Lest we Forget, 6 June, 1944.

[mjkerner]

Grim reading.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1960/11/first-wave-at-omaha-beach/303365/

On the other hand, my city's newspaper, The Wisconsin State Journal, devoted a sentence to D-Day...in the "Today in History" section, in about 7 Type, stuck in between birth, legal, and local govt committe meeting notices!:mad::mad::mad:

Pretty pathetic.

Rant over.

[John Kettler]

mjkerner,

I certainly haven't forgotten. Uncle George landed administratively (part of Boat Two, Patton's Navy detachment for running M-boats at river crossings) the next day and had the lovely task of fishing out mangled bodies from the water and retrieving them from their shattered landing craft. That's the polite description! Am certain that cleanup experience haunted him until the day he died.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Sgt Joch]

Balkoski's "Beyond the Beachhead" has detailed description of what happened to the various companies of the U.S. 29th division that landed at OMAHA.

It was really a matter of luck.

The first wave that landed on western end of the beach, especially DOG GREEN, just happened to be directly in front of a german bunker/MG nests and were almost totally wiped out. This is the scene recreated at the beginning of "Saving Private Ryan".

However, the companies which landed on the eastern end were obscured by smoke and many managed to reach the seawall with little or no casualties. Getting off the beach was another matter...

[Bulletpoint]

I am a young man without relatives who fought in the war, but I find that playing intelligent war games such as this one help me understand and appreciate the role and plight of those who fought to secure the stable and prosperous Europe that I grew up in.

In fact, I consider Combat Mission an "anti war game", as it portrays war as extremely ruthless and with very little place for glory and heroism. And this message is clear even with the real horror of war removed. I find my imagination fills in the blanks.

[A Canadian Cat]

In fact, I consider Combat Mission an "anti war game", as it portrays war as extremely ruthless and with very little place for glory and heroism. And this message is clear even with the real horror of war removed. I find my imagination fills in the blanks.

Agreed, gives you a small sense of the cost - if you take the time to think about it. Certainly much better that those role playing twitch games where you come back from the dead over and over. In those games the value of your "life" is very low.

[Wodin]

His Omaha Beach book is superb aswell...plus he is a wargame designer\wargamer..you'll find him over at BGG.

Balkoski's "Beyond the Beachhead" has detailed description of what happened to the various companies of the U.S. 29th division that landed at OMAHA.

It was really a matter of luck.

The first wave that landed on western end of the beach, especially DOG GREEN, just happened to be directly in front of a german bunker/MG nests and were almost totally wiped out. This is the scene recreated at the beginning of "Saving Private Ryan".

However, the companies which landed on the eastern end were obscured by smoke and many managed to reach the seawall with little or no casualties. Getting off the beach was another matter...

[A Canadian Cat]

I make sure my kids don't forget either. We talk about this kind of topic frequently (wide ranging from 1812 to modern day where ever the discussion leads). My son shocked me last year when he picked the Mulberry docks as a project for his history class. I don't even remember talking about those - although I might have. Clearly he was listening. We both learned a lot too.

[altipueri]

I had to go to SW Scotland last year. with a couple of hours off I drove south of Newton Stewart to Garlieston - and discovered work on the Mulberry harbour was done there.

Below - cribbed from a web article on the harbours (overall, not just Garlieston -

The scale of the project was enormous and was in danger of over-stretching the capacity of the UK's civil engineering industry. From late summer of 1943 onwards three hundred firms were recruited from around the country employing 40,000 to 45,000 personnel at the peak. Men from trades and backgrounds not associated with the construction industry were drafted in and given crash courses appropriate to their work. Their task was to construct 212 caissons ranging from 1672 tons to 6044 tons, 23 pier-heads and 10 miles of floating roadway.

Most of the concrete caissons were manufactured on the River Thames and the River Clyde in some cases using hastily constructed dry docks. The steel "Beetle" floats were assembled in Richborough, Kent, the concrete Beetles at Southsea, Marchward and Southampton and the pier-heads and buffer ramps at the Morfa site Hughes had used for the manufacture of his Hippo caissons. Trials continued to be run in the Garlieston area of the Solway, even during the manufacturing phase, on for example, the buffers.

[Bradley]

New York City Times Square

[mjkerner]

Oooo, nice pic, Bradley.

[Vinnart]

Salute to the "Greatest Generation"!. Not only to those on June 6th, but to all the "D" days through the war. Each island in the pacific had it's D-day too. The world should never forget. It will be a sad day when I go to the V.A., and see no more of these true treasures of our society. These realy are great men to chat with.

[fatehunter]

As I get into my 40's, I find it so amazing that society works in a way that gets young men to join up and kill others, just to satisfy the desires of those at the top.

As I get older, the justification to fight has to get stronger and stronger before I would take up arms and march into someone elses country.

Too bad we can't make the young wise.

[A Canadian Cat]

I had to go to SW Scotland last year. with a couple of hours off I drove south of Newton Stewart to Garlieston - and discovered work on the Mulberry harbour was done there.

Very cool. The project was amazing and to think of the planning and effort involved. It is as mind boggling as the invasion itself. Without that engineering work the Allies could not have sustained the beach heads and the move inland.

[A Canadian Cat]

As I get into my 40's, I find it so amazing that society works in a way that gets young men to join up and kill others, just to satisfy the desires of those at the top.

<snip>

Too bad we can't make the young wise.

Indeed, war is complex. I would argue two things - we would need all the young to become wise simultaneously because if one side is willing to go to war you need to be as well.

Not that it does not piss me off when a powerful few decide others should go fight to make them more powerful. So, really we should be wishing to make those powerful few wise (or kick their asses out of their places of power:-). Wait, that might involve fighting and sacrifice - again.

Hummm back around we come with our argument.

[JonS]

Very cool. The project was amazing and to think of the planning and effort involved. It is as mind boggling as the invasion itself. Without that engineering work the Allies could not have sustained the beach heads and the move inland.

As it turned out, only a relatively small proportion of the supplies off loaded in Normandy came over MULBERRY. The vast majority was offloaded directly from LST/LCT/etc beaching and drying out between tides. Experience quickly showed that MULBERRY wasn't capable of operating at its designed capacity, and dumping stuff straight onto the beaches was faster and easier. And, of course, the American MULBERRY was anyway wrecked in the storm because they wouldn't follow instructions.

What MULBERRY definitely did provide, before D-Day, was the belief that a major port was not necessary in the first few days ashore. That vastly increased the scope of potential invasion sites, and most importantly meant that there were options (actually: really only one option) other than the Pas de Calais.

It's still an incredible project though

[Erwin]

Education helps the young become wise.

Possible reason why the education systems of so many countries have been sabotaged to breed a generation of quite ignorant kids... units of production and consumption, and eager to fight like at a soccer match.

[Saferight]

my grandfather who I didn't have the pleasure of meeting fought in Normandy and was wounded in action in Rouen. i found that from searching the web years ago when a lot of that info was free.

well my grandfather took my father to see "the longest day" when it was first released. my dad an I watched saving private ryan a few years back an he recalled how he saw my grandfather cry at the Omaha scenes in the longest day, he said couldn't imagine him watching SPR. im not sure if he was on that beach or what but the thought of it touched a nerve for him.

anyway thanks mjkerner for posting the link it was a good read!