D-Day
DâDay was June 6, 1944, when Allied forces began their invasion of continental Europe in order to free it from Nazi (German) control. On this day, the Allied forces accomplished the largest amphibious invasion in the history of mankind on the beaches of Normandy, France. The operation used 200,000 men, 9,000 planes, and 5,000 ships.
The landings were originally scheduled for June 5, but bad weather and heavy cloud cover on June 4 forced General Eisenhower to postpone the attack. The next day, the weather had not improved much, but the Allied commanders decided that a delay would be too costly.
Prior to the landings in Normandy, a huge deception campaign was started by the Allies. Radio transmissions were deliberately allowed to be intercepted saying that the landings would be at Calais, not Normandy. Also, on the days before the attack, squadrons of bombers dropped flakes of tin foil on the route to Calais to try to fool the German radar into thinking an Allied fleet was advancing toward Calais. The deception worked, becasue on the day of the actual invasion, much of the German's main army was held back in anticipation of the "real" invasion coming in Calais.
The Night
Starting before dawn, elite paratroopers and soldiers in gliders landed behind enemy lines to take out critical gun emplacements. When the planes were flying to their drop zones, they ran into some cloud cover. Naturally, their formations spread apart because the pilots were afraid they would collide with other planes. As a result, the paratroopers and glider-borne infantry were scattered and, in some cases, miles from their intended drop zones. When they landed, they encountered many problems. The Germans had flooded many low areas, and the paratroopers, weighed down by their chutes and gear, often drowned in just a few feet of water. Those that were lucky enough to survive the landing then had to get their bearings, regroup, and accomplish their objectives. The case of the Merville Battery shows why these men made up the Greatest Generation.
The Merville Battery consisted of four heavy guns in a massive concrete emplacement pointed at Sword beach. It was protected by mine fields and antitank ditches, a 15 foot thick hedge of barbed wire, more mine fields, a maze of machine-gun-filled trenches, and a garrison of 200 men. The plan was to have 100 bombers drop 4,000 pound bombs on the battery. Glider trains were to bring in jeeps, antitank guns, and flamethrowers, Bangalore torpedoes (to cut through the barbed wire), mine detectors, mortars, and ladders. When the ground troops moved in, three gliders filled with men were to crash land on the battery, and if there is no success signal by 5:30, naval bombardment would commence. In reality, Bombing attack failed, and the glider train was lost. Only 150 men of 700 could be found, and that took so much time that they only had one hour to take the battery. They did not have the signal to give to the gliders that were to crash-land on it, so the gliders did not land on the battery. In spite of all this, they still managed to take the battery.
Before the beach invasions began, 9,000 planes and hundreds of warships bombarded the coast. The craters are still visible in many places, including Point du Hoc.
The Longest Day
American soldiers landed at Omaha and Utah beahces, while the British and Canadian forces landed at Sword, Juno, and Gold beaches. The British forces at Juno faced light resistance thanks to bombardment by the Allied Navy. The Americans Utah beach faced the lightest resistance; out of 23,000 soldiers, there were only 197 casualties. However, at Sword, the Canadians faced 11 heavy batteries of 155 mm guns, 9 medium batteries of 75 mm guns, machine-gun nests, pillboxes, other concrete fortifications, and a seawall twice the height of the one at Omaha Beach. The first wave suffered a 50% casualty rate. Omaha beach was the bloodiest landing zone; 2,500 of the 10,000 casualties occured at Omaha. It was defended by 8 concrete bunkers with 75 millimeters or larger guns, 35 pillboxes, 4 batteries of artillery, 18 antitank guns, 6 mortar pits, 35 rocket-launching sites, and more than 85 machine-gun nests.
One of many bizarre historical coincidences, almost none of the German commanders were at the front on the day of the invasion. Rommel was back in Germany to speak with Hitler and for his wife's birthday, June 6. Von Tempelhof, Army Group Bâs operations officer, was in Germany. Admiral Theodor Krandke, the naval commander in the west, was in Bordeaux. Major General Heinz Hellmich, Lieutenant General Karl von Schlieben, and Major General Wilhelm Falley were on their way to war games in Rennes. Colonel Wilhelm Meyer-Detring was on leave, and Hitler was at his Berchtesgaden retreat in Bavaria.
German army doctrine also said to hold the Panzers in reserve several miles away from the beaches and allow the Allies to land, then pound them with the Panzers once the troops had landed. Even after the Allies had landed, Hitler held the main Panzer force in reserve because he thought that the landings in Normandy were a diversion and the real invasion would come in Calais and be commanded by General George S. Patton.
The Normandy invasion signalled the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany, and the Allies would be slowed very little once the main force had landed. Two artificial ports were created that provided a constant supply of reinforcements. The day would be remembered in years to come as the "Longest Day".
