17 Sep 2019 marked the 75th anniversary of the daring paratroopers’ air raid on the city of Arnhem during World War Two.
It was a heroic failure. It gave rise to the famous phrase ‘ A bridge too far’.
The phrase A bridge too far has come to symbolise an objective that is beyond reach. An unattainable objective.
The airdrop was surprisingly planned by the most cautious of Allied generals Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery.
Codenamed Operation Market Garden {17 to 24 Sep 1944} it was the airborne phase of an operation designed to sprint the troops and tanks through Holland, springboard into Germany by capturing the bridges leading to the Lower Rhine River and beyond.
When the audacious plan was mooted, on 10 Sep 1944, General ‘ Boy’ Browning told Montgomery that Arnhem might be going ‘ a bridge too far’. Beevor in his book says Browning probably did not make this statement. {p 31}. Here are 3 books. Beevor is the latest, published in 2018 which I bought in Ludlow, Wales on 1 June 2018. Kershaw published in 1990 will give you the German view seen through the eyes of the German soldiers. Ryan is classic and was made into a famous movie.