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Operation Market Garden
A Bridge Too Far
Back in June, we marked the 80th Anniversary of the iconic D-Day Landings in Normandy with a series of commemorations and events across the UK and France. Operation Neptune was the largest seaborne invasion in history which resulted in the start of the liberation of France and Western Europe and set the wheels in motion for the Allied victory of the war in Europe.
This week marks the 80th anniversary of another operation which is very personal to me as my uncle was involved in the thick of it.
Operation Market Garden was a bold plan to land Allied forces behind enemy lines and capture key bridges across the Rhine to gain route into Germany in order to end the war in Europe by Christmas (1944). The operation was planned in two stages with combined US and UK airborne forces (Market) reinforced quickly by British Land forces (Garden) to seize nine bridges. It was the largest airborne plan in history.
Market Garden commenced on September 17th, 1944 and its battles raged until 25th September.
The operation achieved initial success with Allied forces capturing the Dutch cities of Eindhoven and Nijmegen along with smaller towns along the route.
However, the land forces soon got bogged down on the one road leading up to Arnhem which was the key bridge…
