History - Operation Market Garden

September 16, 1944 Belgium At 1100 hours, Lt. Gen. Brian Horrocks, the popular commander of British XXX Corps, meets with the officers of his command to brief them on Operation Garden. Horrocks points to a large map of Holland; colored tape marks the corps’ route from Valkenswaard to Eindhoven to Veghel, from Veghel to Nijmegen, and from Nijmegen to Arnhem. He tells the audience that while Operation Market will open the corridor to Arnhem; XXX Corps will make Operation Garden a success by blasting through the German lines and driving through the corridor. There is to be no pause in the advance - “keep going like hell” Horrocks tells his officers. After outlining the plan, Horrocks tells his delighted audience, “This is a tale you will tell your grandchildren, and mightily bored they’ll be.” While most are swept along in Horrocks optimistic briefing, there are those that harbor doubts. To drive an armored division over 60 miles on a single road in two days seems improbable, if not impossible. Holland Throughout the Allied planning, German strength in Holland increases. The Fifteenth Army’s men, along with elements of the divisions retreating ahead of the Allied advance, have been fed into the defenses in Holland. Field Marshal Walter Model, demoted to commander of Army Group B when Rundstedt is reinstated as C in C West, has moved his headquarters to Oosterbeek just west of Arnhem. This move displaces Maj. Sepp Kraft’s 16th SS Panzer-grenadier Depot and Reserve Battalion; Kraft now bivouacs his units in the woods near Wolfheze. These units are camping in the woods adjacent to the fields the 1st Airborne Division plan to use as drop and landing zones. At this point in the war, shortages of men, machines, and materiel force the German army to improvise. One result of this improvisation was the creation of Kampfgruppen (battle groups) and Abteilungen (combat teams) in the place of divisions, brigades, regiments, battalions, and companies. Kampfgruppen and Abteilungen are rudimentary military units often organized around a commander (and what remains of his original command). The backbone of any German unit is the alte Hasen (“old salts”); the veterans who give war a human face to the recruits and replacements that fill out the regular units, battle groups, and combat teams. Many of the Kampfgruppen are named after veteran commanders, and many are formed around cadres of veteran soldiers. These are men who fought in Normandy, on the Eastern Front, in Italy, or in North Africa. They know how to fight, how to fight well, and how to survive. The last is a lesson many of the recruits and replacements never get to learn. One overriding factor gives backbone to all German soldiersthey are now defending their homes. The Allies have pushed the war to the German border. Fears and doubts about the ultimate outcome of the war are seldom mentioned, and few have any allusions about defeating the Allies. Many hope they can hold the Allies at the borders, so Hitler's promised "secret weapons" can force the Allies to sue for peace. Still, the majority are determined to defend their home land from the devastation they've seen on the battlefield. By dint of experience, the combat groups of II SS Panzer Corps are billeted carefully. Units avoid larger towns and citiesthere is always the danger of sabotage or ambush from resistance groupsso smaller villages are preferred; woods near important crossroads and villages on or near the highways are quickly secured. There are now units trained in repelling an airborne attack in positions within a few kilometers of the British 1st Airborne Division's drop and landing zones. The training these units received in 1943 now pays dividends; even though the 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions have nominal strength, the men moving into position astride the route to Arnhem are combat veterans trained in fighting paratroops. The German units are supported by more firepower than the Red Devils can muster, which negates the 1st Airborne Division's two-to-one advantage in men.