Operation Market Garden
The largest airborne operation of the war up to that point.
Operation Market Garden was an Allied military operation during the Second World War, fought in the German-occupied Netherlands from 17 to 25 September 1944. Its objective was to create a salient spanning 62 miles 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 American, British and Polish airborne forces ('Market') followed by British land forces swiftly following over the bridges ('Garden').
Quick Facts
- Franchise
- Medal of Honor
- Game
- Medal of Honor: Airborne (2007)
- Theater
- Netherlands; Western Europe
- Historical operation
- Operation Market Garden (September 1944)
- Playable unit (american campaign)
- 101st Airborne Division, U.S. Army
- Developer
- EA Los Angeles
- Publisher
- Electronic Arts
Lore & Background
The airborne operation was undertaken by the First Allied Airborne Army with the land operation by the British Second Army, with XXX Corps moving up the centre supported by VIII and XII Corps on their flanks. The airborne soldiers, consisting of paratroops and glider-borne troops numbering around 35,000–40,000, 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 armoured and motorised brigades with approximately 800 tanks and 50,000 soldiers. The land forces advanced from the south along a single road partly surrounded by flood plain on both sides. The plan anticipated that they would cover the 62 miles from their start at the Belgian–Dutch border to the Arnhem bridge across the Lower Rhine in 48 hours. About 20,000–30,000 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 The British 1st Airborne Division was unable to secure the bridge and was withdrawn from the north side of the Rhine after suffering 8,000 dead, missing, and captured out of a complement of 10,000 men.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 counterattacked the Nijmegen salient but failed to retake any of the Allied gains. Arnhem was finally captured by the Allies in April 1945, towards the end of the war.
Reader's Guide
Highway 69 (later nicknamed 'Hell's Highway') leading through the planned route was two narrow lanes, partly raised above a surrounding flat terrain of polder or floodplain. The ground on either side of the highway was in places too soft to support tactical vehicle movement and there were numerous dikes and drainage ditches. Dikes tended to be topped by trees or large bushes, and roads and paths were lined with trees. In early autumn this meant that observation would be seriously restricted. There were six major water obstacles between the XXX Corps' start point and the objective of the north bank of the Lower Rhine River: the Wilhelmina Canal at Son en Breugel 100 ft wide; the Zuid-Willems Canal at Veghel 80 ft; the Maas River at Grave 800 ft; the Maas-Waal Canal 200 ft; the Waal River at Nijmegen 850 ft; and the Rhine at Arnhem 300 ft. The plan was for airborne forces to seize bridges across all these obstacles nearly simultaneously – any failure to do so would result in delay or defeat. In case bridges were demolished by the Germans, XXX Corps had plans to rebuild them. To this end, a vast quantity of bridging material was collected, along with 2,300 vehicles to carry it and 9,000 engineers to assemble it. Although the area is generally flat with less than 30 ft of variation in altitude, Lieutenant-General Brian Horrocks, commander of XXX Corps, recalled that 'The country was wooded and rather marshy, which made any outflanking operation impossible.' Two important hill areas, 300 ft high, were some of the highest ground in the Netherlands: one northwest of Arnhem and one in the 82nd Airborne Division's zone, the Groesbeek ridge. Seizure and defence of this elevated terrain was considered vital to holding the highway bridges.
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