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

[ComradeP]

Turn 47 05:00 September 22th. Soft conditions. The weather will continue to worsen from now on.



Some of the Division Von Tettau units west of the units across the Waal are no longer in fighting shape. The division withdraws to positions to the west. The SS and various Heer battalions are still holding firm on the eastern side. I'll first try to secure another full hex ferry at Ochten.

Nijmegen is securely in German hands for now, but that's fine for the moment.

Most of my strategy is focussed on applying just enough pressure in various sectors to force the Germans to commit to the area with more than a screening force. It's much easier for me to move units around than it is for the Germans due to all the non-airborne units being motorized. The Germans have an excellent rail capacity, but it's tricky to use that for moving units from one part of the map to the other as I'm firmly in control of the central part of the map. As the Allies, you always want to try to start as many small fires across the map as possible. Keep the Germans off balance.

As the big spike in German losses shows, the operations on September 21st were very successful and destroyed a number of battalions worth of company-sized units.



The bridgehead the 43rd Wessex Division has established across the Meuse by using a ferry hex is a bit too risky. 107th Panzer Brigade is now in the area and it has knocked out a Stuart company that was in T-mode after moving across the ferry. The single infantry company across the river will either perish from German assaults or move across if it succeeds in recovering from its Disrupted state.

The attack by 101st Airborne and 4th Armoured Brigade is making good progress, but the Fallschirmjaeger battalions in the area are putting up a spirited defence. With their good soft attack ratings, they're no joke.

In front of 3rd Infantry Division, the German 59. Infanterie Division and parts of 246. Infanterie Division have pulled back a bit.



It turns out that there was nobody home south of Deurne either aside from a few companies around Asten that couldn't get to safety, so the 11th Armoured and 50th Northumbrian Divisions made good progress. They bumped into the tail end of Division Erdmann at last light. I doubt I can encircle any of the German units so close to the Siegfried Line which starts at Venlo.



The 15th Scottish is still holding the south-western flank.

In case anyone is wondering what the orange artillery unit is at the bottom of the screenshot: that unit belongs to 11th Armoured and it's erroneously Fixed after reappearing on the map as part of 11th Armoured Division instead of 5th AGRA.