All language subtitles for World War II Secrets From Above - Season 2 - EP-04 - Operation Market Garden

September, 1944.

Allied forces launch an all-out attack in
the Netherlands with an ambitious aim.

To bring World War II
to an end by Christmas.

To succeed, they must
engage in fierce combat

with Nazi tanks and infantry
far behind the enemy front line.

Capture key bridges across the Dutch
countryside and seize a corridor into Germany.

The epic mission pits the elite battalions

of the Allied Army
against Nazi military might

in the largest airborne
assault in history.

In this series, we investigate
the most extraordinary events

of World War II from a
brand new perspective.

Matching rarely seen archive film,

photography from the front
line, and declassified aerial

reconnaissance images
to their original locations.

We reconstruct the crucial
battles, daring bombing raids, and

deadly terror weapons, which
change the course of history.

Soaring over the battlefields, we reveal
the secrets of World War II from above.

September, 1944.

An Allied aircraft flies
over the German-occupied

Netherlands, photographing
landscapes and bridges.

The images are taken
in aid of an audacious

plan to cut right through
the Nazi front lines,

invade Germany, and bring
World War II to a swift end.

This targeted offensive strike is
named Operation Market Garden.

The focus of the attack will be the
Dutch town of Arnhem on the River Rhine.

In 1944, a huge steel
bridge crosses the river here.

It sits around 19 kilometers
from the German border.

If the Allies can capture the bridge,
Germany is practically in sight.

Five years after the start of the war,

the Allies finally have
the Nazis on the ropes.

They have driven them out of France
and are poised to push right into Germany.

But in their way is the Siegfried Line,

a 600-kilometer-long defensive chain
of bunkers, tank traps, and barbed wire

that runs all the way along
the western edge of Germany.

To get round this formidable
obstacle with their armies,

the Allies must secure the
river crossing in Arnhem.

Then they can flood into
Germany and attack the

Nazis' industrial
heartland, the Rohr Valley.

Military historian Lynette Nussbacher

investigates the strategy
behind the Allied command.

There is a certain
sentiment in senior Allied

circles that if they give
the German armed forces

a mighty great whack,
stab through into Germany,

it will be possible to
end the war in weeks.

Operation Market Garden is the brainchild
of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery.

He develops his plan in just a few weeks.

The Allies must get their
forces through the Netherlands

and around the German
defenses on the Siegfried Line.

So Montgomery plans an airborne
assault on an unprecedented scale,

dropping tens of thousands
of troops into enemy territory.

The first British soldiers on the ground

must capture a critical bridge
in Arnhem from the Germans.

Only then can the bulk of
the Allied troops in armor

advance and take the
fight to the Nazis' home turf.

For his scheme to succeed, Montgomery
needs to move thousands of troops

and hundreds of tons of
equipment onto the ground.

To do this, he plans to
use gliders and fly multiple

missions over consecutive
days to drop soldiers and kit.

Not only can gliders land
battle-ready troops together,

they can carry jeeps and armored
vehicles, crucial hardware if

the Allies are to mount an
effective attack behind enemy lines.

The glider has another critical advantage.

By 1944, the Allies are
burning through reserves

of metal to build tanks,
ships, and weapons.

This aircraft is made of wood.

The Second World War is a war of resource,
and non-ferrous metals are precious.

If you can make your
gliders out of plywood,

then you are saving metal
to go somewhere else.

On the morning of the
17th of September, the first

gliders deployed in Operation
Market Garden take off.

Gliders don't have engines
to power them into the air.

Instead, they are towed
behind fighter planes.

A long cord tethers
the two aircraft together.

Pilots cut the cord when they
want the gliders to descend and land.

Built out of cheap materials,
they are made to be abandoned.

The flight experience for the 30-odd troops

crammed into the bare wooden
fuselage could be terrifying.

The soldiers feel an eerie silence.

They are in something with no engine,
so the only noise comes from the wind

and the jet stream buffeting
these gliders from the tug aircraft.

It's like being in
turbulence on an airline

or only worse, and
some of the soldiers panic.

Over the entire operation,
34,000 troops will make

the flight into the
German-occupied Netherlands.

On the first day of Operation Market Garden,
the aircraft create a colossal convoy,

almost five kilometers wide
and over 150 kilometers long.

As the pilots cut the
cords, gliders descend

and fill the fields with soldiers
and equipment as they land.

Hundreds of elite paratroopers
fall from the sky to join them.

Former Royal Marine Arthur Williams

explores what happens
when airborne troops

touch down in the fields
just outside of Arnhem.

The sight would have been awe-inspiring.

It was the largest airborne operation
ever conceived by man up until that point.

Once they're on the ground, the troops
must run an over 10 kilometer long gauntlet

of German fire to reach
their ultimate target,

the bridge that crosses
the Lower Rhine in Arnhem.

The landings go to plan, but
the soldiers' real test lies ahead.

Airborne forces have the ability
to land and secure somewhere

very quickly, take advantage
of the element of surprise,

move quickly because
they're lightly armored, but what

they don't have is the
ability to survive for very long.

In the days before the operation,
sources report that Nazi troop numbers

increase around Arnhem,
but they are ignored.

Two divisions of German troops

equipped with heavily armored
cars are stationed in the area.

Alongside emergency Nazi formations, they
quickly rally to repel the Allied attack.

Of the soldiers who land in Arnhem on
the first day of Operation Market Garden,

the 2nd Parachute Battalion
make it to the bridge.

Their commanding officer is Lieutenant
Colonel of the British Army, John Frost.

Around 745 men arrive
at the bridge's northern

ramp on the afternoon
of September the 17th.

They dig in, ready for a fight.

One of the measures we took
was to bring one of the anti-tank guns,

two of them I think we had, so they
were then put quickly into position

so as to cover the main
road, and if any enemy

opened up, we fired at
them with the anti-tank guns.

The following day, on the 18th of September,
German soldiers launched their attack.

22 armored cars of the 9th SS Panzer
Division crossed the bridge towards Frost.

But as the Nazi convoy
reaches the northern

end, the elite British
paratroopers open fire

with anti-tank guns from
their hidden positions.

It's total carnage for the Panzer Division,

and the northern end of the
bridge remains in Allied hands.

Frost and his men repel the Nazi
attack, but their battle is not won yet.

German troops circle around
them, and more are on their way.

The paratroopers are cut off from the rest
of the airborne soldiers and under siege.

Now their only hope is to hold on long
enough for Allied heavy firepower to arrive.

The troops that had managed to
seize Arnhem Bridge will be elated.

They've done their job.

All they need to do
now is wait for the other

elements to do their
job too and relieve them.

If they do that, Market Garden's a success.

Salvation is on its way.

But almost 100 kilometers
of Nazi-occupied territory

lies between backup forces
and the bridge at Arnhem.

The Allied plan to invade
Germany and end World War II

relies on reinforcing the
men besieged by Nazi troops

at the northern end of
the bridge in Arnhem.

But the route they must
take from Allied territory

through German-occupied
Netherlands is fraught with danger.

It's a road that becomes
known as Hell's Highway.

On the first day of
Operation Market Garden,

tens of thousands of British
ground troops and armor

set out north from the
Dutch-Belgian border.

Their task is to reach
Arnhem in just four days.

Hell's Highway is extremely narrow.

Close to 20,000 vehicles,
including 200 tanks,

funnel into a column that
stretches 112 kilometers long.

They act as an artery, channeling supplies

and delivering military might
towards the troops in Arnhem.

Former tank commander, Matt Winters,

examines the American-made
tank that leads the charge.

It's amazing to be up close to a Sherman.

It's one of the most iconic
tanks from World War II

on the Allied side.

It's what you always picture when
you see sort of tanks from World War II.

Sherman tanks are a crucial
weapon in the Allied war arsenal.

Many are built on American factory lines
previously used for mass-producing cars.

The Allies deploy thousands of
Sherman tanks to every battlefront.

They outnumber German
tanks almost three to one.

Sherman tanks are fast.

They reach top speeds of
around 42 kilometers per hour.

Their relatively light armor
makes them maneuverable

and gives them a tactical advantage
in the small towns of Western Europe.

But in the Dutch terrain,
they're vulnerable.

Allied commanders believe that the Dutch
ground is too soft for tank operations.

So they advance forward
along a single narrow highway.

For the crew inside the Sherman, it
could be a claustrophobic experience.

I'm sitting here in the gunner's seat.

Behind me, I'd have the commander sitting
right up next to me, probably standing.

You've got five different
people all talking at once, all

with their own jobs to do,
trying to make the tank work.

The light battle armor of the Sherman
tank suddenly becomes an Achilles heel

as the machines travel end
to end through Nazi territory.

To save weight, the distribution of
the armor on the Sherman was uneven.

So at the front, where you were most likely

to get hit by the enemy, it
was a lot thicker compared to

on the side, where you're
unlikely to receive any fire.

The Allied tanks are hemmed
in along Hell's Highway.

Their thinner flanks
are vulnerable to attack.

Your worst nightmare would be to be going
along in a column in one straight line

where your sides were exposed and you
weren't able to move one way or the other.

Within minutes of entering
German-held territory,

Nazi firepower decimates
nine Allied tanks.

On such a narrow highway,
destroyed tanks quickly block the road

and Allied troops find
themselves stuck in a traffic jam.

By the end of day one
of Operation Market Garden,

the ground troops
and tanks have advanced

only 11 kilometers towards
the siege at Arnhem.

But as the tanks that survive
slowly crawl through Dutch towns and villages,

the battered crews are greeted with crowds

and spontaneous
celebrations fill the streets.

Yet ahead of the convoy lies an obstacle

which could bring their
progress to an abrupt halt.

Lieutenant Colonel John Frost
and his elite airborne troops

have taken control of the bridge
crossing the Rhine in Arnhem.

To reach them, Allied ground reinforcements
must overcome a series of challenges.

One of the most difficult lies just
south of the Dutch village of Son.

Today, a 70-foot wide lift bridge

crosses the Wilhelmina
Canal in the south of the village.

But before the Second World War,
another bridge stood in its place.

This crossing marks a crucial
stepping stone on the route north.

Capturing the bridge is vital if the Allied
tanks are to reach the troops at Arnhem.

To successfully negotiate
100 kilometers of Hell's Highway,

British ground troops must cross
multiple bridges that are in German hands.

To prevent the Nazis from
blowing up those bridges,

Allied commanders plan
to land troops nearby.

The Americans mobilize two entire airborne
divisions to seize the critical crossings.

They must capture the bridges intact

so British infantry
and artillery can quickly

advance towards the
beleaguered men at Arnhem.

At Son, the Allies' carefully
laid plans look set to unravel.

As the troops approach the
Wilhelmina Canal,

German defenders detonate explosives
and blow up the crossing.

With the help of locals,
the American soldiers

quickly assemble a
rickety timber footbridge.

But they must build something far
stronger to get heavy tanks across.

At the nearby Overloan War Museum,

engineer Zainab Adegan investigates
the Allies' solution to this problem.

It's called a bailey bridge.

The purpose of the bailey bridge is to
be able to carry very heavy machinery.

So the importance it had during the war

is absolutely immense.

A bailey bridge can carry
the weight of heavy artillery.

But the Allies need to be able to build it

in the middle of a combat
zone for it to serve its purpose.

With a traditional bridge,
you need very heavy materials

and heavy
machinery, heavy cranes.

But with the bailey bridge,
you don't need any of that.

You're literally relying on human
power to be able to put it into place.

70 kilometers north in Arnhem, Allied
soldiers are facing increasingly heavy fire.

Back at sun, on the 18th of
September, engineers work

through the night to piece
together a bailey bridge by hand.

Using material brought in by
trucks in the Allied ground convoy.

They use pieces of steel, light
enough to be carried by soldiers,

to build a platform strong enough
to support the convoy of tanks.

Thinking about six men having to carry
this section, it is still quite heavy,

but just light enough for them to carry
and to be able to put this into place.

And it really demonstrates
the modularity of the design.

A bailey bridge has
distinctive diamond-shaped trusses,

which reinforce side panels.

These help to stop the bridge
from twisting under heavy weights.

Simple pins and clamps
hold each section together.

The bailey bridge is a fantastic
triumph in engineering, to be very honest.

It comes together as a set of
pieces, almost like a big jigsaw.

This design means that
building a bailey bridge

long enough to span a crossing
as wide as the Vilhelmina Canal,

can take less than 24 hours.

But in Operation Market
Garden, every second counts.

As the first Allied tanks roll towards
sun on the 19th of September,

time is running out for the
men at the bridge in Arnhem.

And further east, Allied airborne units
are in the midst of another epic struggle.

As Lieutenant Colonel John Frost's battalion
struggles to hold the bridge at Arnhem,

other Allied units fight to capture the
Nazi-held route through the Netherlands.

Another of their key targets is
close to the Dutch city of Grave.

More than 20 kilometers south of Arnhem,
the American 82nd Division

dropped their troops into five zones.

Their mission is to secure
a corridor that will give

the Allied reinforcements
a clear run to the north.

One of the most critical
strategic locations

they must capture is
a crossing in Grave.

The bridge spans the powerful Maas River
and is close to half a kilometer long.

Historian Guy Walters investigates the
challenge the Allied commanders face.

That bridge is an
absolutely vital link in

the chain that is
Operation Market Garden.

You've got to take every single bridge if
you're gonna get all the way to Arnhem.

If German soldiers destroy this crossing,

it will be almost impossible
to build a bailey bridge

quickly enough to reach
the troops at Arnhem.

It's crucial that the
Allies take it intact.

It isn't going to be easy.

German troops stand guard and two
defensive fortifications called case mates

on the southern side of
the bridge help to defend it.

The southern most
structure is heavily armed.

On the roof, the Nazis place a 20 millimeter
flat gun that can fire in any direction.

On the top level, they aim machine
guns east towards the bridge.

They pack explosives on the floor
below and store ammunition underground.

Allied fighter planes have already targeted
the fortifications guarding the bridge.

These are from a Mustang,
probably flying from somewhere

over where there shoulder, seeing
this and thinking, you know what?

I'm gonna have a go at that and unleashing
this hail of lead, pa, pa, pa, pa pa, all the way along.

But these aerial attacks have
failed to take out the German guns.

This place is so well defended.

Yeah, the thickness of the walls

it makes you feel almost invincible.

You're gonna be sitting in here
thinking, machine gun fire all around me.

You know what?

The walls are about a meter thick.

Whoever attacks me, I'm
gonna be absolutely fine.

The first Allied feet on the ground
belong to Lieutenant John Samuel Thompson.

He leads a squad of just 16 men.

They drop from the sky and land
a few hundred yards from the bridge

and the defensive casemates.

The paratroopers risk taking
on the formidable fortifications at once,

making the most
of the element of surprise.

Thompson, to his credit,
says, you know what, guys?

There's the bridge.

We can get this.

The troops must cross drainage
ditches to reach the bridge's defenses.

They advance under fire.

What they do is they wade into the water.

You can imagine how
vulnerable they're gonna be.

They're gonna be carrying their weapons
above their heads to keep them dry.

All the time, fire can be put on them.

The small platoon dodge enemy bullets
to reach the other side of the ditches

and eventually take aim
at the southern casemate.

It's a miracle that not one of
those American troops gets hit.

Thompson says to his man with the bazooka,

you know what, you've
gotta take out that

anti-aircraft gun,
otherwise we're in trouble.

He comes to what I guess
would be about here, because the

anti-aircraft gun now can't
suppress down enough to shoot.

He lets off three rounds.

With the German gunner taken out,
the Allies take control of the casemate's

still functioning flat gun and
swiftly capture the bridge.

From your standing here, you
realize how incredible this operation was.

You know, what a really resourceful,

redoubtable leader Lieutenant
Thompson must have been

to have just sat there on
the other side of this canal

with just 15 men thinking,
you know what I'm gonna do?

I'm gonna take that bridge
before any help arrives.

I mean, it is brilliant.

It is absolutely brilliant.

The rapid offensive clears the
road north in a matter of hours.

On the 19th of September, the giant
Allied convoy of tanks and armored cars

cross the bridge, pushing ever closer to
John Frost's embattled battalion at Arnhem.

But to get there, the
ground troops must cross

their greatest obstacle
yet, the mighty Val River.

By the 19th of September, 1944,

the Allies holding Arnhem
Bridge are three days into a siege.

Help is coming.

It is south of the Dutch city of Nijmegen.

The British soldiers at Arnhem Bridge are
isolated, deep in Nazi-occupied territory.

The Allied force sent to relieve
them is less than 20 kilometers away.

The last major obstacle standing in the way

of Allied tanks and
infantry is the Val River.

The road bridge crossing the Val

is the final step in the
Allied plan to get to Arnhem

and finish the job John
Frost's battalion has started.

But taking the bridge in
Nijmegen is easier said than done.

Nazi troops know that
if they surrender this

crossing, Arnhem is
within the Allies' sights.

Battlefield expert, Joris Niewendt,

investigates exactly what's
at stake for the two sides.

For the Nazis in Nijmegen, it's do or die.

If they are able to keep
Nijmegen in German hands,

then the guys at Arnhem will never be reached
and that means the operation will fail.

So they will do anything to
stop the Allies at Nijmegen.

At the beginning of
Operation Market Garden,

an advanced party of Allied
troops arrive at Nijmegen.

The Americans don't
expect any serious resistance,

so they assume that when they get to the
bridge, it'll be a matter of just taking it

and then wait for the
British tanks to arrive.

The strength of the
German defense around

Nijmegen catches the
US troops by surprise.

Under sustained attack
and unable to reach

the bridge, the soldiers
decide to pull back.

They are forced to sit tight
and wait for reinforcements.

Allied commanders know
that the Germans could decide

to destroy the road bridge
crossing the Val at any moment.

The convoy of tanks and heavy artillery

making its way up Hells
Highway can't come soon enough.

But even with reinforcements,
the Germans holding the Nijmegen bridge

will be hard to overpower.

So the Allies get creative
with a daredevil assault.

They send American troops
to cross the river downstream

from the bridge and gain
control over its northern end.

British troops attack the
bridge from the southern side,

hoping to crush the Germans
in a deadly pincer move.

Every second counts for the
troops besieged in Arnhem,

so the soldiers must
cross the Val in daylight.

All they have at their disposal are
flimsy wood and canvas vessels.

Army chaplain Delbert Kiel
is among the first to board.

The British engineers brought the boats.

We almost fainted.

They were flattened by wood
boats with pegs to hold the sides up.

We all looked at each other and said,
"We've never seen a suicide mission.

"This is it.

" I thought, "Oh, if they ever need
me, "they're gonna need me now.

" So I decided I'd cross
with an assault wave.

The troops don't have enough oars.

This forces some men to use
rifle butts to propel the boats.

This is not a normal operation.

I mean, you're under the nose of the enemy.

The enemy is looking down
your throat and you're crossing

this incredibly wide,
fast-flowing river in broad daylight.

It's just off the scale.

They are directly in the crosshairs

of the German soldiers on the rail bridge
to the east and on the northern bank.

From these positions, the
Nazis unleash heavy fire.

Of the 26 boats in the first wave,
only 13 make it to the other side.

Half of the soldiers that make
the crossing are killed or wounded.

Despite heavy losses,
the Allies storm the Nazi defenses

and capture the German soldiers.

With both ends of the bridge
secure and the enemy overrun,

the Allies venture onto Nijmegen
Bridge and defuse the German explosives.

Finally, with the bridge in
Nijmegen in Allied hands,

the waiting convoy of tanks
rolls across the Val River.

Crossing the Val in broad daylight here

was the most courageous
thing that I've ever read about.

I mean, getting inside a flimsy canvas boat

which doesn't have enough
paddles and cross a river

in daylight, get across and complete
the mission, it's just incredible.

The bravery there is just beyond belief.

The heroic capture of
Nijmegen Bridge is a triumph.

But three days on from seizing
Arnhem Bridge, Lieutenant

Colonel John Frost's men
are isolated and exhausted,

and their ammunition is running out.

The Allied captors of Arnhem Bridge
are surrounded by German forces

who are intent on
retaking the Rhine crossing.

The battle enters its end game.

Arthur Williams investigates John Frost

and his men's last stand on
the 20th of September, 1944.

For the British troops
that were fighting the

defense here it would
have been incredibly hard.

They would have had
little sleep, if any at all.

They're under constant attack.

Just think about how much adrenaline

would have been pumping
through their bodies constantly.

You're alert all of the
time, because in the

blink of an eye, it could
be the end of your life.

Surrounded by German forces,

Frost's men hold merely
the northern end of Arnhem Bridge

and need reinforcements badly.

At a hotel five kilometers to the west,

other airborne units are under siege
from German soldiers and cannot help.

The main Allied force of tanks and armored
vehicles is only 15 kilometers away,

but for Frost and his
men, time is running out.

The pressure of the
German attacks is relentless.

When you have a look
around at the makeup

of this area, obviously
it's urban fighting.

You know, that's really
close quarter combat.

It's brutal.

Forget any romantic notion
of daring do adventurous

battles and the liberation
of Arnhem and all that.

This would have been horrendous
for the men that were stationed here.

Supplies are running low.

Frost has been forced to ration
not only food and water, but bullets.

When you're fighting
at close quarters like that,

one thing that you have
to have is ammunition.

And orders had to be
given to the men only to fire

when one was absolutely
certain of having a kill.

But that does allow your
opponent to improve his position

to simply dare not
scatter ammunition about.

As German Panzer tanks close in
on the northern end of Arnhem Bridge,

they demolish British-held
buildings one by one.

If you have a look at the buildings

around the northern
side of the Arnhem Bridge

today, you'll notice that
they're all brand new.

There aren't any old
buildings around this area.

And I think that says a lot
about how much firepower and

destruction was concentrated
on this relatively small spot.

The only hope for the men
at the bridge is the tanks

on Hells Highway, snaking
up the Dutch countryside.

But their convoy is constantly fighting off

brutal counterattacks as Nazi
reinforcements try to sabotage supply lines

and keep the Allied relief force at bay.

The armoured column
moving up from the south

was the airborne
forces' umbilical cord.

It was their lifeline.

If they couldn't reach them really fast,

the troops in the north
just wouldn't survive.

As the hours pass, Frost's
men finally accept that

the tanks are not going
to reach them in time.

They're constantly being
pressed on all sides.

And I'd imagine that optimism
would have pretty quickly

been replaced by just utter
fear of, "We've failed here.

" They just can't hold out.

By 21st September, Frost
and his men have surrendered.

The bridge in Arnhem is in Nazi hands.

Other Allied troops fight on at a hotel
nearby, but soon plans for evacuation begin.

Of the over 34,000 airborne
troops deployed in Operation Market Garden,

more than 10,000
land around Arnhem.

Over 6,000 are captured.

Almost 1,500 British and Polish
airborne troops are killed in combat.

Miraculously, over 2,000 troops withdraw
to safety from the operation's headquarters,

retreating back across the River Rhine.

Operation Market Garden, when
you look at it on paper, it's a good idea.

It makes sense and it can have the
possibility of ending the war by Christmas.

The problem is, as is the
same with any military operation,

you don't want to have
too many moving parts.

In brutal terms, it was a failure.

But there are many benefits
to be taken from the operation.

For all of the towns and
villages in Holland that were

liberated by the Allies,
the war for them was over.

The new front line stabilises
just north of Nijmegen.

One-fifth of the Netherlands has
been clawed back from German hands.

Six months later, in March 1945,
Allied forces finally cross the Rhine.

And the destruction of the
Nazi war machine... ..is in sight.