Posted on 11/12/2018 1:30:47 PM PST by DFG
Battling rough seas with five-foot waves, thrashing wind gusts and heavy enemy fire, U.S. Navy amphibious landing craft attacking Utah Beach on D-Day actually managed to achieve total tactical surprise.
Although amphibious forces eventually took heavy German artillery fire as they got closer, the amphibious landing force was well protected by Allied air superiority and cloudy weather.
“As our forces approached the French coast without a murmur from the enemy or from their own radio, the realization that once again almost complete tactical surprise had been achieved slowly dawned,” said Sir Bertram Home Ramsay, Naval Commander-in-Chief of the Allied Naval Expeditionary Force for the invasion, according to Naval Heritage and History Command’s “Operation Neptune – The Invasion of Normandy.”
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Flotilla 4, Tare Green Sector, Utah Beach.
My Father was a Navy corpsman on the USS Quincy at Utah Beach.
Made the landing several times picking up the wounded.
My dad was a LT JG, detonating mines on Omaha beach so troops could land. After he and his team cleared their stretch of beach, he went into the water and hauled out men who were foundering in the surf.
Sounds like an awesome guy. I once met a guy who was UDT on D-Day. He and his team swam in the night before and set some charges in the surf to destroy some of the iron barriers, then swam back to the raft.
He got shot while on a landing craft later in the day and never landed on the beach.
Pure guts. All of them. Every last one.
Find someone who can name all five landing beaches...
The official Army history of D-Day: Cross Channel Attack https://history.army.mil/html/books/007/7-4-1/index.html
The original 1944 Army history of Utah Beach: https://history.army.mil/books/wwii/utah/utah.htm
extracted from The Corps of Engineers: The War Against Germany, Chapter 14, Preparing for D-day Landings—
https://history.army.mil/html/reference/Normandy/TS/COE/COE14.htm
http://www.300thcombatengineersinwwii.com/normandy.html
The Asst. DC of the 4th was General Teddy Roosevelt, Jr. He badgered the Div. Commander until he finally got permission to land in the first wave, the only general officer to do so.
And it's a good thing he did. After reconnoitering where they were, Teddy made the on the spot decision, "we'll start the war from right here!" He rejected any suggestion to re-embark and land again to the north. He was awarded the Medal of Honor.
I believe even Rommel took a couple of days off thinking the allies couldn’t invade in such weather.
Omaha, Utah, Juno, Sword & Gold
Utah, Omaha, Sword, Juno, Gold
The story seems to confuse Omaha and Utah Beaches. It quotes veterans of the 1st and 29th Infantry Divisions, but they landed at Omaha. The 4th Infantry Division is correctly identified as landing at Utah.
The 4th ID took 197 casualties on June 6, 1944.
Three seconds.
Thbbbbt!!!
yep.
That is where my dad landed. Tare Sector Utah Beach. He was in Company C First Special Engineering Brigade
My scout master was in a UDT team at the time. Several months before the invasion, they came ashore on cloudy, moonless nights to gather samples of sand from each of the proposed invasion beaches. Like the guy you knew, on the night before the invasion his team was setting demo charges on underwater obstructions.
My scout master was in a UDT team at the time. Several months before the invasion, they came ashore on cloudy, moonless nights to gather samples of sand from each of the proposed invasion beaches. Like the guy you knew, on the night before the invasion his team was setting demo charges on underwater obstructions.
That's because bombers were used as bait starting in January 1944. The idea was to lure the Luftwaffe fighters up so American fighters could destroy them. It worked quite well. Before January 1944 fighters were tied to the bombers. After that, they went on ahead on search and destroy missions. One of the benefits of this new strategy was bomber losses fell significantly. Thank Jimmy Doolittle for this.
Just re-watched The Longest Day and for my two cents, General Norman Daniel "Dutch" Cota, Sr., who landed on Omaha Beach in the 2nd wave, was by all accounts the major reason the invasion there succeeded. His above the call of duty leadership and fighting spirit on Omaha and the battle inland are the stuff of legend. He should have been awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions.
Which, by the way, would have made him the holder of all the US Army combat medals for bravery because he has already been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the Silver Star with oak leaf cluster, the Bronze Star with oak leaf cluster and the Purple Heart.
No argument here.
They’d have found me clinging to the back of one of the landing platforms.
Either that or crying in the front.
Truly brave men one and all
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