Operation Market-Garden (Armchair Historian) - Reaction

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[writingcuriosity]

When filming A Bridge Too Far they actually had the real John Frost on sight, and he once told the actor playing him that he was"running too fast" when shot at by the Germans. He told him a British officer wouldn't run that fast in order to show distain for the German bullets.

[aurelius]

To my great grandfather who fought in 82 airborne and jump at Sicily, D Day, and the Netherlands. Fought in the battle of the bulge. 1924 - 2016. 🇺🇸

[beslim]

My high school German teacher grew up in Amsterdam during WWII. She talked about carrying gun parts inside school books for the Dutch Resistance. She would trade books with classmates so the gun could then be assembled and used. I learned so much from her.

[clumsyfox]

Jeremy Clarkson documentary on operation chariot would be cool it contains footage and interviews from people who were there also love this channel learned so much

[coxmosia]

Fun fact or not so fun fact, Churchill was thinking of removing Montgomery from his command. The British, however, needed a hero, so he didn't. But Churchill wasn't opposed to Eisenhower doing it.

[davemac]

If you read 82nd Airborne historian Phil Nordyke's combat history of the 508th PIR in WW2 - Put Us Down In Hell (2012) and American historian John McManus' September Hope - The American Side of a Side Too Far (2012), they both quote officers who attended the final divisional briefing and were witness to Gavin's clear instruction to Colonel Lindquist commanding the 508th to send one battalion to the highway bridge (there were two bridges at Nijmegen) as soon as possible after landing and securing the intial objectives on the Groesbeek ridge.

Lindquist was a talented S-1 (Admin and Personnel) officer an early officer volunteer to the US Airborne and then given command of the 508th battalion on its formation and expansion to a full regiment. As a field officer he did not perform well, and this is made clear in Nordyke's earlier chapters on the 508th's first combat operation in Normandy, paricularly the heavy casualties incurred in the 4 July attack on Hill 95 (Sainte-Catherine) near La Haye. Command problems in the regiment were only partially resolved when Matthew Ridgway (82nd CO in Normandy) court-martialled the Regiment XO, who was combat ineffective on D-Day, kicked out of the Airborne and re-assigned as XO of a regular infantry regiment, to be later killed in the Hürtgenwald battles.

Lindquist remained in place as CO, although Gavin did tell A Bridge Too Far author Cornelius Ryan in his 1967 interview that RIdgway did not trust him and would not promote him. In fact, Gavin said he had a problem in that he couldn't promote another Colonel in the Divison over Lindquist because he had seniority in the grade. It's unfortunatel that Ridgeway did not take Lindquist with him as his G-1 when he was promoted to command US XVIII Airborne COrps in August 1944, and when Gavin inherited the Division from Ridgway he probably had the same problem, and it explains why Gavin did not replace himself as Assistant Division Commander, so he was running himself ragged doing both jobs for Market Garden.

In Nordyke chapter 9, he quotes Captain Chester 'Chet' Graham, who was the 508th's liaison officer to Division HQ and sat in on the divisional briefing, and he was also the unfortunate messenger who had to tell Gavin that Lindquist was not sending a battalion to the bridge until the drop zone was cleared and secured. VHet Graham said he had never seen Gavin so mad and told him "come with me - let's get him moving." On arriving at the 508th regimental CP, Gavin told Lindquist, "I told you to move with speed."

Gavin seems to have muddied the waters somewhat with regard to priorities between bridge and ridge after the war, to avoid throwing a subordinate officer under the bus, but that hasn't helped historians. McManus has gone into this with a deep analysis and correctly concludes that Gavin knew the bridge could not wait and in German hands could be demolished, but if the heights were taken by a German counter-attack, they were not going anywhere and could be cleared with help from Guards Armoured Division if necessary.

[lamploughd]

"Position over-run, CO captured, all officers killed or captured, ammunition gone.
Will continue with bayonet --God save the King." is the full transmission

[fogwar]

I think Montgomery and Patton's rivalry was very likely born out of the fact they were _far_ more alike than either one was probably prepared to admit. They were both excellent commanders and they both knew it.

[CrudestPanda]

I think that one thing that is always missed when talking about Market-Garden is that people think that the Allies just lost most of the land taken by the operation after it failed. But the Allies held all the way to Nijmegen and only lost the land between Nimegen and Arnhem after the operation was over. It did take 1.5 months to shore up the flanks but they kept all but the bridge too far.

[teaadvice]

Love these reactions just found the channel. Go history! I never liked it in school but here it's fun

[timnewman]

A few points.
The original plan was presented to Montgomery by General Browning, who wanted some use for the Airborne Army. Montgomery presented it to Eisenhower, but it wasn't his plan originally. Should he have given the flaws with the plan? Hard to say, but it suited his preferences for how the offensive against Germany should be carried out. But it's Browning's plan, and Eisenhower who authorises it, so I think there's some blame to spread around.


The 1st Airborne drop zone was picked because it was open and a lot of the division was carried in by glider and needed fields. And it wasn't considered a good idea to drop the paratroop infantry directly on the town itself or into the woods (largely parkland). South of the river there was open ground, but it was also low-lying and considered too boggy for gliders.


Whole thing reminds me a lot fof the Red Army paradrops around Kanevm intended to seize crossings over the Dnipr. Drop your paratroops, take the bridges, bring the armoured force up rapidly to exploit the situation. And like Kanev there was German armour in the area, the drop took place over more than one day, and it ended with failure. The Russian airborne forces, the largest in the world, ended up being used as ground forces - 9th Guards Army - late in the war, though they'd fought elsewhere too as regular infantry.


The whole plan would have annoyed Wellington. He famously compared French planning to a well-made saddle, every piece precisely fitted into place. And commented, "I make my plans of ropes. If something goes wrong I tie a knot and move on." This was a very precisely made plan, with very few places you could tie a know and move on.

[darthcalanil]

honestly, the single best and the ultimate documentary on Market Garden is the one by TiK. Nothing else so far does it as much justice and in as many details.

[dagazx]

I actually live next to the Airborne square, which is a traffic square in front of the John Frost bridge. It is a very interesting part of the history of our city. Thank you for covering this :)

[Noxal]

"I don't know much about Market Garden" - Proceeds to talk about it from so many different angles. That's why I love this channel <3 Thanks for the amazing passionate content :)

[sebastianburgess]

"Out of Ammunition. God Save the King".

[johanrunfeldt]

About the different philosophies of Allied commanders: Both Patton and Montgomery wanted the tanks to push ahead as fast as they could, but in a slightly different way. Eisenhoower preferred a slow steady advance of the entire front, basically at the Infantry on Foot pace, not outrunning your own Artillery, AAA, supplies forces etc. He got plenty of criticism from his subordinates Patton and Monty for thus allowing the Soviets to grab a bigger chunk of Europe (including Berlin) this way.

[GodzillaX]

Armchair historian is one of my fav history channels (don't worry, you're up there with him!), really enjoy watching your reactions since it adds another rich layer of education being added to already fantastic content!

[Irishbloke]

Does anyone else listen to these while falling asleep, end up having vivid history based dreams and waking up to some 2 hour documentary on Ancient Greece.

[Victor--]

I am just incredibly proud and gratefull to the allied soldiers fighting for the freedom that I enjoy today. 🇳🇱
🤍🇬🇧🤍🇺🇲🤍🇵🇱🤍

[gallegosm]

Close Combat: A Bridge too Far(an excellent pc game) first introduced me to this operation and eventually got me more interested in studying the history of world War 2. I like the content you release as well including armchair historian who's stuff you reacted to here.