"A Bridge Too Far", Inaccuracies in Movie (1977)

Overall the movie is a Hollywood structured portryal of Operation Market-Garden (the Battle of Arnhem 1944). That having been said, there are several significant inaccuracies which should be cited and explained. As the author of this blog I am endebted to David Rendahl, acknowledge the following article and express my sincere graditude "Bridge Too Far Movie-Serious Inaccuracies David Rendahl Former Intelligence Analyst in the British Army Why does Major Julian Cook's portrayal by Robert Redford involve criticism of the Grenadier Guards, and is there historical truth to those scenes? Historical accuracy in a Bridge Too Far is far from being a truthful account. • Hollywood hero The most egregious film distortion was to eliminate more than half Major Cook’s objectives. We watch Robert Redford run off with a dwindling band of extras to storm one bridge singlehanded. Great stuff for Redford’s charismatic career, but the actual objectives for Cook's 3rd Battalion 504th PIR were a bit more involved. Cook’s responsibility that day included: • taking and holding a beachhead and securing it for a second wave • taking and holding the fortified high ground that overlooked them to the north • taking and holding a rail bridge one mile east of the beachhead • taking and holding a road bridge half a mile further east of the rail bridge. Cook had three of his own rifle companies, his HQ company, artillery teams and advance elements of the 1st Battalion 504th to accomplish all this. A small village that straddled the road to Arnhem north of both bridges was considered the limit of exploitation, Cook was to cross the river, capture all these objectives then fortify and defend them against expected enemy counter attack. It was a big job. When secure he was to call on the Grenadier Guards armoured battle group then fighting through Nijmegen town centre with the 505th PIR, who would cross the road bridge to join his forces at the village and assist in the defence of their perimeter. No one had orders to advance up the Arnhem road until all was secure in Nijmegen town and Waal beachhead. That next move would be the decision at least of Lieutenant General Brian Horrocks, possibly General Dempsey’s, after all the majors, colonels, brigadiers and major generals had reported in. Cook’s 3rd Battalion achieved the crossing of the Waal river with Cook in the leading boat, but after that dodgy moment the Major couldn't go off seeking solo Hollywood glory, he had hundreds of men, multiple objectives and dozens of tactical problems spread over a one or two mile front to command and control. Once across the river Cook established battalion HQ under the fortified high ground and worked with Captain Kappel’s H Company to secure it. This allowed Capt. Burriss’s I Company to turn east and make for the rail bridge approaches, while Cook arranged fire support with elements of the 376th Parachute Field Artillery who had crossed with them. Once both these objectives had been achieved, Cook concerned himself with the continued defence of the high ground and beachhead while making arrangements for Captain Thomas’s G Company to cross in a second wave, bringing across combat engineer teams to make the bridges safe from demolition and then the 1st Battalion 504th PIR, as well as preparing his expanding perimeter for anything the enemy might throw back at him. Once the second wave was on its way Cook gave Buriss the order to go for the road bridge half a mile further east. Cook then stayed at his command post on the high ground commanding his entire battalion perimeter. He never went to the road bridge during the battle for it. • before someone has a hissy fit about me making out Cook was less-than for not living up to Dickie Attenborough’s dramatic direction of Robert Redford - in September 1944 Major Julian Cook was a parachute battalion commander, he could not abandon control of multiple objectives and hundreds of men to seek personal glory acting out a squad commanders job. I don't know of anyone important who says he didn't do a great job as battalion commander in this battle. Those same people would have rightly castigated him for running off fighting jerries and presenting himself as sniper bait like Redford did. • Nijmegen Town. This is a sin of omission in the film. The two bridges at Nijmegen were of absolutely no use whatsoever unless Nijmegen town was captured first. No one was getting across the Waal if the substantial German forces in Nijmegen weren't destroyed first. When Major Cook crossed the river Waal on the 20th September the 82nd Airborne had been on the outskirts of Nijmegen town for three days. They had dropped on the 17th September, seized the Grave bridges and canal bridge with alacrity that same day, but failed to take Nijmegen town or either bridge against light resistance. For two days they waited for XXX Corps allowing German reinforcements to cross into Nijmegen and fortify the town centre and bridge approaches unmolested. When XXX Corps arrived at Nijmegen late on the 18th September - just under 48 hours since starting off in Belgium, fighting their way through 30 miles of German front line, rebuilding the Son bridge and driving another 30 miles overnight to get back on schedule, they were faced with the job of taking Nijmegen town (pop. 100,000) if they wanted to cross the bridge and drive onto Arnhem. Early next morning (19th September) the Grenadier Guards moved into Nijmegen town from the west while the 505th PIR moved off their positions on the Groesbeek heights and into the town from the east. This force would fight its way through multiple fortified buildings all day and into the next (20th September) when Cook made his crossing. By late o’clock (19:00hrs) on the 20th the Greandiers reached the southern approaches of the road bridge just as Buriss’s I company made it to the northern end and requested their support. The Grenadiers had to capture one last major fortified position covering the bridge itself, but after 48hours constant fighting through positions that were supposed to have been taken three days earlier, the Grenadier Guards had suffered more battlefield casualties (killed and wounded) than any other similar size unit in Market Garden* they only had one troop of four tanks and no infantry to send in support. Major Cook’s 600 strong 3rd Battalion 504th PIR suffered 24 killed and 70 wounded crossing the Waal and taking their objectives - a costly action, although not the most costly in the 82nd Airborne. The similar sized 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards lost 90 killed and over 200 wounded in the fight for Nijmegen town and to complete their mission objective. [1] Martin Middlebrook Arnhem 1944 How is this major action depicted in the film? A few cutscenes of British Guardsmen rounding up German prisoners in a burning Nijmegen, before casually driving onto the road bridge all guns firing. I think that a pretty big sin of omission. • Stopping to make tea. With almost half their battalion dead or wounded, just four tanks of the 2nd Battalion Grenadier Guards were able to cross the bridge and go to the support of Buriss’s I company. One tank was almost immediately destroyed by an 8.8cm anti-tank gun, Troop Commander Sergeant Robinson stopped to engage this threat, destroying it and then charged across the bridge with his remaining three tanks. Robinson got into the village where expecting US paratroopers, he was engaged by German infantry. With no infantry of his own to stop and fight them, he advanced on through the village and met Buriss and I Company on the other side, where he was told “You guys are the most beautiful sight I’ve seen for years!”. With fighting still going on in Nijmegen town, the Grenadiers only got one more tank across the river before nightfall, that of Captain Lord Carrington. By the time Carrington made it through the still fighting village to link up with Buriss and Robinson it was dark. Carrington set about positioning his four tanks into defensive positions, supported by US infantry to hold their ground and prevent german infantry sneaking up on them. He and Buriss discussed options to secure their position and toyed with turning around and taking out the Germans in the village, but this is where recollections and scriptwriters begin to differ. The film has Major Cook ask Carrington, in clear daylight, why isn't he moving forward to rescue his own guys at Arnhem? Carrington replies that he doesn't have those orders, the road is exposed and they don't know what threats lie ahead. Carrington says most of his men are still fighting in Nijmegen, when they get here we’ll move on. Cook mocks him by asking ‘must you do everything by the book’ before accusing him of ‘stopping to make tea’ when ‘half my men are dead’ and British Airborne are all getting killed. Carrington shrugs. Firstly Cook was nowhere near the scene. He was about a mile to the east organising the defence of his own perimeter. It was Buriss that Carrington was discussing the situation with. Cook’s 3rd battalion had taken 16% casualties that day, Carrington’s battalion had taken closer to 50%. Buriss recalled to Conelius Ryan, author of A Bridge Too Far that the British tank officer refused to drive onto Arnhem, implying this was where the entire operation failed. This recollection coming several years after the battle. There are no contemporary diary entries or witnesses to the conversation. When this was put to Lord Carrington by Ryan, his recollection was that the US commander made some overly optimistic ideas for his few tanks which he disagreed with, referring to the orders of both men to exploit no further than the village. Both were relatively junior officers, Carrington had three working tanks, fifteen men, no idea what enemy lay on the road to Arnhem and no certainly no authority to order the whole of XXX Corps to support him fighting his way off towards Arnhem in the pitch black night. Buriss was of equal rank in a different force, he had no authority to order Carrington to do anything. This was a disagreement between two junior officers over their individual assessments of a situation many times greater than their scope of vision and responsibility. If one was being cynical you may say that Buriss was deflecting blame for the 82nd putting the entire operation 48 behind schedule by failing to capture Nijmegen and the bridges on day+1. It’s simply more likely two very young officers disagreeing one one of many tactical decisions that day and covering arses ever since. • Nothing stood between XXX Corps and Arnhem. In the film Hardy Kruger, playing German major general Heinz Harmel is watching the three Shermans of Sgt Robinson’s troop pass over Nijmegen road bridge. He orders his man to blow the bridge and send them into the river - the explosives fail, Sgt Robinson crosses the Waal. A young German officer dramatically exclaims ‘what can stop them now’, Kruger replies “nothing”. The real Heinz Harmel has made this same comment in a couple of post-war publications. The film is not misquoting him, but has failed to check his recollection or bias, or the actual disposition of German forces. Harmel is suggesting there was nothing stopping Sgt Robinson from driving his three tanks ten miles up the road in complete darkness, through one defended village, though the defended town of Elst, across open lands on an exposed road with no drive-off areas, through the German reinforcements crossing at the pontoon bridge at Westervoort, that were feeding into the regiment-sized German forces blocking the southern end of the Arnhem road bridge surrounding 2 Para, before going straight into a morning battle over watched from the high ground on the far side of the Rhine with a reinforced Panzer Corps keeping the rest of 1st Airborne Div bottled up at Oosterbeek. Did I mention Sgt Robinson had three Shermans and fifteen men? I’m not calling Heinz Harmel a liar, but I am saying he either had no idea what was going on then, or a very incurious mind since. There was no reason to include that easily provable nonsense in the film, unless you needed a baddie and the Waffen-SS weren’t enough. • Other annoying bits While the tanks of the Irish Guards did support the river crossing of Major Cook's battalion, they were not alone. Two regiments of medium artillery from XXX Corps, a regiment of Sexton self-propelled guns and ground attack sorties from the RAF were also used to suppress the German forces on the far side of the Waal river. That bit where they run out of smoke shells to hide the boats and allow the wind to create gaps for the germans to start slaughtering US soldiers, is though kinda true. The ammo shortage didn't occur during the first wave to cross the river, but by the time Cook’s battalion had seized their first objectives suppressive fire was beginning to slacken. German forces had broken though the positions of the 101st Airborne south of Nijmegen cutting the road(s) and stopping the delivery of artillery and tank ammunition. And artillery uses a lot of ammunition. The reason this rankles is that several scenes later a British Staff officer is curtly shut up by Ryan O’Neil playing General Gavin as an ambitious corporate lawyer, when he reports the road closed behind them. O’Neil suggests having five divisions cut off 60 miles behind enemy lines is no big deal for a real soldier. • A highly mobile tank and mechanised infantry division like the Guards Armoured required 750 tonnes of supplies a day just to remain operational. Figuring in losses to enemy action and increased firepower demands in the middle of a major battle that number could easily double. A light infantry division like the 101st and 82nd Airborne might only need half that amount but there were also the 43rd Wessex and 50th Northumbrian Divisions reliant on those cut logistics. Rather than explain the advance to Arnhem was effectively stopped when the Germans overrun their logistics, the film makes out its just another excuse for inaction by snotty nosed Brits. My uncle, Colonel Bill Conran DSO RE was the engineer responsible for maintaining that road during Market Garden. He had to repair the damage the german counter attack created as well as the allied vehicles pounding it as they counter attacked back. This moment, arguably one of three hinges of fate in Market Garden (the air plan and the failure to capture Nijmegen on day+1) was recaptured and reopened by US and UK forces within 24 hours. A piece of soldiering well worth a movie in its own right. In Bridge too Far it gets bare mention. • important figures left out of the film The film jumps the command structure from Field Marshall Montgomery to Lt. General Browning and Lt. General Horrocks for all the planning and command decisions. This leaves out General Eisenhower who canceled the earlier Operation Comet, stopped the Allied advance for crucial weeks and handed the mission over to the brand new 1st Allied Airborne Army. It leaves out General Lewis Brereton the commander of First Allied Airborne Army who made all the preparations, planning and decisions for the vital transport aircraft streams and drop zones. It was his decision to do away with coup-de-main forces as Op Comet had insisted on. It was he who decided on day drops not night, on three days of landings not one, on distant drop zones that could be defended and refusing to fly two drops on the first day. In the film we have a bumbling RAF officer of low rank making all these decisions, which again is loosely attributed to Montgomery’s planning alone. It leaves out General Miles Dempsey of 2nd British Army who commanded not only Brian Horrocks and his XXX Corps but also VIII Corps who moved up to Venlo in support against the German western wall, and XII Corps who moved to Tilburg on Market Garden’s left flank. I understand a film cannot last thirty eight hours and cover every base in a massive event. I get that roles need to be truncated and amalgamated to make a story entertaining. Just don't expect to be seeing historical truth when you go the the cinema. • last note I had one other relative involved in the battle, Major Brian Urquhart the intelligence officer who warned of tanks at Arnhem before the battle. Although its not relevant to Nijmegen, his scene with General Browning prior to the mission, where he argues the toss over the operational nature of the armour never happened. “Majors don't argue with Lt Generals” he once told me. He’s on record in interviews saying he briefed the three brigade majors of 1st Airborne Div and his boss a brigadier, not Browning. The film makes out two full operational Panzer Divisions were clearly seen on the landing zones days before the drop. Brian in fact got his information from ULTRA decrypts, that remnants of two smashed up Panzer divisions had been moved to the area to be rebuilt. A very different intel picture. 1st Airborne would only face a handful of training tanks and frakenpanzer assault guns in the first two days and destroyed most of them. The Tigers and StuG’s didn't turn up until day three. 8cm Mortar and MG42 stopped 1st Airborne from getting to the bridge. Uncle Brian wasn't sacked after the operation either. Browning recommended him for promotion to Lt.Col and command of one of the Nazi scientist hunting teams. That’s they kind of liberties Hollywood take with historical movies. Not that the truth survives the first bombardment in war, but Bridge Too Far is only just shy of being a musical."