Comments by "TheVilla Aston" (@thevillaaston7811) on ""Arnhem" by Antony Beevor Book Review" video.
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The allied forces at all three areas of operations were under pressure after the Germans retrieved a copy of the complete MARKET GARDEN plan from a dead US soldier, in a US glider, in a US drop zone. There were far more German troops in the vicinity of Arnhem, than in Nijmegen, and therefore, the 1st Airborne drop zones were bound to come under more pressure than those of the US airborne forces.
The evidence is clear, planning for and ultimate responsibility for the MARKET plan rested with the head of the First Allied Airborne Army, US General Lewis Brereton. 1st Airborne had been in action in Sicily and Italy before MARKET GARDEN, putting the division on a par with the US 101st Airborne division in terms of combat experience.
General Urquhart saw action in Sicily and Italy before MARKET GARDEN, of his time in Arnhem, Brigadier, later General Hackett stated: ‘There could have been no one in the 1st Airborne Division without the highest regard for Roy Urquhart, both as an officer and as a man. I have never seen anyone show up better in a battle.’
General Browning saw action in both World Wars and was and in 1941 was appointed as the first General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the newly created 1st Airborne Division. And yet, for political reasons, Browning was passed over for command of First Allied Airborne Army, as the appointment was given to US General Lewis Brereton, who had zero airborne warfare experience.
(What's your source that there was a 1000 German tanks in the Reichswald?
Don’t know who’s source TIK was.
Was it the same guy who said Monty would take Caen on D-Day? Just asking.)
Which guy said Monty would take Caen on D-Day?
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@blastulae
‘I say that because none of Monty’s subordinate generals were any better than, except in personality.’
Your words.
But on what evidence do you base that opinion? On the assumption that you are comparing those American counterparts…
Montgomery had served with distinction in the First World War, being wounded twice and being awarded the DSO. In trying circumstances, in France in 1940, in command of a single division Montgomery had performed with distinction as he trained his division to the highest pitch of efficiency. His work proved its worth as he led his troops on the famous night march to close the gap on the allied left after the Belgian capitulation. When so ordered, he brought his division back to Britain almost intact. As a single army commander, in his first major command, he reorganized 8th Army, won against Rommel with inferior numbers at Alam el Halfa, and then went on to end the war in North Africa as a contest at Alamein. For HUSKY, Montgomery tore up Patton’s lunatic plan to land all around the island to shreds and concentrated allied forces in one place, the campaign was over in six weeks. Montgomery finished OVERLORD ahead of schedule (D+78, instead of D+90), with 22% fewer than expected casualties, and gave the Germans a defeat as big as Stalingrad. Montgomery sorted out the Northern half of the Bulge, carried out the crossing of the Rhine with six divisions suffering just 1,200 casualties, and saved Denmark from Soviet occupation.
Bradley, Eisenhower and Devers did not have a single day of personal combat experience between them. Eisenhower had not even seen a dead body until April 1943. Bradley made a mess of his part on D-Day, and fell to pieces in the Ardennes, and then made a meal of encircling the Ruhr. Eisenhower made a mess in North Africa, having to go to Alexander for help. His planning for AVALANCHE and BAYTOWN nearly ended in disaster. When appointed himself as allied land forces commander in September 1944, his schoolboy broad front strategy gave the Germans just what they needed, time and space to reorganise. Devers did little of note with his DRAGOON sideshow and in the remainder of his time in Europe. By the time that any of them got into the fighting, the Germans were totally committed in Russia, and across all fronts the Germans were short of men, equipment and supplies.
Below that: Crerar and Dempsey both fought in the First World War and performed competently as single army commanders. Hodges, Patton and Simpson did have personal combat experience, Gerow and Patch did not. Hodges went to ground at the start of the Ardennes, Patton got passed over for army group command, it seems due to his personal behaviour, and regularly put his personal agenda ahead of the common good.
‘British 11th Armoured Division captured Antwerp on September 4, with its port 90% intact, thanks to the Belgian resistance. Its CO didn’t proceed to clear the estuary, nor did his corps CO order it, nor his army CO nor did Monty. So all were equally inept.’ Your words.
The Scheldt estuary banks were 100 miles long, the Germans were in forces at the Breskens Pocket, and many of the forces that would be needed for an attack on the estuary were not in place, due to the pace the British 2nd Army advance across Belgium and France.
‘Ike had no choice but to put US troops north of the Bulge under Monty’s command, as they were cut off from the other US armies. But the fool attacked from the tip of the Bulge, rather than cutting it off at the base, as Patton urged Bradley to do.’ Your words.
As for who did what in Bulge…
Here is a German view:
Hasso von Manteuffel, commander of the 5th Panzer Army:
‘The operations of the American 1st Army had developed into a series of individual holding actions. Montgomery's contribution to restoring the situation was that he turned a series of isolated actions into a coherent battle fought according to a clear and definite plan. It was his refusal to
engage in premature and piecemeal counter-attacks which enabled the Americans to gather their reserves and frustrate the German attempts to extend their breakthrough’ His words.
And an American view:
“I find it difficult to refrain from expressing my indignation at Hodges and Ridgeway and my appreciation of Montgomery whenever I talk about St. Vith. It is my firm opinion that if it hadn't been for Montgomery, the First US Army, and especially the troops in the St. Vith salient, would have ended in a debacle that would have gone down in history.”
”I'm sure you remember how First Army HQ fled from Spa leaving food cooking on the stoves, officers' Xmas presents from home on their beds and, worst of all, top secret maps still on the walls... First Army HQ never contacted us with their new location and I had to send an officer to find them. He did and they knew nothing about us...(Montgomery) was at First Army HQ when my officer arrived. A liaison officer from Montgomery arrived at my HQ within 24 hrs. His report to Montgomery is what saved us...”
- Major General Robert W. Hasbrouck, commander, 7th Armoured Division. “Generals of the Bulge” by Jerry D. Morelock, page 298.
And a modern US take on Montgomery in the Bulge:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zd6LrT7Zrjo&ab_channel=USArmyWarCollege
(1hr, 6 minutes, 32 seconds).
‘Everything else you posted supports my point that Gavin was just following Boy’s orders. So again I ask, how is it Jumpin’ Jim’s fault? With his reduced forces, he couldn’t secure the heights, the bridge south of town and seize those across the Waal. Nor did Browning order him to try. Au contraríe, he ordered him to hold the heights first.’ Your words.
Again:
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II
The European Theater of Operations
THE SIEGFRIED LINE CAMPAIGN
By Charles B. MacDonald
CENTER OF MILITARY HISTORY
UNITED STATES ARMY WASHINGTON, D.C., 1993
P 157
‘Take only the bridges and you probably could not hold them without the high ground. Take only the high ground, the Waal bridge at Nijmegen, and the Maas-Waal Canal bridges, and the ground column could not get across the Maas either to use the other bridges or to relieve the airborne troops. With only so many troops at hand, General Gavin saw no solution at first other than to take first the high ground and the Maas and Maas-Waal-Canal bridges-thereby ensuring juncture with the ground column-then Nijmegen.’
There it is, from the US Army history of the war, Gavin thought that the Groesbeek Heights should be taken before Nijmegen Bridge.
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@ToolTimeTabor
‘Seems like Monty forgot that basic fact of Warfare. TIK ignores the reality of the situation as he is a Monty fanboy The commander who underestimates his enemy ( especially when his own intelligence apparatus is ringing alarm bells ) is a fool.’- Para Dave / Big Woody.
SHAEF Intelligence Summary, 26.08 44:
‘Two and a half months of bitter fighting, culminating for the Germans in a blood-bath big enough even for their extravagant tastes, have brought the end of the war in Europe within sight, almost within reach. The strength of the German Armies in the West has been shattered, Paris belongs to France again, and the Allied Armies are streaming towards the frontiers of the Reich’
SHAEF Intelligence Summary, 04.09 44:
[the German forces facing British 2nd Army] ‘are no longer a cohesive force but a number of fugitive battlegroups, disorganised and even demoralised, short of equipment and arms’
SHAEF Intelligence Summary, 16.09 44:
‘the enemy has now suffered , in the West alone, losses in men and equipment that can never be repaired in this war….No force can, then, be built up in the West sufficient for a counteroffensive or even a successful defensive.’
N.B. This is SHAEF information, not 21st Army Group information.
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seth1422
‘doesn't he still do the bulk of his sales in the UK?’
I have no idea what his sales are in Britain or the USA either in total or in relative terms. Nor would I know where to check.
‘the unhealthy assumption that the world is conspiring against the UK due to base vanity and greed,’
Not my assumption. My belief is that the USA is chauvinistic in the extreme in these matters (modern history) and that the US media and American authors (and Beevor) do not care who they trample on to make money out of this mood.
Here is one example of many:
"I did not feel good" about suggesting Americans captured the Enigma code rather than the British. It was a distortion... a mercenary decision to create this parallel history in order to drive the movie for an American audience,"
- David Ayer, Screenwriter U571.
At least this this bloke had the decency to own up - albeit some years later. As far as this matter is concerned, for me I would not now trust anything that comes out of Hollywood any more than I would trust something that came from Stalin’s Russia.
The idea that proximity fuses and so on took the edge off of any desire from people in Britain, and in Belgium to see action against v weapons is absurd. But Americans with their homeland 2,500 miles from danger probably could not care less. Market Garden served to keep the war moving forward and would have cut the Germans off from many launch sites in The Netherlands. If Montgomery had said to Eisenhower – were going into the Netherlands instead of towards Germany one can easily imagine the response of Bradley and Devers, and their subordinates such as Patton. Muddled thinking started with Eisenhower and his aversion to concentrate forces.
‘Admiral Cunningham never stopped being furious with him over the Scheldt. Dempsey didn't trust his judgement. Harris couldn't forgive him for his dissembling over Goodwood. Churchill was uneasy with him and thought he was a "cad". And even Alanbrooke, his most important defender, constantly lived in fear of what he would screw up next.’
If Cunningham was furious with Montgomery then he should not have been. The decision to attempt the Scheldt or Arnhem had to be Eisenhower’s. The buck stops there. Harris furious with Montgomery? Where is that recorded? Churchill called Montgomery a Cad? Where is that recorded? Not in Churchill’s history of the war. I know, I have been all over it. All the mentions of Montgomery were positive.
Example:
WINSTON S CHURCHILL.
THE SECOND WORLD WAR.
CASSELL & CO LTD REVISED EDITION NOVEMBER 1950.
VOLUME IV THE HINGE OF FATE
BOOK II Africa Redeemed
Chapter XXIX: Return to Cairo
P464
‘I saw a great many soldiers that day, who greeted me with grins and cheers. I inspected my own regiment, the 4th Hussars, or as many of them as they dared to bring together – perhaps fifty or sixty – near the field cemetery, in which a number of their comrades had been buried. All this was moving, but with it all there grew a sense of the reviving ardour of the Army. Everybody said what a change there was since Montgomery had taken command. I could feel the truth of this with joy and comfort.’
As for Alanbrooke, what screw-ups?
As an aside, I recommend you look up the bibliographies of the key authors TIK uses in his analysis. Middlebrook, Poulussen and Neillands in particular.’
From memory Martin Middlebrook concluded that Market Garden was a reasonable undertaking given the circumstances prevailing at that time and that the main reason why Arnhem was not reached was that US 82nd Airborne Division failed to take Nijmegen Bridge when it should have done. The whole subject has been done to death – like the rest of the Second World War. All of the key people involved are dead. The books they wrote are all available – and along with contemporary documents must form they must form major part of the story of these events. The documentaries that spoke with the key people were all made by the BBC and ITV in the 1960s and 70s. In modern times the only new information that has come out is the release by the government of codebreaking secrets in 1976.
The likes of Beevor and so on go over old ground and bring almost nothing new to the subject apart from splitting hairs, and splitting the split hairs, passing off opinion as fact based wholly on hindsight.
‘Oh, and I should point out that Beevor does discuss the delay of Warren's battalion of the 508th departing for the bridge on the first day…’He was nothing if not energetic and aggressive in his command style throughout his career, sometimes to a fault.’
I could not care less as all that matters is that Gavin failed at Nijmegen. Most historians and people like Beevor seem to take this view. I have an opinion that Gavin probably could not believe his luck when he got the chance to re-write history when he was asked to work on the film ‘A Bridge TooFar’.
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seth1422
'British military researchers Sir Samuel Curran and W. A. S. Butement invented a proximity fuze in the early stages of World War II under the name VT, an acronym of "Variable Time fuze".'
Brennan, James W. (September 1968), The Proximity Fuze Whose Brainchild?, 94 (9), United States Naval Institute Proceedings, pp. 72–78.
As for the rest of it. Montgomery could not get on with Tedder, Harris could not get with Leigh Mallory, Patton did not rate Bradley, and so on - who could care less. Its been raked over so many times. All Beevor and his like are doing is going over old ground with only hindsight to bring into play as they pass judgement without any proper context.
Him and the rest and the US media should shut the fuck up and do something constructive.
Even my father has lost interest and he went right through 1939-45, D-Day to Luneberg Heath. I'll wager that there is a good many of that generation who feel the same.
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@blastulae
‘Because Browning insisted on securing the heights before seizing the Waal bridges. But even if the fear of this imaginary threat originated with US intel, Browning credited it.’ Your words.
And so it seems, did the US General, Gavin:
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II
The European Theater of Operations
THE SIEGFRIED LINE CAMPAIGN
By Charles B. MacDonald
CENTER OF MILITARY HISTORY
UNITED STATES ARMY WASHINGTON, D.C., 1993
P 157
‘Take only the bridges and you probably could not hold them without the high ground. Take only the high ground, the Waal bridge at Nijmegen, and the Maas-Waal Canal bridges, and the ground column could not get across the Maas either to use the other bridges or to relieve the airborne troops. With only so many troops at hand, General Gavin saw no solution at first other than to take first the high ground and the Maas and Maas-Waal-Canal bridges-thereby ensuring juncture with the ground column-then Nijmegen.’ His words.
‘How anyone can blame Gavin, when he was obeying his corps CO, right there on the spot with him, is beyond me. He sent scouts into the woods, determined no German armor was there, then despatched the only battalion he could afford toward the bridges.’ Your words.
‘Bear in mind that he and Browning had only half the force they were supposed to have, due to Monty and Boy’s brain dead planning, or lack thereof. They went ahead with the hare-brained scheme even after learning from the USAAF that C-47s couldn’t tow two gliders that far. And that two SS armored divisions were at Arnhem.’
Your words.
But the Commander, First Allied Airborne Army, the US General Brereton final say on all aspects of MARKET. On this, the evidence is clear:
CHESTER WILMOT
THE STRUGGLE FOR EUROPE
WM. COLLINS, SONS AND CO LTD. 1954
CHAPTER XXVII. THE LOST OPPORTUNITY
P 588
The Guards, breaking out along one road, met strong opposition nearly all the way to Eindhoven, and yet they drove their armour through these twelve bitterly contested miles in twenty-four hours. When they reached the southern end of the ‘airborne corridor’ on the evening of D plus 1, they were halted for the night by the blown bridge at Zon. This bridge might have been captured intact if the 101st Division had agreed to Montgomery's proposal that it should drop paratroops on either side of the objective, as was done at Grave.
THE GUNS AT LAST LIGHT
THE WAR IN WESTERN EUROPE, 1944-1945
Rick Atkinson
LITTLE BROWN 2013.
This paperback edition published in 2013.
P 265
‘General Brereton’s troop carrier commanders had insisted that only a single mission fly on Sunday; a second sortie would ostensibly exhaust air and ground crews and leave insufficient time to service and reload the planes (although double missions over the same distance had been flown from Italy in DRAGOON the previous month). Pleas by airborne commanders and by an emissary from Montgomery to Brereton’s headquarters failed to reverse the decision, despite analysis that showed transporting the entire combat force at a deliberate rate could take up to four days.’
UNITED STATES ARMY IN WORLD WAR II
The European Theater of Operations
THE SIEGFRIED LINE CAMPAIGN
By Charles B. MacDonald
CENTER OF MILITARY HISTORY
UNITED STATES ARMY WASHINGTON, D.C., 1993
P132
‘Naturally anxious that all their strength arrive on D-Day, the division commanders asked that the planes fly more than one mission the first day. They pointed to the importance of bringing all troops into the corridor before the enemy could reinforce his antiaircraft defenses or launch an organized ground assault. For their part, the troop carrier commanders dissented. Flying more than one mission per aircraft, they said, would afford insufficient time between missions for spot maintenance, repair of battle damage, and rest for the crews. High casualties among the airmen might be the result. If weather remained favorable, they pointed out, and if combat aircraft assumed some of the resupply missions, the troop carriers might fly but one mission daily and still transport three and a half divisions by D plus 2. Although it meant taking a chance on enemy reaction and on the weather, General Brereton sided with the troop carrier commanders. He decided on one lift per day. Although subsequent planning indicated that it would in fact take four days to convey the divisions, General Brereton stuck by his decision.’
‘Given the single road, the idiotic operation should never have been approved on that basis alone’
Your words.
But on what evidence do you state that opinion? Ground forces were at Grave on the early morning of the third day of the operation, in time to reach airborne forces at Arnhem, only to find that the Nijmegen city and bridge were in German hands.
but Ike wanted to get along with Monty. The only good that came of the fiasco was that Ike was free to ignore the egomaniacal fool thereafter.’
Your words.
How do you know what Eisenhower’s motives were for approving MARKET GARDEN?
His words in regards to the matter are as follows:
P336
‘At the September 10 conference in Brussels Field-Marshall Montgomery was therefore authorised to defer the clearing out of the Antwerp approaches in an effort to seize the Bridgehead I wanted. To assist Montgomery I allocated to him the 1st Allied Airborne Army, which had been recently formed under Lieutenant-General Lewis H. Brereton of the United States Air Forces.’ His words.
As for ignoring Montgomery thereafter, within days of the German attack in the Ardennes, Montgomery was asked by Eisenhower to command US 1st and 9th Armies. Montgomery was later tasked with organising the main Rhine crossing with PLUNDER and VARSITY.
‘Monty should have been fired after failing to clear the Scheldt estuary into Antwerp, but coalition warfare is a bitch. Besides, with whom to replace him? None of his army COs were any more capable. His army, corps and division COs at Antwerp also failed to clear the lower Scheldt.’
Your words.
But the Scheldt estuary was cleared. So why would you offer the opinion that Montgomery should have been fired? Further, ‘None of his army COs were any more capable.’ What leads you to state that opinion?
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@seth1422
‘The Guards Armoured’s Coldstream Group was still needed as a reserve for the Airborne division. This left but two armoured groups to go across the Waal. Even those did not make it until next day, D plus 4, 21 September, primarily because of diehard German defenders who had to be ferreted out from the superstructure and bridge underpinnings. Once on the north bank, much of the British armour and infantry had to be used to help hold and improve the bridgehead that the two battalions of the 504th Parachute Infantry had forged. By the time the Nijmegen bridge fell on D plus 3, it was early evening and it would be dark before an armoured column could be assembled to march on Arnhem. North of Nijmegen the enemy had tanks and guns and infantry of two SS Panzer divisions, in unknown but growing strength, established in country ideal for defence.’
‘At the village of Ressen, less than t
hree miles north of Nijmegen, the Germans had erected an effective screen composed of an SS battalion reinforced by eleven tanks, another infantry battalion, two batteries of 88mm guns, 20 20mm anti-aircraft guns and survivors of earlier fighting in Nijmegen.’
THE US OFFICIAL HISTORY
The Siegfried Line Campaign p. 185
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@MrInkblots
Let me be clear...I have NOT read either 'Stalingrad' or 'Berlin'. Nor, at this time, have I any intention of doing so.
I would GUESS that both 'works' dwell on on Russian atrocities at length without putting such Russian behaviour against the appalling and unprovoked treatment meted out on Russia and other Eastern European countries by the Germans. That Beevor bangs on about the hideosly overstated (by Americans) contribution of Lend-lease by citing selectived statistics out of context. That Beevor dwells on Russian penal batallions, the Red Army's sometimes callous treatment of its troops and the Russian population without referring to the Russian traits endurance and patriotism - which transcends politics.
As far a 'Berlin' is concerned, what is in that work that was not covered by Cornelius Ryan in his 1966 work, 'The Last Battle'?
Beevor was born in 1946 and was in and out of the peacetime army in under four years. As far as I can see, he brings nothing new to subjects he writes about. This shifty looking individual sits in interviews pontificating about subjects that have long since been done to death before any of his digits struck a keyboard.
If his 'works' are left to sit in book carousels in airport shopping outlets alongside the works of Harold Robbins, Jeffrey Archer and Jackie Collins then that is fine. Just so long as they are not mistaken for history.
If you want to read about the war, why not read the works of people who were actually there. You could start with 'The Struggle for Europe' by the your fellow countryman Chester Wilmot. Look at his biography, read what he wrote, consider the people that he personally interviewed, and the bibliography he referred to. There are are plenty of others beside Chester Wilmot...
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@ToolTimeTabor
This was the general picture regarding allied knowledge of the enemy as far as I can find it:
CHESTER WILMOT
THE STRUGGLE FOR EUROPE
WM. COLLINS, SONS AND CO LTD. 1954
P523
‘When the British tanks drove into Amiens that morning [31.08.44] they passed within a mile of Seventh German Army H.Q,. where Dietrich was in the act of handing over command of the Somme sector to Eberbach. Dietrich managed to slip away, but before Eberbach could move his newly acquired command post it was overrun and he was taken prisoner as he tried to escape in a Volkswagen. In another car the British discovered a marked map, which revealed not only the Somme defences, but also the chaos which prevailed throughout the Wehrmacht in the West.’
SHAEF Intelligence Summary, 26.08 44:
‘Two and a half months of bitter fighting, culminating for the Germans in a blood-bath big enough even for their extravagant tastes, have brought the end of the war in Europe within sight, almost within reach. The strength of the German Armies in the West has been shattered, Paris belongs to France again, and the Allied Armies are streaming towards the frontiers of the Reich’
SHAEF Intelligence Summary, 04.09 44:
[the German forces facing British 2nd Army] ‘are no longer a cohesive force but a number of fugitive battlegroups, disorganised and even demoralised, short of equipment and arms’
SHAEF Intelligence Summary, 16.09 44:
‘the enemy has now suffered , in the West alone, losses in men and equipment that can never be repaired in this war….No force can, then, be built up in the West sufficient for a counteroffensive or even a successful defensive.’
According to another YouTube contributor, one Dave Rendall, who claims to be a retired army officer, and also Brian Urquhart’s nephew, At FAAA, no-one below Browning was ULTRA cleared. If that be true, then any ULTRA information would have to have been verified by another source, this information could not be verified so it was not passed on.
The aerial photography can be seen on line. Unlike the Hollywood film 'A Bridge Too Far', which includes a photograph of post war AFV, disguised as Second World War machines, shown in clear at a nice oblique angle, the actual photographs were grainy overhead shots, which, only after a considerable amount of enhancement showed what seemed to be a few Mark III tanks that identified as belonging to the Hermann Goering Division training and replacement unit. Which turned out to be the case.
Any information purporting to come from the Dutch Underground at that time was disregarded due to the German 'Englandspiel' penetration of the Dutch Underground. MARKET GARDEN was no different to any other matter in this regard.
As for all this Browning / Gavin stuff, for me you have to have been there to know what was what. I was not there.
As far as the Groesbeek Heights are concerned
A DROP TOO MANY
MAJOR GENERAL JOHN FROST CB, DSO, MC
PEN & SWORD BOOKS 1994.
P xiii
‘However, by far the worst mistake was the lack of priority given to the capture of Nijmegen Bridge. The whole essence of the plan was to lay an airborne carpet across the obstacles in southern Holland so that the Army could get motor through, yet the capture of this, perhaps the biggest and most vital bridge in that its destruction would have sounded the death-knell of the troops committed at Arnhem, was not accorded priority. The capture of this bridge would have been a walk-over on D-day, yet the American 82nd Airborne Division could spare only one battalion as they must at all costs secure a feature called the Groesbeek Heights, where, incidentally, the H.Q. of Airborne Corps was to be sited.
It was thought that the retention of this feature would prevent the debouchment of German armour from the Reichwald in Germany. This armour was there courtesy of a rumour only and its presence was not confirmed by the underground. In fact, as a feature it is by no means dominating and its retention or otherwise had absolutely no bearing on what happened at Nijmegen Bridge.’
‘Any army that ever held Nijmegen held the Heights’. What sort of idiot would make such a comment? Perhaps a youngster from Cleveland, Ohio, USA? The Groesbeek Heights are little more than 100 ft above sea level and are anywhere between five and six miles from Nijmegen Bridge. The brief account I have read of the 1591 Siege of Nijmegen makes no mention of the Groesbeek. Why would it?, given the geography involved.
I have been to the Groesbeek Heights, there is a museum there dedicated MARKET GARDEN and VERITABLE. My father was in the Netherlands in 1944 and early 1945. He did not take part in MARKET GARDEN, but he did take part in VERITABLE, hence my visit. Standing there, you are not bearing down on Nijmegen - how could you at such a distance, and at such a low level?
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seth1422
‘Monty missed several opportunities to isolate enemy forces over his career, including a really tantalizing one immediately after seizing Antwerp.’
What missed opportunities? Not Antwerp, the advance had been too swift and the required forces were not in place.
‘Admiral Ramsey never stopped being furious with him over the Scheldt. Dempsey didn't trust his judgement. Harris couldn't forgive him for his dissembling over Goodwood. Churchill was uneasy with him and thought he was a "cad". And even Alanbrooke, his most important defender, constantly lived in fear of what he would screw up next.’
Where is the evidence that backs up these claims.
‘Films are a terrible source for history.’
But millions upon millions of Americans see them as accurate history and those opinions filter down to things like YouTube. That is why the likes of myself, John Cornell, John Burns and others on here to deal with these idiotic comments.
U571 is one the most blatant examples of American arrogance and chauvinism. There are plenty of others (top of my head): Pearl Harbour, Patton, A Bridge Too Far, Nuremberg, Mussolini: The Untold Story, Anne Frank: The Whole Story and so on and so on). Even the so called masterpiece Saving Private Ryan is the usual American stuff with a 20 minute horror scene bolted onto the front. Even with that the film makers still find time to fit in a dig at the British and at Montgomery.
I understand that even the Canadians are targeted – in a film called Argo?
‘We are knew that already, and are trying to have an adult conversation. The VT (Variable Timing) Fuse is a neat story, and knocking down the V-1s its finest chapter. I recommend you check it out.’
You mean check it out again. I started on Britain’s war story, including Britain’s many inventions like the VT in about 1969. How about you?
‘Churchill respected Monty as a general and the effect on the men Monty had when he took over in '42 was obvious. Churchill did not get on with him personally’
How do you know they did not get on personally? As far as their work was concerned, I picked out one extract from Churchill’s history of the war – there more – across the six volumes.
‘Ever hear the story of Monty's wager with "Beatle" Smith for a B-17?’ Read, dismissed it. Smith should not have made the wager if he was not prepared for the consequences. Hopefully it taught him a lesson.
As for Market Garden. This reason, that reason. Who cares, it has all been done to death. There was a need to show Gavin’s failings but that has now been done. All Beevor has done is to cause the paper industry to fell more trees – for no good reason. TIK has taken him apart on here.
‘That is why none of the major historians do so.’ Surely you are not putting Beevor in the category of ‘major historian’, Are you?
The idea that Market Garden proved the case for a broad front strategy is nonsense. A narrow front strategy in 1944 would have entailed any army group size thrust. Twenty First Army Group with US Ninth Army backed up by airborne forces as required. All with absolute priority on resources. With Bradley’s subordinate commanders, Hodges and Patton being halted if necessary to keep advance going. Such a thrust would have been able to make full use of allied air power and logistic back up. A thrust that would have got to the Ruhr and then Berlin. A thrust that should have been decided on in August as the enormity of Montgomery’s victory in France became apparent.
Market Garden involved light airborne forces and one conventional army corps with a brief period priority in supplies. Even then The Germans only managed to defeat one airborne division. The broad road front strategy was fine provided all the allies wanted the war to go on into the middle of 1945 and carry a counter attack with 100,000 casualties – which is what happened.
‘most the infantry and virtually all of the armor engaged in the battle did not start in the operational area. Virtually all of it came in by "blitz" rail transport from elsewhere. That's why tanks (in contrast to SP guns) were not seen in Arnhem until D+3.’
As correctly noted by John Cornell.
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