Arnhem

It must be said that, in the immediate aftermath, Arnhem was spun as close to a victory as a defeat can be. In that sense, it was Dunkirk Mk II. Ron Kent remembered the adulation in the press, ‘making us out to be heroes of an epic in the annals of British arms. Perhaps the finest tribute we received was from the Daily Mail, which stated that we were “worthy of our fathers and examples to our sons”.’ He liked that but thought it went too far. ‘Our fathers fought in the Great War and their ordeals were far worse and more prolonged than anything we had to undergo.’ He was being modest. Putting aside the limited success of the mission, what mattered was the courage, the comradeship and the incredible fighting spirit the British soldiers had shown. Even the enemy, magnanimous in victory, acknowledged it. A German war reporter paid tribute in a radio broadcast to ‘these hardy fellows, the pick of the bunch’ and their stubborn fight. ‘They are of all sorts – blacksmiths, bus conductors and students. When they are captured they smile, and if they are wounded they hide their pain.’⁴ A Dutch journalist, speaking on the BBC, pledged that his countrymen ‘will proudly guard your dead as if they were the deeply mourned sons of our own people. The word “heroes” has been heard so often during this long and grim war that it is in danger of growing trite. But here it takes tangible shape, before the eyes of our people, who stand in awe and bare their heads.’⁵

In Britain, the praise heaped on the warriors of Arnhem was fulsome with ringing phrases: ‘a tremendous feat of arms’, ‘a gallant stand’, ‘an immortal story’, ‘British valour in the hell that was Arnhem’. A writer for the Army Bureau of Current Affairs was simply reflecting the national mood when he wrote, ‘Arnhem has left in history a record which those who come after must strain every ounce of courage and endurance they possess even to equal.’ Others looked to past victories for comparisons. Montgomery’s assertion that ‘In the years ahead, it will be a great thing for a man to be able to say “I fought at Arnhem,”’ had echoes, which cannot have been accidental, of Shakespeare’s Henry V at Agincourt.

As for the mission itself, the word ‘defeat’ was struck from the lexicon, just as the ‘retreat’ across the river had been presented as a more neutral ‘evacuation’. Newspaper reports spoke of a ‘lack of complete success’, as if Operation Market Garden had nearly made it, but not quite. ‘Four-fifths successful,’ said The Times, and its correspondent quoted a staff officer as saying that the battles at Arnhem and Oosterbeek should be considered ‘not as a brilliant failure but as an expensive success’. Official sources took the same line. Almost immediately, Arnhem was being presented as a near triumph. In The War Illustrated, a veteran commentator and retired general told the magazine’s mass readership that the airborne landings ‘accomplished enough to have made the heavy sacrifices entailed more than worth while. We now know how near we came to complete success and, but for the weather, it probably would have been achieved.’

The courage of those who took part was enough for everyone to overlook the fact that the assault force took two thirds casualties and failed in its primary objective. After Monty met and debriefed Urquhart, the field marshal wrote a letter for him to pass on to the men of the Airborne Division. It was rhetoric worthy of the occasion as he delivered his unambiguous ‘appreciation of what you all did at Arnhem for the Allied cause. I want to express to you my own admiration, and the admiration of us all in 21 Army Group, for the magnificent spirit that your division displayed in battle against great odds on the north bank of the Lower Rhine in Holland. There is no shadow of doubt that, had you failed, operations elsewhere would have been gravely compromised. You did not fail, and all is well elsewhere. All Britain will say to you, “You did your best. You all did your duty; and we are proud of you.” In the annals of the British Army there are many glorious deeds. In our Army we have always drawn great strengths and inspiration from past traditions, and endeavoured to live up to the high standards of those who have gone before. But there can be few episodes more glorious than the epic of Arnhem, and those that follow after will find it hard to live up to the standards that you have set. So long as we have in the armies of the British empire officers and men who will do as you have done, then we can indeed look forward with complete confidence to the future.’