DRIVE INTO THE TEETH

fire. It is impossible to drive on. Allaround enemy parachutes. Up untilnow it appears paratroopers havelanded in battalion strength aroundVeghel and Loon. Also by Grave,Nijmegen and Arnhem.'

'All the bridges there fell undamagedinto enemy hands. That much wasclear. It seems like sabotage.'

'I met a major from 1 Fallschirmjägerheadquarters in front of Eindhoven,he reported that the bridges atZaltbommel and Gorinchem alsoappear to be in enemy hands. This waslater found to be false, no enemy hadlanded there. Back to Valkenswaardbut impossible to get through becauseof heavy artillery fire. In Helmond aseverywhere else confusion reigns. Ourengineers there are still beingimproperly led.'

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'101 American Airborne Division hasbeen tasked to secure crossing pointsover the water obstacles, at Son-StOedenrode and Veghel, and holdthem until the attacking Britishground forces - Guards ArmouredDivision, 50th Infantry and 43Infantry Divisions - link up. Thelatter are assaulting towardEindhoven.'

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A Waco glider from the first wave was shotdown near Student's headquarters in Vught.lifting through the debris, a Feldwebelfound a collection of documents of suchimportance that within hours they were onhe General's desk. The papers were a set oforders for MARKET, the air plan. Sufficientmaterial could be pieced together to enablehe staff of LXXXVIII Corps to advise itscommander the same evening that:

General Student immediately grasped thefull implication of the Allied plan. He him-self had initiated and led a similar operationfour years before. Then, the objective hadbeen to lay an airborne carpet across therivers and canals that formed 'Fortress Hol-land' in May 1940. This time it was theAllies attempting to establish a bridgeheadacross the lower Rhine, going the otherway. Moreover, thus far it appeared to besucceeding.The American 101 Airborne Divisionhad dropped nearest to the ground link-upforces. Its task was to secure 15 miles of the'corridor' between Eindhoven, Son, StOedenrode and Veghel. By the end of thefirst day Son had been captured, but thebridge blown. The other two crossingpoints were captured intact.In the middle of the corridor 82 (US)Airborne Division was to capture thebridges at Grave over the Maas, astride theMaas-Waal canal, and the huge road bridge

Preceding page) THE INITIAL GERMAN REACTION WEST OF ARNHEM DURINGTHE AFTERNOON OF 17 SEPTEMBER 1944.Krafft's SS Training and Replacement Battalion 16 provides a temporary block with threecompanies; while Weber's Luftwaffe Kampfgruppe attacks the landing-zones from Deelenairfield. Krafft's recce and probing attacks are repulsed, and he forms a defensive line which iseventually outflanked by 1 and 3 PARA by late afternoon. A more substantial blocking forcehas meanwhile begun to establish itself along the line of the Dreyenseweg and railway line.This is the SS Kampfgruppe Spindler thickening up between 2000 and 2359. Krafft retreatsalong the railway line and links up with Spindler. Frost's 2 PARA has bypassed this Germanresistance forming from north to south and advances at speed eastward along the line of thelower Rhine, and captures the northern end of the Arnhem road bridge. (Map compiled fromKrafft's original report and maps.)

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