[kaysions]

[geasurpacerma]

[v74ClzKY]

Could've done it without your D-day. Thanks a lot for the lend-lease, though.

[xanonlinexan]

I guess being a stealth nation does have its drawbacks.

[yatrahnualenu]

I guess being a stealth nation does have its drawbacks.

Apparently.

Or it could be a reflection of poor history lessons.

[furious1]

Apparently.

Or it could be a reflection of poor history lessons.

Possibly, but I thought the Euros had good schools?

[riverakathy]

Yeah, the problem with idiots and history is a five minutes attention span.

[wJswn5l3]

Could've done it without your D-day. Thanks a lot for the lend-lease, though.

Stalin kept demanding a real second front, when the US & UK invaded Italy instead of France Stalin even accused the west of deliberately delaying to weaken the Soviet Union, he was absolutely insistent that a second front in France was necessary and would take years off of the war as well as save millions of Soviet lives.

[EarnestKS]

The mere threat of a potential Atlantic invasion kept about 30 to 40 Axis divisions posted in Scandanavia and France and northern Germany. After the invasion only a handfull of units were taken off the Eastern Front and shipped west. I don't remember how many, does anyone know? The question is, even if there had never been an invasion or the threat of an invasion how many divisions could the Axis have spared for the Eastern Front. Consider that fighting partisans in Yugoslavia alone required about 10 divisions. My guess is that even if there had been no threat of Allied invasion the Axis could have freed up no more than 15 to 20 more divisions for the Eastern Front, probably not enough to make a difference.

[uranbigis]

Nobody is contesting that, or is minimizing the sacrifice of all those that died fighting for our freedom, both foreign and domestic.

It was a reply to HC, must have forgot to quote him or something. It can be turned the other way too: Without the Western Allies, Europe would have been brown.

[JohnImamadviser]

Not you Ben! You're not an American! And haven't sacrificed ****!

[pseusawbappem]

Happy double-D Day!!!

2007_0528_2_L-300x225.jpg

[Kimmitmelvirm]

Happy double-D Day!!!

2007_0528_2_L-300x225.jpg

Damn, used my thank you on your prison date thread.

[bromgeksan]

There were several Panzer divisions stationed to counter an invasion. Five or more, IIRC. I'm thinking they'd have been happily blowing up Russians had it not been for the threat of and actual invasion.

Among them several Elite Disivions from Waffen-SS and Army, who had the newest equipment.
Equipment that, thanks to allied air superiority on the western front, often was destroyed from the air before getting deployed on the front, with massive losses in High Tech weapon systems (like Panther, Tiger I and Tiger II tanks) and experienced personnel.
Had these divisions been deployed onm the eastern front instead (where there wasn´t such an air superiority) much more of the equipment would have been able to do what it could do best ... fighting other tanks.

[Pedsshuth]

The turning point in the war in he East was 1942 at Stalingrad, years before D-Day. On the western front the Germans had diverted a corps sized force to Africa, not enough troops to influence the battles in the east. The next great battle was Kursk in 1943 at which the center of the German army in the East was destroyed, occurred a year before D-day. In the summer of 1943 the Germans were fighting in Italy, deploying perhaps two Army corps, still their presence in the east would not have made a difference. By 1944 the German army in the east was simply staging a continual fighting retreat. If they had been able to use in the East the troops neededin the west it still wouldn't have made a difference.

This is why I said birdbrain needed to have his history checked!

[#[SoftAzerZx]]

Let's say that being a sitting duck on a beach while entrenched troops take potshots at you makes it difficult to grade performance. I guess everybody had enough incentive to get the hell out of there.

[ariniaxia]

Gold Almost took all objectives took substantial casualties doing so
Juno Took all objectives and faced serious casualties doing so
Sword Couldn't take Caen until a full month later
Omaha Nearly called a failure. Largest amount of casualties. Offsetting this is that arguably facing the most battle hardened Germany troops (352nd) as opposed to the OST troops at other landing sites. Achieved objectives at D Day +3. Still better performance than Sword beach.
Utah Achieved virtually all objectives with little casualties (but arguably not as much opposition as Juno)


Performance ranking: 1. Canadien 2. USA 3. British

You missed a few key facts:
Sword - cleared the deepest defences and stopped dead a counterattack by a Panzer division (recent research shows that casulaty rates here were actually much higher than believed)
Omaha - IIRC only 2 battalions belonging to 352nd were present here (the rest of the battalions were from coastal defence divisions) - as many as were involved in dealing with the advance from Gold.
Utah - true about opposition but not so about achieving objectives - they didn't even linkup with the paras on D-day

Performance ranking - has to be 6th airborne - Orne bridges, Dives bridges, Merville battery and dealing with a panzer division

[nizcreare]

Perhaps it had something to do with the Germans, as the reinforcing Panzer divisions mainly arrived at Caen?

[Imihooniump]

If their armor had made it to the beaches the objectives might have been reached on the first day. And didn't the Navy keep their larger ships so far from shore that they couldn't do effective close support?