The landings formed part of Operation Overlord, which marked the beginning of the end of Hitler’s Third Reich.
Some historians reckon the scale of the operation far exceeds anything ever undertaken on the planet - including the 1960’s Apollo Moonshot. Others point out that it changed humanity on a scale never experienced before or since.
The visit changed my perspective of what happened, 80 years ago.
While our media focus is (understandably) on the beach landings themselves, this was merely the tip of the spear. Overlord’s objective was to land a million and a half men and munitions in western Europe and keep them supplied until the Nazis were defeated.
The logistics to achieve this are staggering.
Change of mind #1: No-one but the United Sates could have put this together.
For example: the failed strike on Dieppe in 1942 showed the difficulty of securing a deepwater port, vital for the unloading of the required materiel. Eisenhower’s response? We’ll bring our own. To that end, they built floating docks, concrete caissons, pontoon bridges and other bits of naval engineering excellence, and towed them over the channel. There they assembled two enormous artificial ports, one at Utah and the other at Sword.
We visited the latter at Arromanches, where there is an excellent museum, and remnants can still be seen of the original structures at sea.
https://youtu.be/_TVKUDHvzgU
The museum has great models of these astonishing structures
https://youtu.be/PRkxHNLJzU0
https://youtu.be/PoK-bw1nZ1Y
Change of mind #2: Montgomery was frightened of Rommel, and loved having his picture taken.
Although nominally in charge of all ground forces, Montgomery failed in the most pressing objective: to capture Caen and so open the way to the east. The plan (actually, his own, documented plan) was to maintain the momentum of the landings, and quickly thrust inland to achieve this objective. Instead on the day he dithered, and entered into a 42-day attempt at attrition which cost around 38,000 British and Canadian lives. In an attempt to save face, he ordered that Caen be destroyed by bombardment. 600,000 shells were fired, and 2,500 tonnes of bombs were dropped. The Germans had long since departed, and the result was thousands of French civilian deaths, and the destruction of a centuries-old Norman treasure.
Eisenhower meantime got Bradley to mop up Cherbourg in the west, and drive the invasion from there.
No change of mind: Despite the weather almost ruining the landings, despite the stupid self-destructing glider plan which resulted in 50% casualties of the Airborne divisions, despite facing incredible obstacles, the success of the D-Day landings hinged on the individuals who made the impossible, possible.
