True, hindsight is 20-20. And it does not denigrate the efforts of the brave American, British, Canadian, Australian, etc. soldiers in OVERLORD to say that they saved Europe from totalitarian domination. It is just that, in hindsight, they didn't save it from the totalitarians they thought they were fighting. Stalin may have asked for help, but D-Day coincided with the "Destruction of Army Group Center" campaign that gutted the German army clinging to Ukraine and opened the way into Poland and, eventually, Berlin. My argument is that D-day didn't so much get the Soviets to Berlin as much as it stopped them from going any further.
"some of the German units were reconstituted out of misfits and POWs, but most of them were battle-tested, crack units led by fanatics"
There were some very well-led, crack troops facing the allies. Of course, one side's fanatic is the others hero. Put Patton's speech into the mouth of Rommel, and you have a bloodthirsty Nazi spewing hate. Winners write the history.
"Winners write the history."
Tell the Japanese that.
"True, hindsight is 20-20. And it does not denigrate the efforts of the brave American, British, Canadian, Australian, etc. soldiers in OVERLORD to say that they saved Europe from totalitarian domination. It is just that, in hindsight, they didn't save it from the totalitarians they thought they were fighting. Stalin may have asked for help, but D-Day coincided with the "Destruction of Army Group Center" campaign that gutted the German army clinging to Ukraine and opened the way into Poland and, eventually, Berlin. My argument is that D-day didn't so much get the Soviets to Berlin as much as it stopped them from going any further."
Ah, the benefits of hindsight! Well, in hindsight the right thing to do for the western allies would have been to not stop in Berlin but to march onwards to Moscow. Not only would that have prevented eastern Europe from falling into the hands of the communist agressors (after all, Germany was NOT THE ONLY country that invaded Poland), but it would have saved the world a century of troubles (no Korean war, no Vietnam, no religious nuts [aka. "Freedom Fighters"] in Afghanistan and so on...).
But it's only afterwards that one knows what would have been the right thing to do ;-).