Posted on 06/05/2017 6:25:07 PM PDT by John S Mosby
Timeline of the D-Day landings of 6th June 1944 hour by hour as events unfolded on the day
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
My WWII vet dad grouses about the use of the term ‘D-Day’ for the Normandy invasion because “D-Day” is a place holder term widely used in the military-
it seems that when an operation order is written the date that it commences isn’t firm- so ‘D-Day’ is a place holder in the op order... the time that it will jump off is listed as ‘H-Hour’... the second day of the operation is ‘D+1’ and so forth.
So there’s a D-Day for every one of the hundreds if not thousand operations of the war.
I tell him he’s fighting a losing battle, that D-Day for June 6 looks likes it’s gonna stick in the public mind but I don’t think he will quit the fight.
“Our blood, his guts”
My dad preferred Patch, having had both as commanders.
R.I.P., Uncle Bill Warner. America’s finest.
love
The error is mine. The other problem for the Allies was in Italy. I just checked Eisenhower’s book again.
“He only spoke of it one time to the family”.
Seems most of my generation’s dads were WWII vets.
And one thing I’ve noticed is that most vets who saw real action never talked about the war. My dad never, ever talked about the war. To this day I know very little about his time served.
I recall being mystified as a young child at photos of my dad dressed in uniform in north Africa. He was part of the allied invasion of Italy where he was wounded at the battle of Salerno.
Seems the Normandy invasion eclipsed American involvement that proceeded D-Day.
I prefer the CBS version.
Your are correct. But sometimes ordinary thinks take on extraordinary meaning by the magnitude and sacrifices associated with the term. D-day, H-hour, both standard terms in the manuals written about amphibious warfare.
But this D-day was like no other. Talk to someone knowledgeable about our Civil War, mention the terms “the Cornfield” or “the Wheatfield”, he will know exactly what your talking about. The words used in this case do not refer to just any corn field, or wheat field. These words are associated with great sacrifice and terrible combat. It is the same with D-day. There is only one like it.
Thanks.
I believe Patch was an unsung great general.
In his book, “The Generals” Ricks was quite complimentary of Patch.
He is technically correct and you’re lucky to still have him and I hope he still has his mind if not his health.
D-Day though, we all know has become The day of June 6, 1944. Not like Coke is generic for all soda.
“Seems the Normandy invasion eclipsed American involvement that proceeded D-Day.”
For the masses this is probably true. For those who study though it is just the most publicized. Few seem to know or remember what a horrible slog Italy was. After Patton took Sicily (Montgomery helped of course) and the conduct of the campaign was turned over to Clark there seem to have been a lot of “mistakes”. I can’t name them but Rapido River and Casino are mentioned often by people who were there. Those were the big ones though and if you can’t get the big ones right what does this say for the little ones?
Grateful for their sacrifice. It’s just nuts when I think about all of the highly educated troops today, with all their technology... and we just keep losing. There are things you can’t learn at school, those guys, on DDay.. they had it in spades.
It would have only been a matter of time. We were free to provide Britain with everything they wanted, now that we were both fighting Japan. All it would have to took was one sinking by a U-Boat to provide the Casus Belli for going to war with Germany.
What most people forget is that the big news the day before D-Day was that Rome was liberated.
On which SiriusXM channel?
When Pearl Harbor happened, we [Roosevelt's advisors] were desperate. ... We were all in agony. The mood of the American people was obvious – they were determined that the Japanese had to be punished. We could have been forced to concentrate all our efforts on the Pacific, unable from then on to give more than purely peripheral help to Britain. It was truly astounding when Hitler declared war on us three days later. I cannot tell you our feelings of triumph. It was a totally irrational thing for him to do, and I think it saved Europe."
FDR had already committed to “Europe First” long before Pearl Harbor.
Not to diminish any of the gallantry on D-day, but SME is a study of bravery, adapting and overcoming by lightly armed paratroopers.
Not to diminish any of the gallantry on D-day, but SME is a study of bravery, adapting and overcoming by lightly armed paratroopers.
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