Operation Market Garden Operation Market Garden Operation Market Garden was an unsuccessful World War II military operation fought in the Netherlands from 17 to 25 September 1944, planned and predominantly led by the British Army. Its objective was a series of nine bridges that could have provided an Allied invasion route into Germany. Airborne and land forces succeeded in the liberation of the Dutch cities of Eindhoven and Nijmegen, but at the Battle of Arnhem were defeated in their attempt to secure the last bridge, over the Rhine. Market Garden included two subsidiary operations: an airborne assault to seize the key bridges ("Market")
17th Airborne Division (United States) was inserted into the plans for the operation to support the amphibious assaults that would take place, which was code-named Operation Varsity. Three airborne divisions were initially chosen to take part in Varsity, these being the British 6th Airborne Division, the U.S. 13th Airborne Division and the 17th Airborne Division, all of which were assigned to the U.S. XVIII Airborne Corps. However, as planning for Operation Varsity began, it soon became obvious that there was a lack of suitable transport aircraft to transport all three airborne divisions. As such the 13th Airborne Division was dropped from the operational plan, primarily