In
the January of 1944, General Dwight Eisenhower was made the commander of the
Operation Overlord. The first act that he carried out with this position was to
carry out a massive deception operation to make the Germans think that the main
invasion was going to be at Pas-de-Calais, rather than Normandy where the
actual D-day invasion would take place. Many tactics were used to carry out
this deception and including: a phantom army, fraudulent radio transmissions,
and fake equipment. He was very successful in this, and was a great start to
his time as commander of the Operation Overlord.
The
original date that was set for the invasion was June, 5 1944, however in result
of very bad weather the days leading up to June 5th it was postponed
twenty-four hours. That next morning after the go-ahead from their
meteorologist, Eisenhower gave the orders for the Operation to begin. Before
they all left he stated, “You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade,
toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon
you.” Following these words by Commander Eisenhower, 5,000 ships and landing
craft embarked on their journey from England to France. On top of that, there
were also 11,000 aircraft that were mobilized and ready to support and attack
from the air.
On
June 6, thousands of different kinds of soldiers had arrived and were on the
ground behind enemy lines. They were in charge of securing bridges and exit
roads. The invasions started at approximately 6:30 am with the different armies
coming in from several beaches. Luckily enough for the British and Canadian
armies, they overcame very light and easy opposition and were able to capture
beaches with the codenames of Gold and Juno and Sword. This was also the case
for the Americans at the Utah Beach. However, the Americans did face great
tribulation coming in from the Omaha beach. Because of this came around 2,000
American casualties. By the end of that day approximately 156,000 Allied troops
had made their way in, and successfully stormed the beaches of Normandy. Around
4,000 Allied lost their lives throughout the D-day invasion, with thousands
more missing and wounded.
From
a German standpoint, they suffered greatly from this invasion. Because of
confusion, and Hitler’s miscommunication errors there were not many divisions
released for the counterattack. Reinforcements had to be called from further
distances which caused a great amount of delays. It was very bad communication
on Germany’s part. They were overthrown by Allied air support that took out
many bridges and ways of travel. This made it very difficult for the German’s
to move forward, which made the Allied troops even more protected in this
situation.
Throughout
the following weeks, the Allies made their way across Normandy, facing strong
German forces but succeeding and making their way through Cherobourg. At this
point in the invasion, 850,000 men and 150,000 vehicles were in Normandy and determined
to make it to France.
As
it grew nearer to the end of August 1944, the Allies reached the Seine River,
the Germans had left the northwestern territory of France, Paris was liberated,
and the Battle of Normandy had come to a close. This battle began the official
turn against the Nazis. At this point in the war, the Allies were getting ready
to enter Germany.
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