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June 6, 1944

Saw Obama's speech this AM...CNN anchors were gushing...the female anchor almost literally...over the speech...I thought he delivered it terribly (seemed half asleep...exhausted...Poland, Putin, jet lag, etc.) but whoever wrote it for him did a nice job emphasizing that the men of D-Day should never be forgotten and should be an inspiration. The view of the cemetery was moving and the flyover was cool.
 
ImTheCaptain said:
EVERYONE WAS IMPORTANT. But if Operation Overlord is overrated, then the Battle of Moscow is certainly overrated.
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I wouldn't say Overlord is overrated, but it is Western centric. If you have to pick a battle or 2 that were the biggest turning points, I'd prolly say Stalingrad and Kursk in 1943. After those 2, the writing was on the wall for Germany.

I believe the most important historical aspect of the Normandy landings isn't in relation to Germany but to the USSR. Germany was already going to lose. But had Germany better predicted where we were going to land and had they prevented us from establishing that beach head, we aren't joining the Soviets in Germany in the Spring of 1945. Which could well have meant that all of Germany, Austria and maybe other Western Euro countries like Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium and maybe even France could have fallen under the Soviet sphere of influence in post-war Europe.
 
My father was a MP in WW2 and trained to be in the initial waves of troops on D-Day. His battalion always deployed Company A (his unit) first. When the final orders came down, the order of deployment was changed and Company D went in on H-Hour. Those poor under armed guys cleared vehicles from the beaches, evacuated wounded and guarded POW's in improvised cages. Once posted, they had to stay in place and take the German fire - no foxholes allowed. When one of them was hit, another guy took his place.

My father came ashore several days later. When I was 7 or 8 I asked him about D-Day and heard that story. Being a stupid kid, I told him it was too bad he didn't get to go in first. He arched his eyebrows and said "Kid, you're nuts". He went on to tell me about being fired upon by snipers and mortar rounds killing guys in his Company. His best friend in the army was a dead ringer for Fernandel, the French singer/actor, so I assume there were some great stories about French women that I never heard (all he would say is that the women would scream "Fernandel!" and come running when they saw him.)

While I'm reflecting on his service, I'll re-tell my favorite story. My father came to the UK on the Queen Mary. There was a contingent of British marines on the ship for each voyage. One night my father pulled deck guard duty to ensure everyone stayed inside and no lights were visible. One of the British marines came out on deck to smoke. When my father told him to get back inside, the marine replied that he was one of the King's marines on one of the King's ships and didn't answer to miserable pricks (slang for MP's). My father, who was a beast of a man, told him if he didn't get back inside he was going to drag the King's marine across the King's deck, hoist him up on the King's railing and toss him into God's ocean. The marine went back inside.

Growing up, practically every man in our neighborhood fought in WW2. They didn't talk too much about their service except with each other over poker games, so us kids took our fathers' service for granted. As they died off, we learned there was a Silver Star recipient, two Bronze Stars and numerous Purple Hearts living in a four block area. One guy was in one of the units that liberated Buchenwald. Heroes all.
 
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cville deac said:
I wouldn't say Overlord is overrated, but it is Western centric. If you have to pick a battle or 2 that were the biggest turning points, I'd prolly say Stalingrad and Kursk in 1943. After those 2, the writing was on the wall for Germany.

I believe the most important historical aspect of the Normandy landings isn't in relation to Germany but to the USSR. Germany was already going to lose. But had Germany better predicted where we were going to land and had they prevented us from establishing that beach head, we aren't joining the Soviets in Germany in the Spring of 1945. Which could well have meant that all of Germany, Austria and maybe other Western Euro countries like Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium and maybe even France could have fallen under the Soviet sphere of influence in post-war Europe.
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Stalingrad more than Kursk, yes, was certainly a death knell for the Werhmacht. But it's too easy to focus on one battle or front being 'more important' than another, when really none of it is in a vacuum.
 
Stalin was not going to roll into Berlin by himself. The Soviets mauled the Wehrmacht, but they took a terrific beating doing it. All through 1943 and 1944 Stalin was constantly pressuring Churchill and Roosevelt to open a western front to take pressure off the Soviets. If D-Day had failed, the Germans could have held out in the East for longer and inflicted more pain on the Soviets. It is very possible that Stalin would have made a separate peace and Europe would have been divided between two totalitarian powers for a generation.
 
One of what promises to be thousands of poignant pics coming out of Normandy today.

OP2wYEw.jpg


9000 bodies etched in the sand of Normandy to represent the dead from the first day.

XVeV9Cq.jpg
 
ImTheCaptain said:
Stalingrad more than Kursk, yes, was certainly a death knell for the Werhmacht. But it's too easy to focus on one battle or front being 'more important' than another, when really none of it is in a vacuum.
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I agree Stalingrad more than Kursk and get that no single battle or front is a vacuum, but that was really the turning point in the East. And despite what the History Channel intimated last week otherwise, Stalingrad was the gateway to the Caucasus oilfields. We had already kicked Germany out of East Africa, denying him access to the Middle East. By that time, Germany was beginning to have an oil problem. I'm not an historian, but maybe someone else here can comment on that. I think most of Germany's oil at that point was coming from Romania.
 
no you're 'zackly right about the oil fields. my issue is with the "the eastern front was the most important part of WWII" nonsense.
 
Deacon923 said:
Stalin was not going to roll into Berlin by himself. The Soviets mauled the Wehrmacht, but they took a terrific beating doing it. All through 1943 and 1944 Stalin was constantly pressuring Churchill and Roosevelt to open a western front to take pressure off the Soviets. If D-Day had failed, the Germans could have held out in the East for longer and inflicted more pain on the Soviets. It is very possible that Stalin would have made a separate peace and Europe would have been divided between two totalitarian powers for a generation.
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I think he could have had we not succeeded in out 1st attempt at Normandy. Yes, Stalin had been pressuring us to open another front in addition to taking Italy. But had we failed on our 1st attempt, we certainly would have made another. Or maybe just have slogged up France from Marseille. Either way, Hitler would have had to keep a strong enough presence in Northern France to deny us a 2nd time, and I don't think he was in a position to divert more forces to the losing battle he was fighting on the Eastern Front. And yes, Stalin could have made a separate peace, but that peace would have included Hitler's dead body, punishing Germany and occupying all of it had we not gotten there at the same time. If we're turned back at Normandy and end up later still slogging through France from the West or South at the same time Stalin is annihilating Germany. Ain't no way Stalin stops short of the destruction of Germany, especially with Hitler still alive. Just like he didn't stop in Manchuria after the Japanese surrendered. "Joseph, you can stop now - Japan has surrendered. Joseph, that's Chinese territory you're taking. Joseph, are you there? Can you here me now?"
 
ImTheCaptain said:
no you're 'zackly right about the oil fields. my issue is with the "the eastern front was the most important part of WWII" nonsense.
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The Eastern Front was where Hitler deployed the majority of his forces, and it was where the Germans and the Russians suffered huge casualty numbers. I think we lost 4-500,000 casualties total in the war, and the Russians lost around 9mil just in terms of military casualties. And I'm not trying to downplay any of our efforts in the war. We basically took on the Japanese alone. We and Britain crucially kept Rommel from getting across Egypt to Saudi Arabia and took Italy. And the invasion at Normandy and the campaign through France to Germany was critical. But in terms of the staggering numbers, yeah, I do think Stalin and the USSR merit the most credit for the defeat of Germany.

As an aside and speaking of casualties, interesting trivia question that I had never realized until recently because we read so little about it. In terms of total casualties in WW2, everyone knows that Russia lost the most, somewhere around 23 million. Which country had the 2nd most casualties?
 
cville deac said:
I think he could have had we not succeeded in out 1st attempt at Normandy. Yes, Stalin had been pressuring us to open another front in addition to taking Italy. But had we failed on our 1st attempt, we certainly would have made another. Or maybe just have slogged up France from Marseille. Either way, Hitler would have had to keep a strong enough presence in Northern France to deny us a 2nd time, and I don't think he was in a position to divert more forces to the losing battle he was fighting on the Eastern Front. And yes, Stalin could have made a separate peace, but that peace would have included Hitler's dead body, punishing Germany and occupying all of it had we not gotten there at the same time. If we're turned back at Normandy and end up later still slogging through France from the West or South at the same time Stalin is annihilating Germany. Ain't no way Stalin stops short of the destruction of Germany, especially with Hitler still alive. Just like he didn't stop in Manchuria after the Japanese surrendered. "Joseph, you can stop now - Japan has surrendered. Joseph, that's Chinese territory you're taking. Joseph, are you there? Can you here me now?"
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Sure, it definitely could have gone that way, too. I'm just saying that it is by no means certain that Stalin would have done the job on his own. Lot of variables - what if Normandy had been a real debacle, enough to discredit the high command and cause political turmoil in the US and Britain?
 
which is probably the likely result. it was always a delicate political (at home and between the generals) situation; a major failure could've fractured the war effort
 
Deacon923 said:
Sure, it definitely could have gone that way, too. I'm just saying that it is by no means certain that Stalin would have done the job on his own. Lot of variables - what if Normandy had been a real debacle, enough to discredit the high command and cause political turmoil in the US and Britain?
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Then most Western Euros too would have been pronouncing adieu by saying dos vedanya?:)

But I think you're onto something. Churchill, Stalin and Roosevelt all agreed that ze Germans and Japan had to unconditionally surrender. And I think the 2 countries who may not have had the intestinal fortitude to fight all the way to unconditional surrender would have been the US and UK. Had Normandy been a catastrophe, or had we had to invade Japan, kill a few million Japanese and suffer a million or so casualties ourselves, I think our citizenries may have ousted our leadership. And the latter was a real fear to the Truman administration and our military establishment. But given how brutally ze Germans fought the war against the USSR, how Hitler back stabbed Stalin and how much Stalin revered the sanctity of human life and how much he cared about public opinion, there is no way Stalin doesn't fight to the last man and stop at nothing short of the annihilation of Germany.
 
Still planning my trip, one day, to Normandy. Gots to go.
 
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