PC/WI : Hobart Funnies & DD Tanks used in "Market Garden"?

WILDGEESE

Gone Fishin'
As it says on the tin

What if XXX Corp where equipped with Horbart's Funnies and DD tanks at the start of the operation to

a) Help with the capture of the bridges

b)To cross the rivers if a bridge was destroyed

c)To help storm a bridge that was in enemy hands ( Maj Julian Cook's crossing)

d) To avoid a bridge that was in enemy hands and thus create a bridgehead on the other bank.

Would this work?

Would it speed up the operation?

Regards filers
 
Market-Garden was basically a last minute operation. XXX Corps was already engaged in combat operations in Belgium when it was tasked with pushing into Holland.
In 1945 for the Rhine crossings like Operation Varsity the Allies had plenty of prep time to bring up landing craft and Amtracs.
You need a POD where a push into Holland was already expected. Using DD tanks mean training crews how to use them and pulling tanks off the line to add the necessary equipment.
 
The most important thing is to move the areas of responsibility of the Army groups as early as possible before the capture of Antwerp

So move the area of responsibility for 2nd Br Army group further North and West to include Antwerp and the area beyond - this will make it easier for 2nd BR army unit commanders to exploit any success and likely shorten the clearing of teh area and reduce the number of Gr 15th Army personnel who managed to escape

Also for Ike as soon as Antwerp had been captured so quickly (and it was quickly) to remove the responsibility of the Channel ports from the 1st Canadian army and have them masked / besieged by new French divisions and 'greener' US Army Divisions ASAP - with the intention that the Candians would close up to the Sheldt quicker than OTL in full force and clear it ASAP.

Walcheren Island may have to wait until the Commando units had rebuilt from the losses in Normandy so it is unlikely that the assault on the Island can take place much earlier than OTL but much of hte Area to the East and North East of it could have already been cleared by the 1st CAN

In this context DD and Buffelo along with other Funnies would very likely have mnade a difference at the tactical level - if they were pushed forwards earlier (I have no idea as to their actual availability OTL)

Ww2_map68.jpg


As for Market Garden - everyone on the Western Allied side wanted to bounce the Rhine - everyone

Market Garden also made sense because it pushed V2 launch sites further East and out of range of London
 
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Nope, the best move would be to clear the approaches to Antwerp.

To make Antwerp usable as a port, you have to reach the line of the Maas anyway.

And as noted above the major delay in clearing Walcheren Island was the need to refit the seaborne assault units, especially the smaller support craft which had been sitting off Le Havre for 3 months.
 
As it says on the tin

What if XXX Corp where equipped with Horbart's Funnies and DD tanks at the start of the operation to

a) Help with the capture of the bridges

b)To cross the rivers if a bridge was destroyed

c)To help storm a bridge that was in enemy hands ( Maj Julian Cook's crossing)

d) To avoid a bridge that was in enemy hands and thus create a bridgehead on the other bank.

A reminder that the concept of Market Garden was XXX Corps was advancing along " a carpet of airborne troops". It was not the intention that they would have to fight their way across river barriers due to delays that this would cause in having to build a series of bridges - see the flanking Corps speed of advance compared with XXX Corps.
 
OTL The Canadian Army was exhausted and desperately short of infantry by the time they reached the outskirts of Antwerp. The Canadian Black Watch infantry regiment suffered 350 % casualties in Northwest Europe during less than a year of fighting! They had to press cooks, clerks; drivers, etc. into the front lines to replace infantry casualties. Since few of these re-purposed support trades understood the finer points of infantry tactics, they were added to infantry casualties lists.

ATL To create a healthier Canadian Army, you would need to move to POD back a couple of years and introduce conscription in 1941 or 1942. Oh! .... and send zombies (conscripts) to Europe as soon as they were trained.

Oh! Give General Worthington the big-gunned Ram 3 tank that he requested. Worthy always wanted a Ram with a 75mm - or larger - gun. A well-gunned Ram tank would thin German tank ranks quicker.
 
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With perfect hindsight, 1st Airborne should have been used to capture Walcheren Island in conjunction with other British forces, opening Antwerp and capturing the remains of 15th Army. The two American Airborne divisions should have assisted 1st US Army in breaking through the West Wall at Aachen.
 
With perfect hindsight, 1st Airborne should have been used to capture Walcheren Island in conjunction with other British forces, opening Antwerp and capturing the remains of 15th Army. The two American Airborne divisions should have assisted 1st US Army in breaking through the West Wall at Aachen.

The Islands interior was flooded - so an airbourne drop was not feasable.

It was down to an ampbibious and infantry centric operation hence the use of Royal Marine and Army Commandos etc (and the need to wait for them while these elements were refitted most having not come off the line till the end of August)

That being said no reason why the 1st Airbourne (or the US Divisions for that matter) could not have been used to reinforce the Canadians had they not been used - as it was the Walcheran op did use the 52nd Lowland Division which was an 'air portable' division as the follow up wave of the initial Commando and Canadian assaults.

The 52nd had been intended to reinforce the Airbourne troops after Arnhem Airport had been captured but this obviously did not happen.
 
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