D-Day refers to the Normandy landings and represents one of the most impressive military operations in history.
Collection Rodger Hamilton: The War Photos http://wosu.org/2012/archive/hamilton/gallery.php?page=gallery1 Little girl putting flower on grave. The girl is French; the grave is American. U.S. Army Pictorial Service. Une fillette endimanchée dépose une fleur sur la tombe d'un GI, en arrière-plan des civils. Selon ce site : Cote : 13 Num 5475 http://recherche.archives.manche.fr/?id=recherche_documents_figures Une fillette dépose une fleur sur la tombe d'un soldat américain Date : 14 juillet 1944 à Sainte-Mère-Église.
D-Day, code name Operation Overlord, took place on 6 June 1944 and refers to the Normandy landings. It was a crucial moment in the Second World War and one of the most impressive military operations in history.
It took place at dawn on 6 June 1944; it was originally scheduled for 5 June but was postponed by 24 hours due to adverse weather conditions.
The main objective of the Allies was to open a second front in Western Europe to relieve pressure on the Soviet Union on the Eastern Front and begin the liberation of continental Europe from Nazi occupation.
In practice, this meant liberating France by creating a bridgehead that would allow the influx of troops and equipment needed to defeat the German forces, forcing them to fight on two fronts. This was what had been agreed by the Allies (mainly the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union) at the Tehran Conference in 1943.
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The landing was a complex and meticulously planned operation involving land, sea and air forces.
American General Eisenhower was appointed Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe and oversaw the planning. The operation was preceded by intense intelligence activity, sabotage by the French Resistance and preparatory bombing to weaken German defences and mislead the Germans as to the actual landing site; the Allies managed to convince the Germans that it would take place at Pas-de-Calais.
More than 156,000 soldiers were involved, mainly Americans, British and Canadians, supported by a fleet of around 7,000 ships and over 11,000 aircraft.
In the hours before dawn, around 24,000 paratroopers and airborne troops were dropped behind enemy lines to capture strategic objectives such as bridges and roads and to create chaos in the German defences.
At dawn, landing forces began to arrive on five beaches along the Normandy coast, each with a code name: Utah Beach (United States), Omaha Beach (United States), the beach where the Allies encountered the fiercest German resistance and suffered the heaviest losses, Gold Beach (United Kingdom), Juno Beach (Canada), and Sword Beach (United Kingdom).
The landing was preceded and accompanied by an impressive naval and air bombardment to neutralise the defences of the Germans, who had set up a series of coastal fortifications called the Atlantic Wall. The strategic surprise and air and naval superiority allowed the Allies to establish a bridgehead. The nearest German Panzer divisions took time to intervene effectively.
The Battle of Normandy was extremely bloody for both sides; on D-Day alone, the Allies suffered around 10,000 casualties (including dead, wounded and missing), while German losses are estimated at between 4,000 and 9,000 men. The entire Normandy campaign cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
D-Day marked the beginning of the end of the German occupation of France; the opening of this second front forced Germany to divert resources to counter the Allied advance, while the Red Army continued its offensive in the east.
Although the war in Europe lasted almost another year (until May 1945), the success of the Normandy landings was a decisive step towards Allied victory.
Texts and photos are from the 200-page PDF book published by ZoomArchives, text by Alessandro Luigi Perna.
