A Personal Look At Operation VARSITY
by Monique Mousseau Taylor
Serial A-22 Landing Zone “N”, and what one mission report does and does not establish
Operational security was a serious problem in the European Theater. The Allies watched constantly for German espionage, and the Germans worked — often successfully — to determine Allied intentions, just as the Allies worked to determine theirs. That contest was present in every war before this one and in every war since.
What is less common is finding a trace of it left in a mission report.
Operation VARSITY, flown on 24 March 1945, was the last glider mission in the European Theater. I have been working through the landings at Landing Zone “N” in this publication for some time, beginning with Operation VARSITY: Landing Zone “N”. The 32nd Troop Carrier Squadron’s Consolidated Narrative Report of the operation contains a passage suggesting the Germans had advance knowledge of the landings.
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The full article is available to paid subscribers of my Substack, Forgotten Archives of History.
Further reading: Four Hours of Fury: The Untold Story of World War II’s Largest Airborne Invasion and the Final Push into Nazi Germany by James M. Fenelon, an account of Operation VARSITY.
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