(June 5, 2014 at 12:39 pm)Minimalist Wrote: Sadly, after listening to a news broadcast l suspect that these anniversaries serve merely to reinforce American misconceptions about our own importance. The news anchor commented several times how 200,000 "Americans" landed in Normandy. No. It was about 75,000 with an equivalent number of British and Canadians and some Free French.
And, a couple of weeks later the Russians unleashed Operation Bagration
Bagration dwarfed Overlord.
So true, not to mention that the equipment and quality of soldier the Russians faced were superior.
Utah, Juno, Gold and Sword were certainly not surfing competitions, but the inability to clear obstructions and almost non-existent air and sea bombardment support initially made Omaha a special kind of hell. The concentration on Omaha I think lends itself to American misconception. The fixation on Omaha also leads to a general ignorance of how incredibly tough the next two and a half months were.
Capturing St. Lo and Caen didn't go as scheduled. Hitler's refusal to let Rundstedt redeploy made any advance sluggish and costly. If I remember right it took Montgomery three tries to take Caen and in the end the fighting was house to house. Bradley had better success at St. Lo, but how many people know what bocage means?
