D-Day 24 hours (1 Viewer)

[BobbyLayne]

79 years ago today

One of my favorite YT channels has some good fresh content they started rolling out last night:

World War Two

Some of you already watch their weekly real time show; new episodes release every Saturday morning covering the week that was.

For the largest amphibious assault in history, they created a special channel to release the new content:

D-Day 24 hours

Spoiler: 24 HOURS

Invasion by Air - D-Day (Part 1)

Through The Gates of Hell - D-Day [Part 2]

Piercing the Atlantic Wall- D-Day [Part 3]

German Counterattack - D-Day [Part 4]

***************

HOUR 1 - First Boots on the Ground

HOUR 2 - Drop Zone Cotentin

HOUR 3 - Nazis Caught Sleeping

HOUR 4 - Neptune’s Armada

HOUR 5 - Bombing the French Civilians

HOUR 6 - Shelling the Germans

HOUR 7 - H-Hour for Omaha and Utah

HOUR 8 - H-Hour for Gold, Juno and Sword

HOUR 9 - Hitter’s Fortress Walls Crumbling

HOUR 10 - The Greatest Press Story Ever Told

HOUR 11 - Where the Hell is the Luftwaffe?

HOUR 12 - Allied Planes Hunt in Packs

HOUR 13 - Where the Hell are the French?

HOUR 14 - Invasion in a Traffic Jam!

HOUR 15 - The New Warrior Comes from the Sky

HOUR 16 - The US Invades Great Britain

HOUR 17 - We’re Bombing the French Again!

HOUR 18 - Omaha Finally Secure?

HOUR 19 - The Weapon to Target Hitler’s Brain

HOUR 20 - The Nazis Strike Back - the Panzers are Coming

HOUR 21 - Not Another Dieppe Raid!

HOUR 22 - The Three Act Drama of Utah Beach

HOUR 23 - Omaha Beach: Tragedy or Victory?

HOUR 24 - The Atlantic Wall Has Fallen

 

[beer 30]

Came here looking for the D-Day thread to bump it up #neverforget

 

[BobbyLayne]

Frank DeVita’s story is one of many inspiring memories from the men who landed on the beaches of Normandy 79 years ago this Tuesday. But that fact doesn’t detract from his story. Rather, it makes the enormous sacrifices of that day even more remarkable.

DeVita was a 19-year-old Gunner’s Mate 3rd Class aboard the USS Samuel Chase. His job was to ride in one of the many troop transport ships that delivered men to Omaha Beach amid terrific artillery fire, then to lower the ramp that would allow them to exit the ship and run onto the beach, desperate to establish a beachhead on the European continent.

Pre-dawn bombing raids had failed to effectively hit the fortified positions German soldiers had established above Omaha Beach. That allowed the Germans to riddle incoming boats with relentless machine gun fire.

D-Day Stories: The Gunner's Mate Who Witnessed Carnage at Omaha Beach

As DeVita said, he could hear bullets pounding the ramp as they approached the beach, like the staccato clacking of a typewriter. As long as the ramp was up, it was a shield.

“I figured in my mind, when I drop that there ramp, the bullets that are hitting the ramp are going to come into the boat. So I froze,” he said.

Only when the boat’s coxswain yelled and swore at him to lower the ramp did he do his duty.

“I dropped the ramp,” he said. “The first seven or eight, nine, 10 guys went down like you’re cutting down wheat.”

That was his first trip to the beach. By the eighth trip that day, he was carrying the wounded and dead off the shore and back to the main ships.

He remembers those men, “18, 19, 20 years old. They were too young to vote, but they weren’t too young to die.”

“Half of us were going to be killed. They told us that. But everybody went anyway,” he said, his voice breaking as he began to cry. “They didn’t hesitate a minute, and neither did I.”

D-Day was a pivotal moment in World War II, not just for U.S. soldiers, but for the allied forces and the world. Officially known as “Operation Overlord,” the invasion included more than 195,000 personnel from eight allied nations on 7,000 ships and landing craft, with about 133,000 from the United States, Britain and its commonwealth landing on June 6, 1944, according to the Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library.

Casualties that day, dead and wounded, numbered 10,300. That is difficult to comprehend at a time when the entire 20-year war in Afghanistan resulted in 22,311 U.S. casualties. D-Day has been called the largest invasion force in human history. It may be the greatest single example of selfless sacrifice, as well.

Because of the bravery and willingness of those men that day, the world has not faced a similar pivot point of such great importance since then.
Those who survived D-Day and the rest of World War II are rapidly dwindling. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs said only 167,284 of the 16 million who served in that conflict remained alive in 2022. Those numbers are expected to fall below 100,000 this year.

As the website of the National WWII Museum says, “Every day, memories of World War II — its sights and sounds, its terrors and triumphs — disappear.”

But the remembrance and gratitude of today’s Americans for that generation must never vanish. Neither should the resolve to follow their selfless example whenever circumstances make it necessary again.

 

[Desert_Power]

Don't forget about our Canadian buddies on this day.

 

[FatMax]

I stopped watching the series in March because I knew what was coming, and I wanted to binge the lead-up. I think I made the correct decision. I'll be caught up again before the weekend is over.

 

[BobbyLayne]

Don't forget about our Canadian buddies on this day.

Armchair Historian had a good one a few months ago

D-Day from the Canadian Perspective | Bird's Eye View

 

[rockaction]

Related, if not on point.

Video of French caretakers rubbing the dirt from Omaha Beach on each American gravestone is a fascinating bit of showing an allegiance and never forgetting.

https://twitter.com/MichaelWarbur17/status/1666027889484021762

 

[-OZ-]

 

[TLEF316]

"Hey fellas. Get in this floating metal box.....and when the door opens, run through waist high water towards the automatic gunfire. Eventually we'll get you some help"

Freaking legends. Consider what these guys did and what the current generations aren't willing to do. Crazy

 

[BobbyLayne]

Reel History: How Accurate is Omaha Beach in “Saving Private Ryan”?

 

[BobbyLayne]

OMAHA BEACH: Last Living 1st Wave D-Day Officer on Storming Normandy​

John C. Raaen, Jr., graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1943. Commissioned as a 2nd. Lt. in the Corps of Engineers, he joined the newly activated 5th Ranger Battalion where he underwent extensive training in Florida, England, and finally Scotland in preparation for the invasion of occupied Europe.

On June 6, 1944, Raaen and his rangers were supposed to follow the 2nd Ranger Battalion and attack Pointe du Hoc, but delays and miscommunication saw Raaen and his Rangers rerouted directly to Omaha Beach. The 5th Rangers landed intact as a battalion and thus became the dominant influence on Omaha Dog Beach.

During his first time in combat, Raaen, who was an Army Captain at the time, distinguished himself on the beaches of Normandy France. He was awarded the Silver Star and Combat Infantryman Badge for his actions on that day.

 

[Sand]

I had the privilege of going to Omaha Beach last year. I walked out to the ocean's edge and turned around to see what the landing parties had to deal with. Holy ****. The bluff is huge - much, much higher than one would expect. The beach isn't what one would think of as a beach in the US - sand stretching to infinity both ways. Omaha Beach is closed off - Point Du Hoc on one side and cliff like features on the other. It's effectively only a couple/three miles wide. Looking from end to end it didn't seem big enough to bring in the masses of troops that landed.

I am in awe of the men that stormed the beach that day.