Poll: WWII Military Leaders

[seryoga]

People keep crediting the Soviet's general winter for winning the war when leaders like Zhukov, Konev, and Rokossovsky, aswell as Stalin himself(he was kind of a dick, but all of his industrial buildup prepared the Soviets for war, both industrally and physically) were the true leaders of the soviets, infact, the germans had more trouble with transportation in october and november than in winter because it was cold, rainy, and muddy and its very hard to move supplies across thick mud. So my vote goes to the Soviets, for the above ill defined reasons

EDIT: Germany's commanders were trained to only work against small armies in open areas, most of them never even experienced urban combat before.

 

[Treblaine]

Also it was an American General Eisenhower who was in overall command of the Allies in Europe and he did a damn good job of getting the best out of the American, British and Other commanders. That is a significant strategic achievement, to arrive late and jsut take charge so effectively.

Yeah, but don't forget it was also Eisenhower who let Operation Market Garden fail to such a drastically extent, which arguably caused the war in the western theatre to go on for about another six months.

Well Montgomery was in command of that particular operation, Eisenhower was in charge of the ENTIRE western front in Europe. Eisenhower gave him full support, all the resources to him but ultimately it was down the Montgomery to conduct the operation.

And was Market Garden REALLY such a fuck up? I don't think it caused the war to last 6 months longer it think it was a bold attempt to SHORTEN it by 6 months. Every other battle plan was a slow steady advance with a slow-down in the winter, that would not defeat the Nazis much before April 1945.

IF market Garden had worked then the war would have been over 6 months earlier. That is hugely significant considering how in the latter stages of the war the Nazis had the extermination camps accelerate their murder to a truly industrial scale.

Anne Frank had been captured just before Market Garden and was somewhere in the Nazi extermination system. If the war had ended in September 1944 with the Allies swarming into the Rhur...

My opinion, Market Garden was worth it. Even though it was a disaster, even though the odds of success were so low anyway, it was an operation that could have saved literally MILLIONS of innocent lives from the extermination camps, had it succeeded.

It's not clear to me if Montgomery knew about the Death Camps, if he knew the sheer scale of genocide what would come to be known as the Holocaust. Did that drive him to be so bold in Europe when he had been so cautious in North Africa?

 

[SckizoBoy]

America would probably come in 2nd if you count the godly Pacific fleet admirals, Nimitz, Halsey, etc.

I'd have to go for Adm Ray Spruance... cruiser skipper turned carrier genius overnight. Absolute brilliance.

And why even the mention of the French and the Italians?

Well... someone evidently thinks so... *shrug*

Germany is the most obvious answer, and top leader....

Well gonna go against the popular opinion of Rommel on the ground that his story has been vastly overhyped by our media to the point that he is held as an almost "perfect" leader when historical accounts and musings of ther german generals give a different picture.

Basically, he was a fine tactician and great at small scale actions such as leading his panzer force deep into france, he was very agressive and daring overall which led him to victories that would have been impossible for more timid or prudent leaders.

But he was HORRIBLE at logistics, the situation he got himself into in Africa was due to him pushing too much and not fully understanding the logistical problems he had until it was far too late.

So gonna go with Erich Von Manstein.
That guy was a true strategical genius on a scale rommel wasn't.

HUZZAH!! First mention of the great von Lewinski!!

However, your criticism of Rommel as a poor manager is perhaps a little unfair, because he was caught between a rock and a hard place since supplies were shipped from Italy and were generally few and far between (with regards to hardware), so he sort of had to make a charge for Cairo out of necessity. (I'll have to read up on that to check.)

snip

See, I despise Montgomery for what he did to Auchinleck. Monty only got his position by politically sucking up to Churchill and the timely death of William Gott, who probably would've handled the situation better, and credited the Auk where it was due and acted with a great deal more contrition. He only won the Second el Alamein thanks to Auchinleck's planning and only won the larger campaign because he got all the materiel he wanted while Rommel got (by comparison) sweet fuck all.

Moreover, Montgomery's handling of OpMktGdn really rankles at me, especially his attitude towards the Dutch Royal Family, his idiotic level of influence on SHAEF and belittling of Patton and Eisenhower.

Yeah, you can tell I (really) don't like him...

"The attack began well and unquestionably would have been successful except for the intervention of bad weather." This is what General Eisenhower wrote in 1948. And I'm sorry, but if you're the Supreme Commanding General to the U.S. military then you need to factor weather into your planning better.
Don't get me wrong, Eisenhower was a brilliant commander, I'm glad we can agree on that, but he authorized Operation Market Garden even though he knew full well that spreading the Allied forces out as broad front would drive the Germans back further.
Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather. Taking responsibility for your actions, even if they have negative consequences is also imperitive to good leadership.

Come on, that is a bit harsh. After D-Day, the offensive ground to a halt within two months and another month was spent milling about trying to get that truck service moving (the one that used more fuel than it delivered... can't remember what it was called). Montgomery proposed that plan, which was ultimately flawed, and Patton's idea at the time was to simply bulldoze through from central-ish France. Montgomery's plan was audacious, risky and (in hindsight) plain stupid, but it looked elegant, was presented as such, and Eisenhower was under massive political pressure to force a result from three governments (US/UK/Fr). Could you really condemn him for a decision that would've pissed off fewer people at the time of acting?

Guderian invented modern blitzkrieg after all.

Common misconception, no-one really invented blitzkrieg... and there's a lot of controversy about the term itself (whether it was used by OKH or even if it was accepted tactical/operational doctrine). However, Ernst Volckheim was the source of a lot of Guderian's writing and receives little to no credit for the development of the tank into an offensive weapon.

Right, time for my responses:

Naval - toss up between Japan & US, but ultimately, one cannot deny the prowess of the USN (Nimitz, you fucking god! and Spruance as I already mentioned)

AirForce: front line - hawhawhaw, der Luftwaffe, Erhard Milch was no slouch, but a bit ineffectual politically, and Adolf Galland, youngest non-brevet general (30, I believe) in the modern era, and while not commanders: Hans-Joachim Marseille, Erich Hartmann and Gerhard Barkhorn, no-one will ever top their skills.
Strategically, though, I'll go for the Brits, Battle-of-Britain and all that, what! AVM Keith Park, most underrated New Zealander ever, ACM Hugh 'Stuffy' Dowding, a very wise leader who got the best out of the command structure given to him. However, fuck Trafford Leigh-Mallory, he can piss right off.

Army: problem - Germany had the best tacticians by far and some of the best strategists, but the worst grand strategist to have ever graced (sic) my encyclopaedias. My personal vote goes to Erich von Manstein for skilfully taking over 11th Army of AGSouth when Barbarossa was going wrong, and successfully encircling Russian armies repeatedly around Kiev.
However, I must mention Archibald Wavell for the excellent job for Operation Compass and Claude Auchinleck for reasons already mentioned (halting the German advance and being the first commander to give Rommel a bloody nose). Also, Zhukov, if anyone was scared of Hitler, he was even more scared of Stalin, and to be able to calmly plan the mass kicking of der Heer more than a thousand miles west, he deserves all the praise he gets.

*sigh* that'll do for now...

 

[Kenko]

Germany without a doubt. Hitler was an idiot and constantly undermined his generals, the best military leaders of the world at the time. Had Hitler stayed out of the military strategies and focused on the politics... The world probably would've been alot different today.

 

[Treblaine]

Also it was an American General Eisenhower who was in overall command of the Allies in Europe and he did a damn good job of getting the best out of the American, British and Other commanders. That is a significant strategic achievement, to arrive late and jsut take charge so effectively.

Yeah, but don't forget it was also Eisenhower who let Operation Market Garden fail to such a drastically extent, which arguably caused the war in the western theatre to go on for about another six months.

How exactly was it Eisenhowers fault?

"The attack began well and unquestionably would have been successful except for the intervention of bad weather." This is what General Eisenhower wrote in 1948. And I'm sorry, but if you're the Supreme Commanding General to the U.S. military then you need to factor weather into your planning better.
Don't get me wrong, Eisenhower was a brilliant commander, I'm glad we can agree on that, but he authorized Operation Market Garden even though he knew full well that spreading the Allied forces out as broad front would drive the Germans back further.
Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather. Taking responsibility for your actions, even if they have negative consequences is also imperitive to good leadership.

If Market Garden has succeeded then the Death Camps would have been liberated half a year sooner saving millions of lives.

I think to achieve that, it's worth taking a chance with a lot of things. BTW, it was Montgomery who took that chance, he was in command of the operation. Eisenhower authorised it based on his faith in Montgomery's judgement and assessment of the overall situation and also the gravity of the situation.

"Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather."

What? Neither Montgomery nor Eisenhower either "blamed the weather" nor blamed themselves. It's is a simple FACT that if it had not been for the unpredictably bad weather (persistent fog in Southern England in September is very unexpected) then the operation would have been a success. You can't plan for such bad luck, no military commander can.

Stop playing the 'blame game'.

 

[Treblaine]

Common misconception, no-one really invented blitzkrieg... and there's a lot of controversy about the term itself

I heard it was an invention of nazi propaganda that was repeated by the free press. My opinion is the term "Blitzkrieg" certainly sounds more like the invention of a propagandists and a term that the civilian pundits would have more use of than the serious chief staff.

I mean if you can put a familiar name to your tactic, that is kind of blatantly opening yourself up to a counter measure.

 

[SckizoBoy]

"Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather."

What? Neither Montgomery nor Eisenhower either "blamed the weather" nor blamed themselves. It's is a simple FACT that if it had not been for the unpredictably bad weather (persistent fog in Southern England in September is very unexpected) then the operation would have been a success. You can't plan for such bad luck, no military commander can.

Stop playing the 'blame game'.

While I agree with the point you're making (Eisenhower should not be entirely to blame for OpMktGdn), 'bad weather' was not the sole (or decisive) reason. Intelligence showed that the 2nd SS Pz Corps was in the area, but the higher ups did not believe this (see the reports of one Major Urquhart). Also, the two days required for XXX Corps to make the 64 miles from south of Eindhoven to Arnhem was horrendously misjudged. Four to five days (at minimum) would've been more realistic, especially with that single highway.

Moreover, the advice of Prince Bernhard and much of the Dutch liaison party was ignored (i.e. take a detour off the highway around Elst and circle around from the east (I think) to attack Arnhem, a Dutch Officer Training College exam question's answer, I hasten to add, and the US/UK attempt would've failed that exam, as it did in reality).

Credit (if any to is to be had) for the German success/not complete Allied failure in OpMktGdn goes to Wilhelm Bittrich (whose 'panzer' corps comprised fewer than a hundred serviceable tanks and his conduct when negotiating the ceasefire) & Johnny Frost (whom the Dutch hold, justifiably, in much higher esteem than Montgomery, and whose one thousand men held the area of Arnhem around the bridge for nine days without relief and against Paul Graebner's attack of forty-odd armoured cars, as well as the 9th SS Pz Div 'Hohenstaufen').

 

[Farther than stars]

Also it was an American General Eisenhower who was in overall command of the Allies in Europe and he did a damn good job of getting the best out of the American, British and Other commanders. That is a significant strategic achievement, to arrive late and jsut take charge so effectively.

Yeah, but don't forget it was also Eisenhower who let Operation Market Garden fail to such a drastically extent, which arguably caused the war in the western theatre to go on for about another six months.

Well Montgomery was in command of that particular operation, Eisenhower was in charge of the ENTIRE western front in Europe. Eisenhower gave him full support, all the resources to him but ultimately it was down the Montgomery to conduct the operation.

And was Market Garden REALLY such a fuck up? I don't think it caused the war to last 6 months longer it think it was a bold attempt to SHORTEN it by 6 months. Every other battle plan was a slow steady advance with a slow-down in the winter, that would not defeat the Nazis much before April 1945.



IF market Garden had worked then the war would have been over 6 months earlier. That is hugely significant considering how in the latter stages of the war the Nazis had the extermination camps accelerate their murder to a truly industrial scale.

Anne Frank had been captured just before Market Garden and was somewhere in the Nazi extermination system. If the war had ended in September 1944 with the Allies swarming into the Rhur...

My opinion, Market Garden was worth it. Even though it was a disaster, even though the odds of success were so low anyway, it was an operation that could have saved literally MILLIONS of innocent lives from the extermination camps, had it succeeded.

It's not clear to me if Montgomery knew about the Death Camps, if he knew the sheer scale of genocide what would come to be known as the Holocaust. Did that drive him to be so bold in Europe when he had been so cautious in North Africa?

"The attack began well and unquestionably would have been successful except for the intervention of bad weather." This is what General Eisenhower wrote in 1948. And I'm sorry, but if you're the Supreme Commanding General to the U.S. military then you need to factor weather into your planning better.
Don't get me wrong, Eisenhower was a brilliant commander, I'm glad we can agree on that, but he authorized Operation Market Garden even though he knew full well that spreading the Allied forces out as broad front would drive the Germans back further.
Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather. Taking responsibility for your actions, even if they have negative consequences is also imperitive to good leadership.

Come on, that is a bit harsh. After D-Day, the offensive ground to a halt within two months and another month was spent milling about trying to get that truck service moving (the one that used more fuel than it delivered... can't remember what it was called). Montgomery proposed that plan, which was ultimately flawed, and Patton's idea at the time was to simply bulldoze through from central-ish France. Montgomery's plan was audacious, risky and (in hindsight) plain stupid, but it looked elegant, was presented as such, and Eisenhower was under massive political pressure to force a result from three governments (US/UK/Fr). Could you really condemn him for a decision that would've pissed off fewer people at the time of acting?

OK, I'll answer you both in one (a little impersonal, but you posts read the same and I have stuff to do [read: tennis to watch]):

I admit that shifting the blame onto Eisenhower was a little rash in such a short and unexplained comment and has seemed to have created a bit of a tumult because of it. I completely concede that the failure was due to a number of decisions by multiple leaders, of which, I remain adamant that Eisenhower was one. I mean, like I said, his decision to authorize it led to other fronts being stretched for supplies and therefore the entire assault became too thinly spread (as my own opinion goes).
Say what you will about the bad weather, contingency plans should have been broad enough to cover that, no matter whose responsibility that falls under.
And refering to one of Treblaine's other posts, it was never my intention to start dealing out the blame, it was more of a qualification of how well Eisenhower did over all (it was just a random example of when he did badly at a moment when I couldn't think of a better one).

Note to Sckizoboy: I thought I should let you know that in your unsnipped post there's a stylictic mistake. You say "I despise Montgomery" and after that paragraph "Yeah, you can tell I (really) don't like him". Like I said, just thought you should know - it seemed like a conflict of style.

Note to Treblaine: I can swear read somewhere that Field Marshall Montgomery took personal responsibility for letting the plan go so badly, but I can't find anything about, so I'll let you have this one.

 

[G96 Saber]

Churchill has some serious balls to stand up against Hitler when Germany where completely ready for war and Britain were going to modernize there military... in 1945. Britain just weren't ready. But they fought anyway. And Montgomery beat the Germans in a tank based war in which the Germans had better tanks.

 

[octafish]

A general is only as good as his troops. So Australia, New Zealand, Canada and Nepal have the best WW2 leaders. Mostly Nepal.

I'm intrigued- what did Nepal get up to that impressed you so much?

Nepal=Gurkhas. Best fighting force in any modern army. You command Gurkhas, you win.

 

[Spud of Doom]

Rommel alone is enough to make me vote Germany. The man was a freaking legend. Following Hitler's orders and executing PoWs? Nah, that wasn't his style.

 

[Squilookle]

Nepal=Gurkhas. Best fighting force in any modern army.

As demonstrated by such actions as...?

 

[octafish]

Nepal=Gurkhas. Best fighting force in any modern army.

As demonstrated by such actions as...?

In Italy they would routinely stalk sentry pairs and kill the awake sentry with their kukri, and leave the sleeping soldier unharmed to find their companion when they awoke. For the lulz. German command was so intimidated that they gave orders to summarily execute any allied soldier captured with a knife.

 

[SckizoBoy]

Note to Sckizoboy: I thought I should let you know that in your unsnipped post there's a stylictic mistake. You say "I despise Montgomery" and after that paragraph "Yeah, you can tell I (really) don't like him". Like I said, just thought you should know - it seemed like a conflict of style.

Note to Treblaine: I can swear read somewhere that Field Marshall Montgomery took personal responsibility for letting the plan go so badly, but I can't find anything about, so I'll let you have this one.

Re: Note to me - Meh, sort of says the same thing, and the second bit was more out of sardonicism than trying to make a statement.

Re: Note to Treblaine - regarding that, all I remember is what Montgomery said afterwards which was that 'Operation Market Garden was a 90% success' (80 or 90, one of the two). Now, this was immediately afterwards, so it was probable that he made such a comment to appease the political powers and his own ego, but one can easily understand how the Dutch were hard done by and why Prince Bernhard uttered 'my country cannot afford another Montgomery success' (which is ironic, since the prince was German, but, sort of, proved his loyalty to the Dutch people).

 

[Merkavar]

i would go with england or germany.

england cause they basically won the war or germany cause they managed to stay at war for 5 years. you cant stay at war for 5 year unless your doing something right.

japan attacking the US was just a bad idea and the US, i deduct points for declaring war in 41 instead of 39 only after they were attacked. even though the US allies were at war.

but hell im no historian so maybe some military leader unknown to me had a greater impact on the war.

 

[EMFCRACKSHOT]

Nepal=Gurkhas. Best fighting force in any modern army.

As demonstrated by such actions as...?

Monte Casino, Gallipoli, The Falklands, Malaya, Burma and pretty much everywhere the British army has served.
They have served with distinction in every action. 26 members of the Gurkhas have been awarded the Victoria Cross and in WW2 the Gurkhas earned nearly 3,000 awards for gallantry. In the Falklands, the argies were so scared of the Gurkhas they ran away to fight the paras instead xD

As to the OP my answer is Germany.
Guderian was the driving force behind Germany's armoured doctrine and the creation of the Panzer Division. His efforts in Russia, which were quite remarkable if you ask me, were constantly hamstrung by Hitler and the High Command. His efforts at holding the Russians back during the retreat would have been successful if his plans for holding the line, with the creation of an adequate strategic reserve had not been thwarted by Hitler. Every time forces were raised to form a strategic reserve for the Russian front they were instead sent west to fight Britain and America.
Then we have Von Manstein who was a remarkable strategist who gets nowhere near enough recognition.
Rommel, Montgomery and Patton all get far too much credit and their reputations are massively overblown. None of these three should come anywhere near a list of the greatest military commanders of WW2.

 

[freakonaleash]

Also it was an American General Eisenhower who was in overall command of the Allies in Europe and he did a damn good job of getting the best out of the American, British and Other commanders. That is a significant strategic achievement, to arrive late and jsut take charge so effectively.

Yeah, but don't forget it was also Eisenhower who let Operation Market Garden fail to such a drastically extent, which arguably caused the war in the western theatre to go on for about another six months.

How exactly was it Eisenhowers fault?

"The attack began well and unquestionably would have been successful except for the intervention of bad weather." This is what General Eisenhower wrote in 1948. And I'm sorry, but if you're the Supreme Commanding General to the U.S. military then you need to factor weather into your planning better.
Don't get me wrong, Eisenhower was a brilliant commander, I'm glad we can agree on that, but he authorized Operation Market Garden even though he knew full well that spreading the Allied forces out as broad front would drive the Germans back further.
Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather. Taking responsibility for your actions, even if they have negative consequences is also imperitive to good leadership.

You're right, and I think that the reason they both looked past everything that could go wrong was because they were both so eager to end the war as quickly as possible and they let that eagerness cloud their judgement.

 

[Treblaine]

Also it was an American General Eisenhower who was in overall command of the Allies in Europe and he did a damn good job of getting the best out of the American, British and Other commanders. That is a significant strategic achievement, to arrive late and jsut take charge so effectively.

Yeah, but don't forget it was also Eisenhower who let Operation Market Garden fail to such a drastically extent, which arguably caused the war in the western theatre to go on for about another six months.

Well Montgomery was in command of that particular operation, Eisenhower was in charge of the ENTIRE western front in Europe. Eisenhower gave him full support, all the resources to him but ultimately it was down the Montgomery to conduct the operation.

And was Market Garden REALLY such a fuck up? I don't think it caused the war to last 6 months longer it think it was a bold attempt to SHORTEN it by 6 months. Every other battle plan was a slow steady advance with a slow-down in the winter, that would not defeat the Nazis much before April 1945.



IF market Garden had worked then the war would have been over 6 months earlier. That is hugely significant considering how in the latter stages of the war the Nazis had the extermination camps accelerate their murder to a truly industrial scale.

Anne Frank had been captured just before Market Garden and was somewhere in the Nazi extermination system. If the war had ended in September 1944 with the Allies swarming into the Rhur...

My opinion, Market Garden was worth it. Even though it was a disaster, even though the odds of success were so low anyway, it was an operation that could have saved literally MILLIONS of innocent lives from the extermination camps, had it succeeded.

It's not clear to me if Montgomery knew about the Death Camps, if he knew the sheer scale of genocide what would come to be known as the Holocaust. Did that drive him to be so bold in Europe when he had been so cautious in North Africa?

"The attack began well and unquestionably would have been successful except for the intervention of bad weather." This is what General Eisenhower wrote in 1948. And I'm sorry, but if you're the Supreme Commanding General to the U.S. military then you need to factor weather into your planning better.
Don't get me wrong, Eisenhower was a brilliant commander, I'm glad we can agree on that, but he authorized Operation Market Garden even though he knew full well that spreading the Allied forces out as broad front would drive the Germans back further.
Admittedly Montgomery himself was responsible for a lot of the mishap, but at least he conceded that he had been in the wrong and didn't just blame it on the weather. Taking responsibility for your actions, even if they have negative consequences is also imperitive to good leadership.

Come on, that is a bit harsh. After D-Day, the offensive ground to a halt within two months and another month was spent milling about trying to get that truck service moving (the one that used more fuel than it delivered... can't remember what it was called). Montgomery proposed that plan, which was ultimately flawed, and Patton's idea at the time was to simply bulldoze through from central-ish France. Montgomery's plan was audacious, risky and (in hindsight) plain stupid, but it looked elegant, was presented as such, and Eisenhower was under massive political pressure to force a result from three governments (US/UK/Fr). Could you really condemn him for a decision that would've pissed off fewer people at the time of acting?

OK, I'll answer you both in one (a little impersonal, but you posts read the same and I have stuff to do [read: tennis to watch]):

I admit that shifting the blame onto Eisenhower was a little rash in such a short and unexplained comment and has seemed to have created a bit of a tumult because of it. I completely concede that the failure was due to a number of decisions by multiple leaders, of which, I remain adamant that Eisenhower was one. I mean, like I said, his decision to authorize it led to other fronts being stretched for supplies and therefore the entire assault became too thinly spread (as my own opinion goes).
Say what you will about the bad weather, contingency plans should have been broad enough to cover that, no matter whose responsibility that falls under.
And refering to one of Treblaine's other posts, it was never my intention to start dealing out the blame, it was more of a qualification of how well Eisenhower did over all (it was just a random example of when he did badly at a moment when I couldn't think of a better one).

Note to Sckizoboy: I thought I should let you know that in your unsnipped post there's a stylictic mistake. You say "I despise Montgomery" and after that paragraph "Yeah, you can tell I (really) don't like him". Like I said, just thought you should know - it seemed like a conflict of style.

Note to Treblaine: I can swear read somewhere that Field Marshall Montgomery took personal responsibility for letting the plan go so badly, but I can't find anything about, so I'll let you have this one.

Well there were no contingency plans.

If they detected an SS Panzer division in the area then the only alternative was to call the entire plan off.

There was not time for a contingency, the ONLY way to supply the paratroopers was from airbases in England. With those fogged over that's it. Factoring in freak weather the only contingency was not to send paratroopers there if they couldn't be resupplied. Even if they could find an alternate airfield you'd need TWICE the planes and materiel one batch at each airfield. There was a huge shortage of planes and equipment for a large para-operation, there were few redundancies.

With hindsight it probably would have been a good idea to take the Dutch officers' advice with more weight, after all who would know better how to invade The Netherlands than actual Netherlander officers. But hindsight is 20-20, the reality of the situation is Montgomery was a British officer, we would take information but not dictation from other countries unless it followed a clear chain of command.

It is VITAL to understand the chain-of-command in the military.

But the problem with Market Garden was time: it was planned quickly, prepared for quickly and had a very small time window. It wasn't like D-day that had over a year of planning and preparation. Yes, something like market Garden had been on the shelf for a while but it wasn't as fleshed out as D-day or other invasion operations.

If Monty had 6 months to prepare MG then he would probably have had time to brainstorm with everyone to have their due say, properly assess the intelligence and set up supply contingencies.

 

[Farther than stars]

You're right, and I think that the reason they both looked past everything that could go wrong was because they were both so eager to end the war as quickly as possible and they let that eagerness cloud their judgement.

Thanks for your support. Although if you agree with me, I also urge you to read the discussion I've been having with Sckizoboy and Treblaine, as they offer some insightful analysis concerning this situation.

Just a final comment on what Treblaine said in the post after yours:

But the problem with Market Garden was time.

Time is indeed our greatest enemy. And in these kind of situations, I guess we should count ourselves lucky that we had such brilliant minds to make these sort of decisions; leading to a favourable victory in the end.