Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Operation Overlord...

On this day. Operation Neptune was the codename given to the initial assault phase of largest seaborne invasion in history: Operation Overlord; its mission, to gain a foothold on the continent, started on June 6, 1944 (most commonly known by the name D-Day) and ended on June 30, 1944.
"In the East, the vastness of space will... permit a loss of territory... without suffering a mortal blow to Germany’s chance for survival. Not so in the West! If the enemy here succeeds… consequences of staggering proportions will follow within a short time." Adolf Hitler.
'The Normandy landings were the first successful opposed landings across the English Channel for nine centuries. They were costly in terms of men, but the defeat inflicted on the Germans was one of the largest of the war. Strategically, the campaign led to the loss of the German position in most of France and the secure establishment of a major new front.' Lest we forget.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was actually listening to Talk Splat (for the first time) today (because I cannot stand Bannister and didn't want to listen to how EVIL middle-class wine drinkers are) and it was dreadful. Gaunt is chippy and stupid but he read out an email from someone saying "why are you discussing (whatever it was they were discussing) instead of mentioning the anniversary of D-Day?"

Gaunt said - "but how could we use it as a phone-in discussion?".

Errr?

I gave up and just switched the radio off.

Span Ows said...

...because they're thick twats, one and all. I tried listening to some radio when I was back last month and I find most of it complete tosh. I think I'm getting grumpy old man's syndrome a bit early: I found almost every single commentator/broadcaster/host completely thick or rude or unprepared or naive or something other than professional. The fact that the reply to you was re it not being a decent discussion for a phone-in is just another sign, I mean we could go on about some 2-bit Z list 'celeb', couldn't we?

Re D Day it's incredible. I've seen or heard nothing. There was a pots on the MB earlier with no replies (!!) so I added a link - obviously no-one followed it :-(

Paul said...

The thing about Normandy is that when you go to Arromanches two things happen.

Firstly, as you stand on the cliffs looking out across the remains of the Mulberry Harbour, you think how the hell didn't the Germans see them coming?

The second is when you look at the magnificent war memorial that records the number of the dead from each allied nation. You go through the Brits, Americans, Canadians, Poles, French etc and then you see the number of Russians and it just numbs your brain.

Span Ows said...

The 2nd front helpe dthem although it was about 2 years late!!!

Militarily, if you add all the losses of the other countries, involved, including China and Japan (about 1.5 million each) the Russian losses are still greater number, numbers estimated between 11 and 13 MILLION dead....remember this is just military.

Gavin Corder said...

"The Normandy landings were the first successful opposed landings across the English Channel for nine centuries."

Bollocks! Wednesday 12th July 1346 is NOT nine centuries ago!

Piss, spit (and similar epithets, not at you at Twatsville quoted)

Span Ows said...

Look at this! offline for a few days and Gavin shows up! You'e going to have to explain what you mean, I know you're a Crecy fan but that was later (on my brother's birthday...well he was born on the same day) but not July...

Foreign soldiers have landed several times over the last 900 years but not as an invasion...and sometimes by mistake!...so...please explain.

P.S. Welcome back! :-)