D-Day - 74 years ago today

I can't think of anything more Alpha as frick than this.

Lot of interesting trivia about D-Day like how long the operations order was, where a lot of the landing craft were made and so on.

[quote] The west end invasion had a 85% casualty rate, the east end had a 50% casualty rate. [/quite]

Had never heard those numbers. Knew it was bad, but that is insane.

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There was a west end invasion and an east end invasion of the beach.

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Our military leadership was stellar, because the beach assault casualty numbers would have been much higher if not for some frickery of the German spy channels.

False information was put forth by military comms that was put out deliberately with the knowledge that the Germans would intercept the message and be ready for it. That information was, that we were planning a mass landing insertion- but much farther up the coast.

Hitler's army, having learned this, was forced to move many of their troops and war machines away from where our actual landing took place. We even sent a decoy fleet towards the false landing target (A force that suffered mass casualties, I might add, and those people are among the most notable heroes in all of WWII). They understood that they likely were not going to survive but they knew that the only chance the Allies had to get American boots on the ground in Europe was to divide up the Nazi army.

It was a bold, and very effective strategy. My grandfather arrived at Normandy on D+12 And said that even then, there was still sporadic assault on the beach by German forces, but that for the most part the U.S. had a strong foothold on the area. I can't remember the numbers and don't have the time at this moment to consult Grandpa's war memoirs, but the diversion forces suffered almost total defeat. And, as I said, without gut wrenching difficult decisions by our generals- and absolute fearless selflessness by our diversionary force, D-day never would have happened.

Greatest moment by the greatest generation, period.

In addition to the US invasions at Omaha and Utah, let's also remember the 82nd and 101st Airborne who jumped into occupied enemy territory prior to the landing.

And also the British taking both Gold and Sword beaches and the Canadians taking Juno.

It still gives me pause to think of the millions of French Resistance, night after night listening to BBC to pick up coded messages, waiting, hoping, praying, and on the night of June 5th, in the middle of a broadcasted play, one of the actors said "the dice are on the table". Imagine the French just smiling and saying "The Yanks are coming, and they are bringing hell with them".

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Visited the cemetery there years ago and it is unreal.

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Been there 3x. I second that. Walked the beach at Omaha. They still talk to you...

ETA: It's only after visiting there do you get a full appreciation for what these guys did. It was NOT like Gulf Shores. It was straight uphill from the beach - and not just a little bit. BTW, the pill-boxes are still there.