History D-Day June 6

army.mil features ^ | 06-06-2020 | various

[stuckincali]

My Dad was D-day plus 6. Said there were still bodies on the beach, stacked up. He went into Berlin amongst the first Americans, after they paused to let the Soviets go first.

[TMN78247]

Fwiw, “my sister of the heart”, Sharon’s dad said that he was “just a dogface GI” during WII. = Because of what we had found out about my dad’s & uncle’s war service, we ordered her dad’s service records too.

We discovered that 1LT Joe Berry was “with Merrill”, i.e., he was a MERRILL’S MARAUDER in the CBI, who fought the 18th Japanese Field Army (an elite combat unit at least 10X as large as the Marauders) to a standstill in the jungles of Burma.
(It is believed that 3,805 Marauders entered the Burmese jungle & 903 survived the “fight in the jungle” & entered friendly lines in India after about 8 months of near continuous combat. - That is about 23% of Marauders that survived their service behind enemy lines!!!)

Like I said, do yourself a favor & ASK for your deceased relative’s service records IF you want to know the TRUTH about their war service.

Yours, TMN78208
USA, Retired

[chimera]

Tarawa? Geez, what was it, like 3000 went in,300 survived? In terms of KIA per capita, those Pacific Theater campaigns were unbelievably brutal and bloody.

[TMN78247]

YES, those fights were brutal & far too costly for what the islands were worth.

MANY of those Japanese island fortresses could have been BYPASSED, their resupply ships & barges stopped from landing ammo/food/supplies using PT boats/submarines & allowed to “wither on the vine”.

Yours, TMN78247

[chimera]

Which was the strategy eventually adopted. That's why, from a military perspective, it was kind of a no-brainer to drop the bombs. Truman had enough sense to know it was useless to keep sending our guys into meat grinders if we could take out the Japanese with a couple of single-plane bombing missions. And invading Japan would have been the bloodiest meat grinder of them all.

[TMN78247]

My late mother was a young USAAC wife at that time & said that GEN Marshall believed & stated that the USA would lose a MILLION KIA to invade & defeat Japan in “the home islands”.

Yours, TMN78247
USA, Retired

[TMN78247]

My late mother was a young USAAC wife at that time & said that GEN Marshall believed & stated that the USA would lose a MILLION KIA to invade & defeat Japan in “the home islands”.

Yours, TMN78247
USA, Retired

[chimera]

What was the casualty rate among USAAC crews, like 50% or so never made it back? Sounds like your folks beat some fairly long odds.

[TMN78247]

While serving in combat with the USAAC was often hazardous duty, it was NOT nearly as dangerous as some other WWII missions & unit casualty rates were. - For example, the famed MERRILL’s MARAUDERS had a 77% casualty rate in the CBI Theater.

Yours, TMN78247