Operation Overlord: Operation Market Garden And The Normandy Invasion

Secondly In addition to Operation Overlord, Operation Market Garden was a key attempt that would help delilitated the German army. With the successful landings in Normandy the allies were pushing deeper into Europe, the retreat of German forces all the way to the Rhine River allowed the Allied armies be on the front doorstep of the Rhineland. Established in the south was the United States and in the North was The UK and Canada. Commanded by Field Marshal Montgomery of the United Kingdom, he convinced General Eisenhower to put a halt on all allied advances and put major time and resources into a plan that could possible end the war by Christmas. According to the Oxford Companion to World War II, Operation Market Garden main goal was, “Divided
This Operation began on October, 14 1944 and ended on October, 15 1944. It was a joint mission that was conducted by the Royal Air Force and The U.S. Army Air force, in command was Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris of the UK and Lieutenant General James H. Doolittle of the United States. The main objective for this mission was to bomb the German cities of Duisburg and Koln. The allies wanted to make a point to Germany and Hitler's mighty Luftwaffe that they were no match to the air superiority that the allies contained, a statement that was well received. On October, 14 1944 the allies launched nearly a two thousand bombers with the help of fighter planes that escorted them along the way. Even though there were two different cities being bombed, it was the cooperation of the United States and the United Kingdom that allowed the success of this mission to be possible. The United States would send close to 1,200 bombers to bomb the city of Koln along with roughly 750 fighter planes. On the other half of the operation the British would send about 1,000 bombers. On the daybreak of October, 14 1944 the United Kingdom and the United States sent their Air Forces to embark on one of the largest bombing campaigns of the war, an estimated 12,000 tons of bombs were dropped on the cities of Duisburg and Koln. The same night the Royal Air Force returned to the city of Duisburg and delivered roughly another 4,000 tons of explosives on the city in multiple waves of strategic air bombings. The mission was a success as the Allies did destroy the city and their targets along with sending a hard and devastating blow to the Nazi homeland. There was an estimated death toll of 600 casualties, however most of the German people did survive and had to be evacuated due to the devastation of the cities. In the allies case they had suffered minimal casualties with around 30 aircrafts loss and a major boost in moral.