Gen. Eisenhower announced that the air-borne landings in Holland were “going well” in this latest blow, a blow which might break the back of German resistance strained by the piling up demands of many fronts.

“One of the greatest air-borne operations in military history,” as it was described by Lt. Gen. Lewis H. Brereton, commander of the 1st Air Army, was said by the Germans to be centered at Nijmegen, only about 3 miles from the Dutch-German border and 12 miles northwest of Kleve, where the Siegfried Line is reported to end.

Other landings were reported by the enemy radio at Arnhem, 10 miles north of Nijmegen, where a bridge head would have been established across the famous water barriers of Holland—the Waal River and the Neder Ryn (Rhine).