Attack on the Moerdijk Bridges The Netherlands

Marcel · 01-04-2008, 02:58 PM

A german propaganda film, made in 1940 about the airborn attack on the large Moerdijk bridges in The Netherlands, very near to where I live. It looks like the film was actually made here in on the spot, but not during the real fighting, but a few months afterwards. You'll have to understand German or be able to read the dutch subtitles. Enjoy:

YouTube - Sprung in den Feind (Invasion of the Netherlands in 1940)

pbfoot · 01-04-2008, 05:03 PM

pretty good it took me a while to figure out what the flags were for on the ju52's prior to the jump

HoHun · 01-04-2008, 05:42 PM

Hi Marcel,

>A german propaganda film, made in 1940 about the airborn attack on the large Moerdijk bridges in The Netherlands, very near to where I live.

Hm, I know next to nothing about ground war, so this is probably obvious to everyone else: How come these paratroopers weren't thrown out by some tanks (with infantry backing)?

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Marcel · 01-05-2008, 03:21 AM

Hi Hohun,

The dutch had only one tank and it was one like this:

(Picture from Wikipedia)

HoHun · 01-05-2008, 04:05 AM

Hi Marcel,

>The dutch had only one tank and it was one like this:

Hm, I guess it was vulnerable against anti-tank rifles as the paratroops might have carried? Perhaps even against MG fire with armour-piercing rounds, too ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Marcel · 01-05-2008, 02:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HoHun

Hi Marcel,

>The dutch had only one tank and it was one like this:

Hm, I guess it was vulnerable against anti-tank rifles as the paratroops might have carried? Perhaps even against MG fire with armour-piercing rounds, too ...

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

I think so, it had a speed of 8 km/h and they had only one, so not much to do with it. The Dutch also had a few armoured cars, but they were involved in defeating the fallschirm jaeger near the Hague. 50% of the dutch artillery dated from 1870, so were really oldfashion too. Alltogether they had not much to fight with.

HoHun · 01-05-2008, 05:47 PM

Hi Marcel,

>I think so, it had a speed of 8 km/h and they had only one, so not much to do with it.

Oops - in my ignorance, I thought you meant they had only one type of tank ... it didn't cross my mind that they could have had only one example.

Guess that made it easier for the paratroops - my question was probably influenced by the famous "one bridge too far ..."

(Oh, and coincidentally, there was a discussion of British airborne troops and Pegasus bridge on this forum just yesterday

Regards,

Henning (HoHun)

Marcel · 01-06-2008, 06:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HoHun

Hi Marcel,

Oops - in my ignorance, I thought you meant they had only one type of tank ... it didn't cross my mind that they could have had only one example.

No problem, I guess outside the NL not much is known about the dutch strugle. The dutch lost their war long before actually fighting by cutting way too much budget on the military and not having fought in a war since 1830. Their idea´s were old fashioned their guns were way too outdated and most soldiers were actually just civilians called to arms in 1939 without proper training. I have an account of one of them who served in a bicycle(!) squadron. Maybe when I have time and anybody is interested, I'll translate it and post it in the stories selection.
An interesting detail about the film:
The french division mentioned in the film was actually part of the dutch problem. They had agreed with the dutch to defend a gap in the line near Breda, but retreated the next night without bothering to tell the dutch. The German army took advantage of the thus created gap and surprised the defending dutch near Moerdijk from the south.