D-Day: 79 years later
[NOTE: The following is a slightly-edited version of a previous D-Day post.]
Today is the 79th anniversary of D-Day, the Normandy landings in WWII that led to Western Europe’s liberation.
I wonder how many people under forty, either here or in Europe, now know or care what happened there. The dog barks and the caravan moves on.
The world we now live in seems so vastly different, including the relationship between the US and western Europe. But make no mistake about it; if threatened in a way that finally gets their attention, Europeans would be counting on us again. And although I think that our armed forces probably would still be up to the task, despite worsening leadership, the question is whether our government and especially our press would.
About forty-five years ago I visited Omaha Beach, site of the worst of the carnage. A quieter place than that beach and those huge cemeteries, with their lines of crosses set down as though with a ruler, you never did see.
But the scene was quite different back in 1944. The D-day invasion marked the beginning of the end for the Germans.
The weather was a huge factor, and the Allied commanders had to make the decision knowing that the forecast for the day was iffy and the window of opportunity small. For reasons of visibility and navigation (maximum amount of moonlight and deepest water), the invasion needed to occur during a time of full moon and spring tides, and all the invasion forces had already been assembled and were at the ready. To postpone would have been hugely expensive and frustrating, but to go ahead in bad weather would have been suicidal.
This is how bad the weather looked, how difficult the decision was, and how much we owe to the meteorologists, who:
…were challenged to accurately predict a highly unstable and severe weather pattern. As [Eisenhower] indicated in the message to Marshall, “The weather yesterday which was [the] original date selected was impossible all along the target coast.” Eisenhower therefore was forced to make his decision to proceed with a June 6 invasion in the predawn blackness of June 5, while horizontal sheets of rain and gale force winds shuddered through the tent camp.
The initially bad weather ended up being an advantage in other ways, because the Germans were not expecting the invasion to occur yet for that reason:
Some [German] troops stood down, and many senior officers were away for the weekend. General Erwin Rommel, for example, took a few days’ leave to celebrate his wife’s birthday, while dozens of division, regimental, and battalion commanders were away from their posts at war games.
In addition, there was Hitler’s personality and his reluctance to give autonomy to his military commanders:
Hitler reserved to himself the authority to move the divisions in OKW Reserve, or commit them to action. On 6 June, many Panzer division commanders were unable to move because Hitler had not given the necessary authorization, and his staff refused to wake him upon news of the invasion.
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This didn’t mean that the beaches were not heavily fortified and manned, especially Omaha:
[The Germans] had large bunkers, sometimes intricate concrete ones containing machine guns and high caliber weapons. Their defense also integrated the cliffs and hills overlooking the beach. The defenses were all built and honed over a four year period.
The number of Allied casualties was enormous. Reading about it today makes one appreciate anew what these men faced, and how courageously they pressed on despite enormous difficulties. This is just a small sampler of what occurred on Omaha Beach at the outset; there was much more to come:
Despite these preparations, very little went according to plan. Ten landing craft were lost before they even reached the beach, swamped by the rough seas. Several other craft stayed afloat only because their passengers quickly bailed water with their helmets. Seasickness was also prevalent among the troops waiting offshore. On the 16th RCT front, the landing boats found themselves passing struggling men in life preservers, and on rafts, survivors of the DD tanks which had sunk. Navigation of the assault craft was made more difficult by the smoke and mist obscuring the landmarks they were to use in guiding themselves in, while a heavy current pushed them continually eastward.
As the boats approached within a few hundred yards of the shore, they came under increasingly heavy fire from automatic weapons and artillery. The force discovered only then the ineffectiveness of the pre-landing bombardment. Delayed by the weather, and attempting to avoid the landing craft as they ran in, the bombers had laid their ordnance too far inland, having no real effect on the coastal defenses.
These obstacles and unforeseen circumstances were extraordinarily costly in terms of the human sacrifice that occurred that day. Note that I use the word “obstacles and unforeseen circumstances” rather than “mistakes.” Today, if the same things had occurred (at least, while under the aegis of a Republican administration), they would be labeled unforgivable errors rather than the inevitable difficulties inherent in waging war, in which no battle plan survives contact with the enemy.
Another historical footnote is the following passage from Eisenhower’s message to the Allied Expeditionary Forces: You are about to embark upon the great crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. It’s another sign of how times have changed; the word “crusade” has become verboten.
In his pocket, Eisenhower also kept another statement, one to activate in case the invasion failed. It read:
Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based upon the best information available. The troops, the air and the Navy did all that Bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.
The note was written in pencil on a simple piece of paper, and is housed in a special vault at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library & Museum in Abilene, Kansas, a bit of thought-provoking fodder for an alternate history that never occurred – fortunately for all of us.
Compare Eisenhower’s willingness to have accepted complete responsibility if the invasion had failed to our current president’s unwillingness to ever accept responsibility for anything.
I have been to the Normandy Beaches many times. Most recent was March/Ap 2022. On a Historical tour, with 4 Historians. We did a Beach a day, then moved inland some. I am still in awe of what those Men accomplished. Standing on Omaha and looking up at those bluffs you can only wonder how they did it. I have also been to Eisenhower’s War Room where he made the decision to launch the invasion. The invasion map was saved and is still there.
Neo notes, “Another historical footnote is the following passage from Eisenhower’s message to the Allied Expeditionary Forces: You are about to embark upon the great crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. It’s another sign of how times have changed; the word ‘crusade’ has become verboten.”
The last sentence of Ike’s order of the day is usually omitted by recent documentaries: “Good Luck! And let us all beseech the blessing of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking.” Can’t imagine why that might be offensive to lefties, if they remember D-Day at all.
Another example of the use of the word “crusade” occurs in FDR’s radio broadcast to the American people on June 6, 1944– which actually took the form of a prayer:
June 06, 1944
My fellow Americans: Last night, when I spoke with you about the fall of Rome, I knew at that moment that troops of the United States and our allies were crossing the Channel in another and greater operation. It has come to pass with success thus far. And so, in this poignant hour, I ask you to join with me in prayer:
Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. Lead them straight and true; give strength to their arms, stoutness to their hearts, steadfastness in their faith.
They will need Thy blessings. Their road will be long and hard. For the enemy is strong. He may hurl back our forces. Success may not come with rushing speed, but we shall return again and again; and we know that by Thy grace, and by the righteousness of our cause, our sons will triumph.
They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest-until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men’s souls will be shaken with the violences of war.
For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and good will among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home.
Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom.
And for us at home – fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas – whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them – help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.
Many people have urged that I call the Nation into a single day of special prayer. But because the road is long and the desire is great, I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts.
Give us strength, too – strength in our daily tasks, to redouble the contributions we make in the physical and the material support of our armed forces.
And let our hearts be stout, to wait out the long travail, to bear sorrows that may come, to impart our courage unto our sons wheresoever they may be.
And, O Lord, give us Faith. Give us Faith in Thee; Faith in our sons; Faith in each other; Faith in our united crusade. Let not the keenness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment, let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose.
With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy. Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogancies. Lead us to the saving of our country, and with our sister Nations into a world unity that will spell a sure peace– a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men. And a peace that will let all men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil.
Thy will be done, Almighty God. Amen.
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/prayer-d-day
To be sure, FDR was far from a flawless example of religious faith and practice. But can you imagine Biden, or any other recent president, leading the nation in prayer in the course of an event like D-Day?
Only today have I seen an item which shows how the great plan might not have worked at all, if an alert Captain in a landing craft hadn’t noticed two piles of bodies and concluded that between them might be a lead-shadow where German bullets were scarcer. And that’s how the Americans got up the cliff and began doing real close-range damage to the German pillboxes creating the crossfires.
“…the ineffectiveness of the pre-landing bombardment.” My father was a sailor aboard U.S.S. Frankford (DD497), the flagship of Destroyer Squadron (DESRON) 18, off Utah Beach. The squadron stood in within 500 yards of the surf line to take out German gun emplacements that had not been eliminated by earlier bombardment. Any ship that went aground would, of course, have been destroyed.
My dad never talked about his WW2 service. I just tell my sons that their grandfather had a busy morning that day.
For all the preparations, it was an Infantry affair. The Infantry prevailed.
Just when you thought the guy with the magic Cambodian hat (see https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2006/05/return-of-the-magic-hat.php) was keeping his mouth mercifully shut, he sticks his foot in it yet again: Addressing a group of energy executives in Norway, Kerry compared the D-Day landings to the fight against climate change.
“The one-time US presidential candidate used a keynote address on the 79th anniversary of the allied landings in Normandy to make his case to an audience of industry leaders in Norway. . . . While Kerry said there were key differences between the fight against Nazi Germany and the battle to ease global warming, there are similarities.
‘Make no mistake, just as that was a fight for the future as much as anything we have ever faced, what we are seeing now is the same,’ he said. Kerry said the world was now in a decisive decade and the price of failure could carry greater consequences than those faced during the D-Day landings if the right choices are not made. . . . Unlike the fight against Hitler’s forces, the climate battle is not one against a single enemy, Kerry reasoned. ‘Today’s threat comes from all of us. It comes from the result of the things we do or avoid doing,’ he said.”
I don’t expect Mr. Teresa Heinz to give up his fleet of SUVs or his $12 million waterfront mansion on Martha’s Vineyard any time soon, though. If you have a strong stomach, you can read the rest of Kerry’s D-Day speech at https://www.rechargenews.com/energy-transition/fight-of-our-times-john-kerry-channels-spirit-of-d-day-in-battle-against-climate-change/2-1-1462793
PA+Cat, what Kerry leaves out is that the Allies knew far more about German capabilities and battle plans than we know about climate change and its causes.
Kerry’s view that fossil fuels are the sole cause of climate change is like saying, “If we can just stop the Luftwaffe, the battle will be won.”
WWII in Europe was a far simpler problem than climate change. Only a fool, and John Forbes Kerry is a pompous fool, would think otherwise.
And only fools would give up fossil fuels until an affordable, reliable, reasonably safe alternative is in place. My guess is that the Norwegians aren’t foolish enough to abandon their fossil fuels, the backbone of their prosperity and economic strength.
JJ–
Nobody ever accused Kerry of exceptional intelligence or insight. His undergraduate grade average never rose above the so-called gentleman’s C. I’m just glad that someone like Eisenhower, USMA 1915, was in charge of Operation Overlord rather than a clown like Kerry.
I continually marvel at the organization that went into that massive effort. Then I marvel even more at the unimaginable courage. Today, I put together an email, which no one acknowledged, to commemorate the day. One of the photos I found was that of re of a landing craft enroute to the beach, and some of the “kids” were actually smiling. Little did they know.
(By the way, my chubby, overage Dad, father of three children, was a crewman on such a craft at Okinawa. He was drafted immediately after a stint managing war related construction projects in Brazil. My mother’s former father-in-law was head of the local draft board; just coincidence I am sure.)
Back to D-Day, and the cost. The First Infantry Division (Big Red 1) reportedly took 2,400 casualties on that day, about a fourth of the the total allied count of 10,000 (over 4,000 dead).
On another level, think of planning and organizing that operation with pencil and paper; and think of sending men to the moon with little more computer capability than a high end smart phone, if that, and compare those feats to how we struggle to accomplish anything today.
John Kerry “mooned” the world once again; which is another way of saying that he showed his true self. (Trying to be more or less polite here.) Like most of his ilk, he is completely lacking in self awareness.
Video linked in this post.
https://notthebee.com/article/today-is-d-day-let-ronald-reagan-remind-you-why-it-matters
One more example of how the Woke / ESG corporations are trying to run your life.
https://notthebee.com/article/theyre-literally-trying-to-drive-twitter-bankrupt-elon-musk-discusses-censorship-by-advertisers-with-robert-f-kennedy-jr-on-twitter-spaces
I wonder if Musk really understood just how pervasive wokeness is in business C-suites, and how fanatic they are about enforcing it?
That might have been an issue not readily apparent under all the blatant, overt bias promulgated by the FBI et al., which he says he underestimated although he knew the Twits were biased, he wasn’t aware of the depth of Fed involvement until the Twitter Files operation was in gear.
(I meant to go back to the Open Thread to post that comment; however, given Reagan’s speech, maybe it’s just as relevant here. This is NOT what we fought for in WWI or II.)
“…unimagineable courage…”
Indeed.
Here’s a fascinating post from Powerline blog on some of the heroes of the hell that was Omaha Beach.
“ANGELS OF OMAHA”—
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2023/06/angels-of-omaha.php
(Apologies if this has already been linked to….)
AF, I suspect that it’s less woke corporations and more “Biden” and “his” dark minions that are trying to bankrupt Musk or at least sufficiently knee-cap him.
Oldflyer: “By the way, my chubby, overage Dad, father of three children, was a crewman on such a craft at Okinawa.”
One of the Greatest Generation from my hometown was a Navy Radioman who provided comms from landing craft to ships in the South Pacific. He was badly wounded in the Okinawa invasion.
While he was recuperating back home, He taught our Scout Troop semaphore and morse code. A fantastic man. He went on to be a national leader in the American Legion.
We will never again see amphibious landings such as were done on D-Day. With modern coms, aerial/satellite surveillance, smart weapons, and advances in drones, landing craft are easy targets. One reason I expect that China will not hazard an amphibious invasion of Taiwan. Or, if they do, it will be a turkey shoot.