OT: A commentary on D-Day

[pmulcahy11b]

I was just reading this commentary about Big Red One's Actions on Omaha Beach on D-Day. He said: "The Omaha landing was one of the biggest clusterf***s in the history of modern warfare, and yet it still worked. That's when you know you have good troops."

[Adm.Lee]

That, and according to some commentators, good fire support. Most say without the destroyers that went in close, the infantry would have had it.

[JHart]

Bradley was a hair away from calling the landing on Omaha off as the initial reports came in. It was the veterans of the 1st combined with the 29ths training and camaraderie that would have made their Civil War ancestors proud, that carried the day on Omaha. Sometimes you just have to do things the hard way.

[Nowhere Man 1966]

If you want an interesting take on D-Day and "In Flander's Fields," on Youtube, there is posted "What Have We Learned, Charlie Brown?" It is a sequel to their movie where they go to France as exchange students and they tour Omaha Beach and Flander's fields. Linus does a lot of explaining and pondering on D-Day as well as reciting "In Flander's Fields." It really raises the hair on my neck and I get tears in my eyes everytime I see it or even think about it. I would say, "well done by the Peanuts Gang." There were amusing moments too like Snoopy driving the 2CV car and Charlie Brown always having to crank it to start it, usually tripping over himself or getting banged up while Peppermint Patty picks on him. I think the latter is a little out of character but this is an excellent explaination and reflection in 30 minutes time.

Chuck M.

[Mohoender]

The place is hell and was certainly the most difficult landing location of the entire operation. Nevertheless, from popular memory I would say that Omaha was one of two outstanding peace of bravery on the part of American troops in werstern Europe (the other being Bastogne but we already talked about that one some times ago).

Fire support was important, of course, but success was also favored by a tactical mistake of the German and it was definitely due to the troops on the ground. From what I know, the place was very well defended and the US troops had to suffer from very bad luck: bad conditions and in one of the tank battalion, out of 15, 13 DD tanks sunk. Moreover, when the troops reached a sufficient number to launch an assault the sea was high and the beach had been reduced to a small strip of sand.

Another thing about Normandy. It is a fairly flat region which seems easy on a map but at that time it was not so true. All roads had very thick hedges on each side and this gave a tremendous advantage to the defender. I'll check on it (for the tank commander's name) but one of the experienced German tank crew, riding a Pzkfw VI Tiger I, took out something like 100 vehicles from an ally armored division (I think British) all by himself, including tanks and armored. The vehicles were stuck on the road and couldn't maneuver and the only thing the Germans had to do was to shoot them one after one from the other side of the hedge at point blank while driving slowly (the hedge was so thick that the infantry couldn't cross it). Because of the hedge and the confusion that followed the Tiger I escaped intact. A few days later that tank crew was ambushed by several Sherman Firefly and finally destroyed by the last surviving Sherman (not entirely sure about that last point so).

[Adm.Lee]

That Tiger ace would be Michael Wittman, from one of the SS divisions. He and his tanks stopped a British advance cold in early/mid-June.

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

That, and according to some commentators, good fire support. Most say without the destroyers that went in close, the infantry would have had it.

The big mess that the commentator mentioned was the preparatory aerial and naval bombardment. Both overshot their targets by literally miles. As a result, the German shore fortifications on Omaha were essentially intact, manned by troops that were basically fresh.

[Adm.Lee]

Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b

The big mess that the commentator mentioned was the preparatory aerial and naval bombardment. Both overshot their targets by literally miles. As a result, the German shore fortifications on Omaha were essentially intact, manned by troops that were basically fresh.

Yep, but I was referring to the DDs that came in after the preliminary bombardment, while the initial waves were stalled on the beach, and gave the direct fire support that the (sunk) divisional artillery and DD tanks could not.