhine in 48 hours. About 100,000 German soldiers were in the vicinity to oppose the allied offensive. It was the largest airborne operation of the war up to that point.

The operation succeeded in capturing the Dutch cities of Eindhoven and Nijmegen along with many towns, and a few V-2 rocket launching sites. It failed in its most important objective: securing the bridge over the Rhine at Arnhem. The Germans slowed and then halted the armoured brigades advancing from the south before they reached the Rhine. The First Airborne Division was unable to secure the bridge and was withdrawn from the north side of the Rhine after suffering 8,000 dead, missing, and captured out of a complement of 12,000 men. When the retreat order came there were not enough boats to get everyone back across the river. The Germans subsequently rounded up most of those left behind, but some of the British and Polish paratroopers managed to avoid capture by the Germans and were sheltered by the Dutch underground until they could be rescued in Operation Pegasus on 22 October 1944. Historians have been critical of the planning and execution of Operation Market Garden. Antony Beevor said that Market Garden "was a bad plan right from the start and right from the top."

The Germans counter attacked the Nijmegen salient but failed to retake any of the allied gains. The Germans punished the people of the Netherlands by cutting off food shipments to the country and 20,000 people died of starvation. Arnhem was finally captured by the Allies in April 1945, towards the end of the war.