Scheldt '44 Market Garden (expanded) Allied AAR - settled for a Draw turn 69

[ComradeP]

From September 19th onwards, I'll provide detailed unit information. I'll post screenshots for the start of the Dawn and 13:00 turns of each day. Dawn of September 18th is only turn 7, the battle has just begun and losses are fairly light thus far.

Forgive the crude Paint skills, I'll slowly try to match "Plain Ian quality" for the AAR.

Turn 7, 05:00 Dawn, September 18th 1944. Normal Conditions.



The British Army in WWII was known for methodical and properly planned battles. This isn't one of them. Formations are released in bits and pieces, there are no proper echeloned attack options possible for most formations as the units are all over the place. This takes some ironing out.

The only divisions that start completely on-map and are released at this point are the Guards Armoured Division (which consists of just 2 brigades) and the 15th (Scottish) Division.

Two of the battalions of the 15th (Scottish) Division start in a terrible position on the other side of the canal (in the objective hex with the engineer and Belgian resistance units next to it) and it will be difficult to save them if the Germans attack them. One of them starts Disrupted, so it can't be ferried across the canal. The other starts with yellow/medium fatigue. The third battalion in the brigade starts with high fatigue in the rear. I got lucky and got a bridge up fairly quickly, so they've been enjoying some rest for a few turns by now.

The 53rd (Welsh) Division has constructed a bridge across the Bocholt-Heerentals canal out of sight of German units. The division and most of the 15th (Scottish) Division will cross the canal here to threaten Kampfgruppe Chill with encirclement.

The Guards Armoured has made some progress, but there's no real breakthrough yet. That will soon change as you'll see in the 13:00 screenshot, as I was able to "chain" assaults (assaulting a Disrupted unit several times to move "through" a ZOC of another unit) together into a breakthrough.

A single brigade of the 50th (Northumbrian) and some divisional assets are active. For obvious reasons, the divisional assets quickly end up Low Fuel/Ammo as the divisional HQ is in the rear.



101st Airborne has not encountered much resistance thus far. There's a convoluted path to Veghel, but no direct road link as units have to "side-step" into a marsh hex and then move into the Broken hex next to Veghel. Armoured units, which need a heavy bridge, have no cleared path yet.

For all airborne units, the second lift arrives later today. For 101st Airborne, the glider regiment arrives at LZ "W"

101st Airborne can trace supply from the map edge.



82nd Airborne has not captured a heavy bridge across the Maas as the bridge at Nederasselt blew up, the first major setback. The glider regiment arrives much later, the second lift only includes artillery and AT assets around Groesbeek.

Supply is fairly generous, with there being two 40 point supply hexes in DZ "O" and LZ "N". The formation can already trace supply from the map edge.

Capturing Nijmegen isn't going to happen due to there being a stack in the hex.



Limited offensive action by 1st Airborne isolated a couple of low-quality German companies that will soon be destroyed. Its third paratrooper brigade will arrive at DZ "Y" later today.

Due to generous rail capacity and the available of more forces than was historically the case (as they can be moved here from different parts of the map), 1st Airborne won't be making much of an offensive push. I'd be surprised if any units are alive by turn 40. They have only 1 supply hex, at LZ "Z"