NETHERLANDS: A waffen-SS soldier lies where he fell on the Nijmegen road bridge, one of the key crossings the allied forces were able to capture. Arnhem Birdge was located several miles away. The wire on the left is either telephone cable or detonator cord leading to the demolition charges the Germans rigged up on the bridge. The southern approaches were well defended by the Germans, who were entrenched in Hunner Park and around the Valkhof. It required a three-pronged attack by the Grenadier Guards and the US 505th Parachute regiment to clear the defenders. RARE PHOTOGRAPHS of a botched military operation which was memorialised in a controversial Hollywood blockbuster ???A Bridge Too Far??? have emerged 75 years after the infamous battle. Operation Market Garden, a military maneuverer conducted in September 1944, was supposed to see US and British troops sweep through the battle-weary Nazi forces which were occupying the Netherlands, proceed to liberate Arnhem and its key infrastructure, open a back door into Germany, and bring the war to close by Christmas. This was one of the most audacious and imaginative operations of the war - and it failed. Graphic images show German soldiers laying dead in the street, hundreds of allied paratroops being dropped on Nazi-occupied land unaware that they would be desperately outnumbered and outgunned, and the devastated remains of a Dutch city which served as a battleground for Europe. The striking images are included in military historian Anthony Tucker-Jones??? new book The Battle For Arnhem 1944-1945: Rare photographs from the wartime archives, a dramatic insight into all sides of the remarkable but ill-fated Operation Market Garden which has fascinated historians and been the subject of much controversy ever since. Mediadrumimages/AnthonyTucker-Jones/PenandSwordBooks