In any discussion of Overlord, and the near disaster at Omaha, you seldom hear any mention of the gunfire support destroyers. According to Bradley's Gunfire Support Plan, each of the initial assault battalions would be supported by two destroyers to provide final fires on the beach defenses and to be on call for any additional fire support.
The destroyers were originally supposed to remain 2,000 yards offshore, but, as the extent of the disaster that befell on the assault troops, the destroyers closed to close range. At least two of the destroyers touched bottom (then as now, a court martial offense for the commander). All of them reported damage from machinegun and rifle fire as well as fragmentation damage from near misses.
Each of the Fletcher-class destroyers carried five 5-inch/38 rifles with 250 rounds per gun, the four destroyers that were closest to the beach; USS Carmick fired 1,127 rounds; USS McCook fired 975 rounds; USS Emmons fired 767 rounds and the USS Thompson fired 638 rounds of 5-inch as well as almost emptying their magazines of 40mm and 20mm ammunition.
Many of the Omaha Beach veterans relate in their oral histories of the action how deadly accurate the destroyers gunfire was, as well as how close the destroyers got to the beach. Truely, the destroyermen of the gunfire support ships performed above and beyond!
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The reason that the American Army does so well in wartime, is that war is chaos, and the American Army practices chaos on a daily basis.
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