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Operation Market-Garden: How Intelligence Could Have Changed The Battle

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Operation Market-Garden: How Intelligence Could Have Changed the Battle
Kerry W. Clark, SSG, USA
Senior Leader Course, Class 18-01
Military Intelligence Noncommissioned Officers Academy
Fort Huachuca, Arizona

Operation Market-Garden: How Intelligence Could Have Changed the Battle The purpose of this paper is to investigate how intelligence from the Ultra program could have influenced Operations Market-Garden had the intelligence agencies disseminated it to lower levels. The Ultra program intercepted substantial Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) traffic that could have offered the commanders on the ground an important advantage when they began Operation Market. Had the commanders known the details of the Ultra reports at the onset …show more content…

7). The Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) lead by General Eisenhower approved the operation on 10 September 1944. Field Marshal Montgomery of the British Army championed Operation Market-Garden as part of his “Narrow Front” strategy. General Eisenhower’s “Broad Front” had been working extremely well so far in the war but was beginning to stall due to logistical reasons (Jeffson, 2002, p. 6). This operation was seen as a way to surprise the German Army and end the war before Christmas 1944. The Allied commanders planned the entire operation in seven days and executed it on 17 September …show more content…

Instead, his real threat was from the 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions located north of Arnhem. He could have moved a portion of his division to the north of the Waal River to secure the north side of the bridge. At Arnhem, the commander of the 1st AD would have realized he had a real armor threat to deal with from his north. During planning, he would have identified the need for additional AT weapons as well as needing to move his DZs to the east of Arnhem. Moving the DZs to the east of Arnhem would bring him miles closer to his objective and mean he would not have the German Army Group B screening his objective. General Browning, the overall commander of Operation Market, could have prioritized the Polish 1st Independent Parachute Brigade on day one of Operation Market. He also could have chosen to reinforce the 1st AD with a brigade from the 101st AD. Even without either one of these changes, a portion of the 1st AD was able to make it to the bridgehead and effectively stop German movement across the bridge (Jeffson, 2002, p. 10). Had the 1st AD’s DZ been closer and with additional forces, they could have easily held the 9th and 10th SS Panzer Divisions to the north of the

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