Originally posted by Micah
I don't think any one here ever said that the US won the War in europe "single handedly" we were how ever the turning point of the war.
Now about D-Day, Convienient that the british would attack sword, as it was the least defended beach of the lot. osisting of mostly a residential area rather than tons of pill boxes, traps, and artllery zero'd in on the beach.
You know the US was expecting almost 5 times the casualties seen at omaha beach. Are the Regular infantry of the United states better trained? ... perhaps ... but we will never know ... but think on this ... we have the most money in the world and we're willing to throw it at a problem until it goes away.
-Micah
Sorry to burst your bubble, but the least defended beach was Utah (one of the two American beaches).
The beach at which most casualties fell was Omaha. This was because of some serious foul ups. Both the naval and air bombardments had been largely off target. This was because the clouds at Omaha were overcast, obscuring sight for the strategic bombers. Because of the fear of droppin their bombs short of target (and thereby dumping them in between the approaching invasion fleet), the pilots dropped there bombs a few seconds late, causing them to hit the earth a few miles inland, thereby missing the beach defenses. The naval bombardment was mostly without effect because of the smoke caused by the opening barrage. Shots were fired blindly. The situation was critical at Omaha, until a few destroyers moved dangerously close to the surf, and started blasting German pillboxes at point blank range. Also, the presence of a few junior officers and NCO's who'd decided they had taken enough of a shelacking made a huge impact. The problem was that a large part of the leadership of the first wave had died on the beach, rendering the landing parties leaderless, until these previously mentioned people decided it was better to die trying than just to die.
Don't think the English had a cakewalk. The Canadians had the toughest job of the British beaches, landing in front of heavy defensive positions. The situation was not unlike Omaha beach, but the Canadians were able to move inland a lot quicker, because of the absence of a 100ft bluff, a feature that seriously hindered operations at Omaha.
The British may not have suffered as bad as the US on D-Day, but in the following days they actually took on a larger proportion of the German army. In Normandy the British faced most of the German Panzer divisions, including a number of SS formations.
One battle the Americans did fight almost singlehandedly was the battle of the Bulge, the Ardennes offensive. This was however by default, since the Germans decided to launch an attack against a US part of the front.
I hate bring it to you, but the Russians were winning the war in 1943 already, way before any Brits or Yanks set foot on continental Europe. After the debacle at Stalingrad, the German army ceased to be a real offensive threat after the battle of Kursk, where most of the German armoured formations were decimated to the point of no recovery.
If you want to know more about this sort of stuff, I suggest you read D-Day, by Steven Ambrose. It'll tell you all you want to know about that day, since it's composed of archival research, combined with eyewitness accounts of the people who were there, including the Germans.
Enough of this now! It's time we realise that no country is better than the other! Yes, country X may be more developed than country Y, but that does not make a person from country X more valuable or intelligent than the person from country Y. There are scholars in underdeveloped countries too. Do not for one minute think that you are better or smarter than somebody from the deep dark jungles of God knows where. Yes, this person may not be as adapt at the important things in life, like posting on this board. But I bet that this guy stands a better chance of surviving in the Jungle than any of us. So how good you are, is only determined by the extent to which you are adapted to your surroundings.
Don't forget, there are dumb asses in every society!!!
I have to say that it's funny to see how the countries that fought in WWII all tell history in a slightly different way, just to make themselves look better. Sometimes it's good to be from a country that hardly made a contribution, it allows one to look at things unbiased.
Peace ya'll!
