The Royal Air Force and Operation Market Garden: Chapter 1

This is the story of the Royal Air Force’s role in Operation Market Garden, the attempted capture of the bridge over the Lower Rhine at Arnhem. But to understand that operation, one must go back to the beginning for the context and rationale.

Genesis: 6 June 1944 to 9 September 1944

“Amateurs talk strategy; professionals talk logistics”
General Omar Bradley, US Army

On 6 June 1944, Allied forces under the overall command of General Dwight D Eisenhower, Supreme Allied Commander, Allied Expeditionary Forces, landed on five beaches in Normandy, France, under Operation Overlord (now colloquially but erroneously called ‘D-Day’). This was the largest amphibious landing the world had ever seen – or ever will. In a period of 24 hours, more than 130,000 men had landed by parachute, glider and assault landing craft: a scale beyond comprehension. Naval personnel (UK and US) were 195,000. Add in merchant navy, aircrew, dockyard workers, aviation ground crews, support and logistics, railwaymen, medical staff – one could easily argue that 1 million people were directly involved.

And by the end of June, 850,000 men, 148,000 vehicles and 570,000 tons of supplies had landed through two artificial harbours: Mulberry A and Mulberry B (of which more later).

For the RAF, virtually every home-based Command was involved, using some 2,274 aircraft (gliders not counted as they were army assets flown by crew from the Glider Pilots Regiment). Additionally, the United States Eighth Army Air Force deployed strategic bombers and fighter escorts, with the Ninth Air Force deploying fighters, medium bombers and troop transports – in total 3,362 machines. Plus, aircraft of the Royal Naval Air Service and US Navy (anti-submarine and naval gunfire spotting).

‘Special Markings’ being applied afternoon of 4 June 1944

The objective of Operation Overlord: to liberate the German-occupied countries of Northwest Europe and to join up with the Soviet forces pressing in from the east, to capture Berlin and the destruction of the Nazi regime.

Although initial casualties were lighter than feared, fighting around the landing beaches was still severe – especially on the American Omaha beach (‘Bloody Omaha’). Despite massive artillery support from battleships and cruisers in the English Channel and overwhelming air superiority, German forces defended vigorously and none of the objectives for the first day were met. In the British sector, for example, Caen, a major town some 10 miles south of the coast, should have been taken by midnight of D-Day, 6 June. In fact, German resistance was so stiff that the centre of Caen would not be liberated until 9 July and the expulsion of the Germans from the southern suburbs took another 9 days of intense, bloody, struggle: 30,000 British and Canadian troops were killed, alongside 3,000 civilians. For comparison, on 6 June the fatalities were in the region of 5,000 across all landing areas – beaches and air assault.

Although the Supreme Allied Commander was American, his Deputy, Air Chief Marshal Arthur Tedder, and the three force commanders were British: Admiral Bertram Ramsay, Naval forces, Air Chief Marshal Trafford Leigh-Mallory air forces, and General Bernard Law Montgomery for the land forces.

Ramsay commanded the Royal Navy, United States Navy, plus supporting nations (Dutch, Norwegian and French navies) and Merchant Navy; Leigh-Mallory controlled the Allied Tactical Air Force (comprising the RAF’s 2nd Tactical Air Force and US Ninth Air Force); Air Defence of Great Britain; Transport (RAF 38 and 46 Groups); and 85 Group (Reconnaissance). Montgomery commanded the 21st Army Group which, on 6 June, comprised the US First Army under General Omar Bradley and the Second British Army under General Miles Dempsey.

The role of the RAF

Without air superiority, the invasion could not have taken place.

Avro Ansons and Airspeed Oxfords used for CASEVAC (casualty evacuation) – NOTE Red Cross markings

Many Medical Orderlies trained at RAF Hendon: Crown copyright

The Allied Tactical Air force was there to support the army. For this 2nd Tactical Air Force (2TAF) alone (not counting US 9th AAF) had under Leigh-Mallory’s direct control vast numbers of aircraft: for air defence, strike and photo reconnaissance: Spitfires 62 Squadrons; Mosquito 21; Typhoon 19; Mustang 11; Mitchell 4; Tempest, Beaufighter and Boston 2 each; and 4 squadrons of Auster AOP (Air Observation Platform) for close artillery spotting. Transport assets were Dakota 5 squadrons; Albermarle 4; Stirling 3 and Halifax 2 (four-engined bombers were needed to tow the massive tank-carrying Hamilcar gliders). 2TAF had its own Air Sea Rescue fleet of Warwick, Walrus, Lysander and Sea Otter. For CASEVAC (casualty evacuation back to UK base hospitals), Dakotas would carry war stores on the way out and casualties on the way back (therefore not marked with Red Cross) but dedicated aircraft were Anson and – almost unbelievably, Handley Page Sparrow, modified Harrow, themselves derived from pre-war Imperial Airways Handley Page airliners (with many female medical assistants on those CASEVAC planes having trained at RAF Hendon). And although not appearing in the formal list, Hurricanes delivering urgent despatches and soldiers’ mail. Even Albacore and Swordfish – biplanes obsolete even before the war started – were used as late as the end of 1944, flying from Belgian airstrips on anti-submarine patrols. If all that were not enough, Leigh-Mallory could also call on Bomber Command and the US 8th Air Force’s Flying Fortresses and Liberators. Despite strong opposition from Air Chief Marshal Harris and General Doolittle of the USAAF, between May and September, the Lancasters and Halifaxes were redeployed away from strategic night bombing of German industrial cities to tactical targets such as railway marshalling yards, gun emplacements and troop concentrations, often by day.

Dakotas would bring in war stores and evacuate casualties – not eligible for Red Crosses

Fairey Swordfish in use by 2nd Tactical Air Force as late as December 1944.Painted all black, with radar, to hunt U-Boats. Rockets just visible under lower port wing of centre aircraft

The full Order of Battle can be found in ‘2nd Tactical Air Force’ (Shores and Thomas pp 120 – 121 see bibliography below). And for those who seek an exquisite level of detail, this author can suggest Michael Bowyer’s ‘Aircraft for the Many’ (see bibliography).

The armies in France needed close air support so a series of Advanced Landing Grounds (ALG) were constructed – an Emergency Landing Strip (B1 at Asnelles-sur-Mer) opened on D+1 (the first day after landing on 6 June, i.e. 7 June), just inland from Gold Beach, with the first proper ALGs on D+8 at Bazenville (B 2) and Beny-sur-Mer (B 4). Thereafter, ALG were built to follow the advancing front line, with B 70 by September at Antwerp, later ones using existing Luftwaffe airfields, as available.

Bomber Command Lancasters attacked German shore batteries and troops to support landings

Biggest bomb bay of the war

Aircraft were rearmed, refuelled and maintained by Aircraft Servicing Commandos – regular ground personnel who had also undergone standard army infantry training as ALG often came under attack. Full radar and fighter control support soon arrived, including on modified ships [see https://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/blog/lawn-mowing-on-d-day/]. Typhoon fighters, using rocket projectiles (RP), would operate a ‘cab-rank’ system over the front line whereby there would always be a squadron in the air, circling and waiting to be called down called down to attack specific targets by an RAF controller on the ground, using a radio in a scout car.

However, even 2TAF and Bomber Command had to be partially diverted away from army support from late June because of the appearance of two new and remarkably advanced weapons, the V-1 and V-2 [V for Vergeltungswaffe Revenge or Retaliation]. The V-1 (Fiesler Fi 103), called doodlebug or buzz-bomb, was a high-speed pilotless jet bomber and the V-2 was the world’s first ballistic missile (designed by Wernher von Braun who, later, used that experience to build the Saturn V which took men to the moon]. The first V-2 fell on London on 8 September, launched from western Holland. Both weapons caused high casualties and immense damage in London and southern England and the launch sites were heavily bombed. But the menace only stopped when the launch sites in France, Belgium and Holland were over-run by Canadian troops.

Spitfire IX fitted with bomb racks (UK airfield) Crown copyright

Fighter Direction Tender – RAF controllers sailed with the fleet

After the landings, Montgomery’s strategy was to have the British Army (on the eastern beaches) acting as a hinge against the Germans, centred on the area around Caen, whilst the American First Army at the western end of the landing area, broke out firstly south and west to capture the port of Cherbourg and Brittany, then east towards Germany, ultimately to link up with the Allied forces which landed in the South of France in Operation Dragoon on 15 August. Paris was liberated the same day, on 15 August. In the north, after the wholesale destruction of German forces in the Falaise pocket (19 August), progress eastwards along the Channel coast was rapid, Brussels being liberated on 4 September and the port of Antwerp the same day – 300 miles in just two weeks, a phenomenal 20 miles a day.

But, at this point, the rapid advance along the whole front line from the North Sea to Switzerland stalled. Men exhausted, equipment worn out and broken and, crucially, supplies falling far below need. Initially, all supplies had to be landed over the beaches via the two artificial Mulberry Harbours but the American one was wrecked by a storm on 29 June, leaving just the British Mulberry at Arromanches. The port of Cherbourg had been captured by American forces but the Germans had wrecked that port and turned others along the Channel and Atlantic coasts into Festung [fortresses], so heavily defended that some held out until the final German surrender in May 1945. With the French railway network having been destroyed by Allied bombing, stores for a million and more men had to be driven all the way, 450 and more miles from Normandy. A couple of examples of the supplies problem will suffice: planning staff had worked on the assumption that Aachen would be reached on D+360 (360 days after the landing), whereas the reality was that Aachen fell on D+90. Second: Allied forces on the continent needed 1 million gallons of petrol a day, but were receiving only a fraction of that amount: Patton had ordered 400,000 gallons but received 32,000 – leading to his famous plea ‘my men can eat their leather belts but my tanks gotta have gas’. Petrol was being airfreighted in jerry-cans by Halifaxes, each flight carrying 30,000 gallons but consuming an equal amount in the effort. Even as the Germans retreated, the Allies simply could not pursue them. The logistical network could not be accelerated to that extent.

Hawker Typhoon with under-wings bomb racks – ‘Bombphoons’

Advanced Landing Grounds established where Air Servicing Commandos would rearm and refuel Second Tactical Air Force aircraft

How had this state of affairs arisen? The US Army conducted in-depth analysis later and for a detailed and well-argued analysis, this author would commend a paper by Roland Ruppenthal, a US Army logistician, at https://history.army.mil/books/70-7_18.htm.

This desperate shortage of supplies brought to a head the simmering disputes over strategy, characterised as ‘broad front versus narrow front’. Since the Normandy invasion, the command of the land armies had changed, with General Eisenhower, Supreme Commander, taking direct charge of the three armies now in the field: Field Marshal Montgomery’s 21st Army Group; American Lieutenant-General Omar Bradley’s 12th; and British Lieutenant-General Jacob Devers’ 6th. The disagreements over strategy between Eisenhower, Montgomery, Bradley and General ‘Old Blood and Guts’ George S. Patton, commander of the US Third Army under Bradley, have filled many books. But, in summary, Eisenhower favoured coordinated progress along the whole front-line from Switzerland to the English Channel whereas Generals Montgomery and Patton both favoured concentrating resources on a narrow push into the heart of Germany. Both Generals were forthright, antagonistic towards each other and each claimed the need for all available resources to pursue their own preferred strategies.

Montgomery and Eisenhower were critical of each other: Montgomery asserted that Eisenhower knew nothing of conducting war whereas Eisenhower – mindful that US men and forces now predominated – said Montgomery knew nothing of politics. Indeed, at one point, Eisenhower actually had to pull rank on Montgomery and order him to stop pushing for absolute priority and follow orders.

Treats for the Troops – bomb rack modified to carry kegs Crown copyright

‘Joy Juice’ graffiti as beer poured into fuel tank Crown copyright

Nevertheless, Eisenhower was aware that the First Allied Airborne Army was standing idle in Britain. This comprised the British First Airborne Division (which had not been in Normandy for Overlord), the 1st Polish Parachute Brigade, as well as the 82nd and 101st American Airborne Divisions who had dropped into Normandy. Ever since Montgomery had come to fame as the victor at El Alamein, in the Western Desert, he had always been viewed as a cautious, meticulous, planner who did nothing by chance – viewed in this manner by British, American and German military men alike. The leading German General in the West, von Rundstedt, described Montgomery as ‘over-cautious, habit-ridden and systematic.’ But Mongomery had devised a daring plan for a lightning strike into the German manufacturing heartland of the Ruhr – bypassing the Siegfried Line of forts along the east bank of the Rhine- and finishing the war by Christmas. And before the Red Army storming in from the east arrived in Berlin. Montgomery proposed this plan to Eisenhower at a meeting in Belgium on 10 September, who was so surprised and impressed by this initiative that he authorised Montgomery’s plan – indeed, in a post-war interview with an author (Stephen Ambrose, see bibliography), he said that he had positively instructed Montgomery to proceed. Operation Market Garden was born.

Author’s Note: RAF Museum has very kindly provided access to documents and photographs but the views expressed herein are the author’s alone.

V1 Author at Smithsonian Washington DC

V2 Author at Smithsonian Washington DC

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND FURTHER READING

2nd Tactical Air Force: Volume One Spartan to Normandy, Christopher Shores

2nd Tactical Air Force: Volume Two Breakout to Bodenplatte, Christopher Shores and Chris Thomas: Classic/Ian Allan 2004

A Bridge Too Far cinema film directed by Joseph Levene, directed by Richard Attenborough Released by United Artists 1977

A Bridge Too Far, Cornelius Ryan; Hamish Hamilton 1974

Aircraft of the Many, Michael Bowyer Patrick Stephens

D-Day Atlas, Charles Messenger; Thames & Hudson 2004

https://history.army.mil/books/70-7_18.htm

Overlord, Max Hastings; Michael Joseph 1984

The Longest Day, Cornelius Ryan; Victor Gollancz 1960

The Supreme Commander: the War Years of General Dwight D Eisenhower, Stephen Ambrose, Doubleday 1970 p 518 as quoted by Ryan