Comments by "Bullet-Tooth Tony" (@Bullet-Tooth-Tony-) on "Montgomery vs Eisenhower on Operation Market Garden's True Purpose | History Debate" video.

@dubyacwh7978 After Cobra it took Patton's 3rd Army two weeks to advance 60 miles, After El Alamein the 8th Army advanced 760 miles in twenty days. After the Normandy breakout Monty's 21st Army managed an advance of 250 miles in 4 days.
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@bigwoody4704 What I mean is compared with the Americans, the British forces were smaller, their line of communications was shorter, the road networks in Belgium were better than those in Lorraine, and the rail network in the British sector was comparatively intact. Perhaps most important of all, Montgomery's advance up to then had taken him closer to the Channel ports and shortened his supply lines, while Bradley's advance had moved away from the coast and had lengthened his supply lines.
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@garymorris1856 Ike was a good politician and micromanager of keeping generals egos in check, but his broad front strategy is still controversial.
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@garymorris1856 I don't doubt his ability as a team player but in strategy, Ike wanted to outfight the Germans, the trouble with that is the longer a war goes on the more time the enemy has to inflict casualties on your forces. Montgomery wanted to outsmart the Germans by unbalancing them and then punching a hole in the German line with a massive thrust. He wanted to push the Allied armies through this hole and make a beeline for Berlin, potentially ending the war.
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@garymorris1856 I'm talking about Ikes broad front.
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@garymorris1856 Of course, I know Ike was Supreme Commander, but his strategy over Ground Forces still had faults, the first one being trying to supply multiple armies across a wide front, only makes them weaker as they are not strong enough in one place, which is how the Germans were able to capitalise on this and slam into the Ardennes. Montgomery's proposal after D-day was for 40 allied divisions to advance in a powerful thrust and take advantage of the weaker German position after their defeat in France ( They had only 11 divisions between the Allies) seize the Channel ports of Antwerp, allowing the Allies to recieve plenty of supplies which would address the issue of the Broad front, then sweep over the North German plain and advance on Berlin. Shortening the war.
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@bigwoody4704 One of the fault lines between the British and American high commands was General Eisenhower’s commitment to a broad front advance with no strategic reserve. This view was opposed by the British Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Field Marshal Alan Brooke, who promoted a rapid advance on a narrow front with the other allied armies in reserve. This basic disagreement was the wedge Hitler exploited with his counter offensive and the fact that a breakthrough was achieved seemed to justify the British objections. Also the British remembered a similar German armoured counter attack at Kasserine Pass in North Africa where the American army was routed by the German strike once again confirming the British conservative view of strategy.
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@bigwoody4704 Market garden was a good idea. The goal of the operation was to strike at the center of power of Germany. the Ruhr industrial region and out flank the Siegfried Line. On paper that sounds good as it means no WW1 frontal assaults on Fortified positions. The British were looking for a way to reduce casualties and were not willing to put themselves through a meat grinder like the Huertgen forest battles. After the horrors of the Somme and Passchendale it's not a suprise that the British were totally against the Broad front attrition strategy.
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@bigwoody4704 "SINGLE ROAD - no room to manuever" It wasn't based on a single road. Horrocks XXX corps thrust was along that road, but VIII corps (O'Connor) and XII corps (Richie) attacked in the same direction along a different route. O'Connor's corps would cross the canal at Helmond and the Maas at Boxmeer, Richie's corps was to then follow the highway through Tilberg, S'Hertogenbosch and cross the Maas at the bridge north of Oss.
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@bigwoody4704 But XXX Corps also took a different route to Driel to relieve the Oosterbeck pocket, and as I mentioned above O'Connor's corps crossed the canal at Helmond and the Maas at Boxmeer, Richie's corps was to then follow the highway through Tilberg, S'Hertogenbosch and cross the Maas at the bridge north of Oss. So it's not a single road... People forget that it was 3 Corps involved, 2 of which (VIII and XII Corps) were covering Horrocks left and right flanks.
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@davidrendall7195 " it would be an earlier version of the Hurtgen forest battles" But David, the Allied armies would be crossing the North German plains, which is flat terrain. Nothing like the forests and mountains to the south.
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@scottduncan6654 That's a very twisted distortion of History by you. I wouldn't call an advance of 780 miles in 19 days pursuing Rommel all the way to Tunisia plodding 🤪 Moving slowly in Sicily? His Eighth army actually advanced 300 miles in 17 days across mountainous terrain, taking Syracuse, Catania and Augusta. Messina was a PR victory, the Germans and Italians STILL ESCAPED so it didn't matter whether Messina was captured or not. No he DID NOT say preinvasion that he would take the town on D+1 that is a complete lie. Even at St Paul's School in London in April 1944, 2 months before Operation Overlord had even started, the plan Monty unveiled was as follows. Quote " The British and Canadian armies were to decoy the enemy reserves and draw them to their front on the extreme eastern edge of the Allied beachhead. Thus while Monty taunted the enemy at Caen, we were to make our break on the long roundabout road to Paris. When reckoned in terms of national pride, this British decoy mission became a sacrificial one, for while we tramped around the outside flank, the British were to sit in place and pin down Germans. Yet strategically it fitted into a logistical division of labors, for it was towards Caen that the enemy reserves would race once the alarm was sounded". Market Garden was far from a disaster either, the Allies seized up to 64 miles of territory from the Germans driving them out of most of Southern Holland whilst seizing multiple towns/cities like Eindhoven, Grave, and Nijmegen as well as liberating hundreds of thousands of Dutch civilians. Most of the failures of Market Garden can be attributed to the Air Borne generals like Browning and Brereton who were part of the First Allied Air Borne Army, which I should point out to you was subordinate to SHAEF , not to Montgomery's 21st Army Group. Montgomery is not responsible for the failures of Market Garden.
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@bigwoody4704 "until the GI's came 3,500 miles across the Atlantic to do it for them" Ahh yes and came across with the Royal Navy who supplied what? 80% of all assets on D Day. The whole Naval force was commanded by a British Admiral. And of course the whole D Day planning, research, diversionary tactics, reconnaissance and delivery was entirely BRITISH. And it was a British Gunnery Officer who re-directed fire onto the cliff emplacements when he saw the slow progress being made by the brave Americans on that beach. Looks like the GI's needed a helping hand.....
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@bigwoody4704 Perhaps you have not heard of reverse lend lease? Britain and her empire provided military bases to America, also food, clothes and other war materials such as planes and patrol boats, which helped patrol American waters when the U-boats attacked American coastal waters with the wolf packs. It was an allied effort, that's the whole point of allies, so please cut the superiority crap, it's disrespectful to everyone who died for the Allies.
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@marklivingstone3710 The problem is no Market Garden means a meat grinder like the Hurtgen Forest.
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People keep going on about Antwerp but have forgotten something. After the bridge at Arnhem was to be taken, the next goal was for the British 52nd (Lowland) Infantry Division to land, and secure the territory to the north of Holland (Apeldoorn/Flevoland), which would cut off the German 15th Army and free up the Scheldt for Antwerp to be secured by the Allies.
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@LA_Commander Market Garden was given limited priority. Had XXX corps had better support on it's flanks it wouldn't have had to detach the Guards and the 50th division to defend the highway and beat off attacks by German units. This again goes back to Monty's disagreement with Ike, he wanted support from Bradley's forces, as the British and Canadians didn't have enough corps to simultaneously support Market Garden, clear the Scheldt and invest the channel ports that were still occupied by Germans. The fact that he even proposed to allow Bradley to command the ground operation shows how important he felt it was to have ONE Thrust, and not to have Bradley and Patton to waste troops in other efforts (ie - Metz & Hurtgen forest) Market Garden should have been properly supported by 5 corps, likely 2 British and 3 American.
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@bigwoody4704 Bradley, Patton and Devers supplies came from the organisation known as COMZ , which was commanded by John Clifford Hodges Lee . The British and Canadian armies had their own supply trains. The American supply system had severe problems, they'd lost their mulberry harbour in storms and were compensating by using DUKWs and other stop gap measures over the open beaches and were actually doing quite well at it. But they were inland which meant a long supply chain, every truck has to go dozens, possibly hundreds of miles to make its delivery which in turn needs mechanics, admin, fuel and resupply points for those trucks. So you supply the men who move the supplies to supply the men who move supplies to the men who fight. The point was that all three forces were starving for supplies which allowed the previously broken German army to pull back and regroup into a fighting formation aided by the American defeat in the Huertgen forest. Montgomeries plan with Market Garden was to divert mediocre supplies to one force so they could make a dash forward and break into Germany before they could regroup. It didn't work out. Allied supplies weren't that great in Europe, fortunately the Germans barely had any supplies at all because their own supply lines were being shredded daily or diverted to three different fronts.
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"The final point on Market Garden's destination - this was Nunspeet on the Zuider Zee coast, and not Arnhem for the reasons already explained. TIK's drawing of the Market Garden corridor in green, with the right flank beyond Arnhem following the River Ijssel is exactly right." Yes, the plan as executed called for the 52nd division to land, and secure the territory to the north (Apeldoorn/Flevoland), cutting off Holland and the German 15th Army.
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@davemac1197 It's funny how the subject of Antwerp always pops up and the idea that it was disregarded by Monty, even though the next phase of Market Garden was to advance up toward the Zuider Zee and surround the German 15th army holding it, making the job of taking the ports easier for the Canadians.
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@Jerry-sw8cz Market Garden fell far short of expectations but it wasn't a total failure as it advanced the front in that sector by around 90 miles and inflicted almost twice the number of casualties on the German's than what the Allies suffered. It was certainly a better operation than Bradleys Hurtgen Forest campaign
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@bigwoody4704 "explain why the French came back across the channel with the GIs" Errr the French surrendered?
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@bigwoody4704 France was no where to be seen at the table of the big three, Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin, so what exactly are you trying to say? That france was any help? They SURRENDERED.
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@bigwoody4704 Monty's plan had the US 7th army hugging Monty's flank and taking whatever punishment the Germans or Italians could throw at it. Patton, who had proposed his own plan to land at Palermo and move east in a gigantic pincer movement, which was rejected, decided to attack that way of his own accord to set up the race to Messina. Patton would take Palermo and Messina based off of his own audacity, but the fighting against the Germans around Mt. Etna was hard and men that fought under him there HATED him for it. He did well against the Italians, but the Germans stopped him cold at the Etna Line. There Patton ran into the same difficulty that Monty had faced. While Monty tried to out siege the Germans, Patton tried to bulrush them, and while Patton would beat Monty to Messina, it would not be because Patton had out maneuvered or outgeneraled Albert Kesselring. The troubles of the Sicilian campaign are more Patton's disregard of orders to be a supporting character and excellent defensive tactics from Kesselring that negated the entire fighting efforts in Sicily and Italy.
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@bigwoody4704 Apologies if im a little bit harsh sometimes, nothing personal Woody, if theres something i do like in men like Slim and Omar Bradley is that they weren't glory seekers they were the soldiers soldier and i respect Eisenhower for really keeping the Allies together without causing a divide
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Rotterdam would've been used
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@LA_Commander They were starving because not one single army was recieving priority. The problem with Eisenhower's broad front at that time was that it was getting to where no army group could make any further significant advantages given broad front resource allocation, while only one of them could advance if they got the focus. Market Garden was a response to the logistic difficulties caused by Ike's broad front strategy, the use of a single British corps and paratroopers direct from England in an effort to keep the German's on the run without too much effect on the fuel supplies of the other armies.
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@bigwoody4704 On paper though the Allies never truly matched the Germans ability at mobile warfare. The only thing to counter German operational efficiency was turning the whole thing to static and attritional operational warfare which British excelled at but Germans could not cope with when firepower and logistics determined everything and reduced casualties in frontal attacks. The reforms that Montgomery made like big division sized organisations kept under firm hand by army commander, close cooperation between various arms like infantry , armour and artillery and RAF for close air support etc..should have been done long time ago by his predecessors like Cunningham ,Norrie,Ritchie, Auchinleck etc. I certainly wouldn't say Montgomery lacked flexibility since he wanted a concentrated thrust straight to Berlin after D-day instead of a wide push.
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@bigwoody4704 More like Albert Kesselring outgeneralled Patton since his army still escaped to Italy.
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@bigwoody4704 Admittedly Bill Slim is my favourite overall, but i still think that Percival, Wavell, Ritchie, and Auchinleck were not as succesful as Montgomery
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@bigwoody4704 Nah i keep hearing about that, send it over in a link
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@bigwoody4704 I think Winston did sum up Montgomery "in defeat, unbeatable, in victory, unbearable" he was a man in love with his own image as much as i do defend Monty, he was definitely an egomaniac with a difficult personality and always hell bent on getting to Berlin and having the glory of winning the war
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@bigwoody4704 Does Winston have any quotes regarding the issues with the taking of Caen?
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@bigwoody4704 Its almost as controversial as the Market Garden topic, i still don't get why on one hand he was supposed to take caen but then the other hand some say it wasnt his plan, i mean how do you explain what he said here i know its controversial Montgomery: Notes for address to General Officers of the Four Field Armies, 7 April 1944. 'Operation Thunderclap' "Second British Army To assault to the west of the R.Orne and develop operations to the south and south east, in order to secure airfield sites and to protect the eastern flank of the First US Army while the latter is capturing Cherbourg. In its subsequent operations the army will pivot on its left and offer a strong front against enemy movement towards the lodgement areas from the east"
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@jimcronin2043 9,000, the Germans and Russians would call this a skirmish..
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@thevillaaston7811 Should have approved Montgomery's concentrated thrust after D-day
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@youraveragescotsman7119 It may have been a success had Monty actually oversaw the bulk of the planning.
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@bigwoody4704 What about the crossing of Operation Plunder? 23-27 March 1945
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@bigwoody4704 Didn't the Auk suffer heavier casualties at 1st El Alamein though? Last time I checked, 13,250 losses to Rommels 10,000.
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