Quote:
Originally Posted by dragoon500ly
The sheer size of Overlord still boggles the mind.
The Allies landed the British 6th Airborne and the US 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions on the night of June 5th and then landed the US 1st and 4th Infantry Divisions, two regiments of the 29th Infantry Division, dozens of attached battalions on two beachs and the British landed the 3rd and 50th Divisions, the Canadian 3rd Division, the British 79th Armoured Division as well as supporting brigades and battalions.
The Royal Navy committed 3 battleships, 17 cruisers, 2 monitors, 65 destroyers, 11 frigates, 17 corvettes and 4 sloops.
The United States Navy added 3 battleships, 3 heavy cruisers, 30 destroyers and 2 frigates.
The Free French sent 2 light cruisers, 1 destroyer, 2 corvettes and 4 frigates.
The Free Poles sent a light cruiser and 2 destroyers.
Norway added 3 destroyer, Greece 2 corvettes and Holland sent 2 sloops.
Not to mention 4,126 landing craft and ships, 736 ancillary ships and craft and 864 merchant ships.
An armada the likes of which will never be seen again.
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Not to lessen the significance of D-Day, but the Battle of Okinawa had a larger battle fleet (1300 ships, including more than
40 aircraft carriers, 18 battleships, and 200 destroyers) and even had more troops (182,000 vs. 175,000 for D-Day). I haven't been able to find a count of landing craft for the 5th fleet, but given the number of troops, it had to be roughly as many as that on D-Day. There were more self-propelled floating objects in the English Channel than at Okinawa (mainly because of all the civilian vessels pressed into service), but the fleet at Okinawa was a hell of a lot more powerful, hard as that may be to comprehend given how big the D-Day fleet was.
The main difference between the two battles is that the Japanese didn't contest the landings, in contrast to how bloody Omaha beach was (and, to a lesser extent, the other four zones). And the D-Day invasion, as you pointed out, represented more nations than just the US and British Commonwealth.