Some D-Day facts

[the ringo kid]

"...Drafted into the United States Army Air Forces, Buttons in 1943 appeared in the Army Air Forces' Broadway show Winged Victory, along with several future stars, including Mario Lanza, John Forsythe, Karl Malden and Lee J. Cobb. A year later he appeared in Darryl F. Zanuck's movie version of Winged Victory, directed by George Cukor. Buttons also entertained troops in the European Theater in the same unit as Mickey Rooney...." per wickipedia

Is there another reference that says Red Buttons was a paratrooper?
Seems to be another misquote about D Day and WWII.

The only time Buttons was a "Paratrooper" was the one he played in TLD--the one who gained fame for being hung up on a Church roof or Steeple. Buttons however,wore the same para pants when he and Duke made: Hatari.

 

[federali]

Visit Normandy

Two years ago I visited the Normandy beach head and also visited the American cemetery at Omaha Beach called Collville-Sur-Mer. I was nearly moved to tears seeing the precise rows of graves. Two of the very first graves I saw were of brothers, buried side by side but who died on different dates.

The cemetery contains graves from the early months of the war and not just the Normandy invasion. History was made real as I found graves with the date of death as June 6, 1944 or perhaps it was 6 June 1944.

There are museums worth visiting in the area and I can honestly say that the French from the Normandy region are forever grateful to the allies for their liberation.

 

[wbraswell]

In the early stages of D-Day, I don't think there was air cover bacause of the weather. Like was said above, most the naval bombardment went over the machine gun nests. I don't know if I have ever heard of napalm bombs used in Europe, only in the later invasions of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. While 10,000 KIA on D-Day seems a lot, I think the Allied brass expected worse. Over 15,000 more were lost before the breakout, fighting in the towns and hedgerows. PT boats would have been sitting ducks since they wouldn't be able to maneuver through all the landing craft.

 

[cmort666]

In the early stages of D-Day, I don't think there was air cover bacause of the weather.

The Luftwaffe had largely been swept away BEFORE D-Day, allowing the Allies to disrupt the movements of German forces. Railways were a particular focus of attention.

Of course the weather didn't stop the airborne drops the night before D-Day.

The German defense was doomed from the start. Nobody could make a meaningful decision when it was needed, and once they did, it couldn't be put into decisive effect. It would have taken incompetence of a degree that made Gallipoli look like poetry in motion to save the Germans. Ike may have been a good many things. Incompetent wasn't one of them.

George McClellan could have lost D-Day. Ambrose Burnside would have. Ike? Nope.

 

[Tex1001]

Irwin Rommel was in charge of "fortress Europe's" gun placements and bunkers. Look at the photos both before the invasion and those taken today and you can see just how rugged they were. PT boats mounting 50 cals and 20mm wouldn't make a dent.
Omar Bradley was counting on forward observers to call in the heavy navy artillery. All of the observers were killed in the first wave. That's why the battle wagons didn't fire.
Bradley later said that there were a couple of times when he was just millimeters from calling off the invasion because of the carnage. As the morning wore on, he began to lose hope.
The allied destroyers were ordered to stay away from the beach shallows because if the underwater barriers that could rip out their bottoms.
Destroyer command watched as the invasion started to stall. The destroyer commanders were pleading for orders to go in close, no matter the danger.
Then the destroyers got orders to go in. The allied soldiers finally got their artillery support.
That's what tipped the balance to the allies favor. Bradley later stated that the invasion was saved by the destroyers.
_______________________
I don't have Alzheimer's- My wife had me tested.

 

[cmort666]

Irwin Rommel was

"Incompetent"? No.

Hopelessly handicapped by the machinations of a syphilitic meth addict with Parkinson's? Absolutely.

 

[shouldazagged]

McClellan wouldn't have made the decision to take advantage of the brief break in the weather. He'd have put off the whole operation.

 

[sheepdawg]

Yogi Berra was there too.

 

[cmort666]

McClellan wouldn't have made the decision to take advantage of the brief break in the weather. He'd have put off the whole operation.

He'd have allowed Joe Kennedy to convince him that the Germans had 10,000,000 men in Normandy.

 

[Texas Star]

I've read several times about Red Buttons having been a paratrooper. If this is incorrect, his publicist or fans may have been overzealous.

Errol Flynn's publicist at one time said that he was Irish. He was really an Australian, born in Hobart, Tasmania, if memory serves. Why not be candid?

My best guess is that in the 1930's, most Americans knew little of Australia, but many were of Irish descent and might like the star if he seemed to be of that background.

We'll probably never know the answer. I guess that everything one reads about a celebrity has to be checked. Even if he's just a newscaster, as with Brian Williams. However, his motive seems transparent: he wanted unwarranted glory.

 

[Texas Star]

Ill take The Longest Day over SPR any time any day--even if SPR was more accurate in the landing scenes. Also, James "Scotty" Doohan,lost a couple fingers while landing on D-Day. I THINK he was in the Royal Engineers?????

I just looked him up on Wiki, and he was a Canadian who was in an Artillery officer role, and landed on Juno beach on D-Day. He killed two snipers but was wounded by a Canadian Bren gunner who was overzealous in the dark. He did lose one finger as well as having other wounds. He became a flying artillery officer and was somewhat daring as a pilot.

He had many acting roles, and the Wiki entry is well worth reading. BTW, he had a longstanding feud with fellow Canadian actor Wm. Shatner. He was quoted as saying that he liked Capt. Kirk, but not Bill.

Born in Vancouver, he faked many accents. One was the Scots one for, Star Trek.

 

[Gamecock]

When called on for tactical support, our bombers had a bad habit of bombing our troops. Precision bombing wasn't.

 

[snowman]

Irwin Rommel was in charge of "fortress Europe's" gun placements and bunkers. Look at the photos both before the invasion and those taken today and you can see just how rugged they were. PT boats mounting 50 cals and 20mm wouldn't make a dent.

Sir,

I can see that PTs wouldn't be able to do the job, given rough seas and limited manuverability, but what about P51s? Correct me if I'm all wet, but it seems to me that, providing they knew the locations of the gun placements, experienced pilots could have scored enough hits to send showers of concrete chips flying in all directions, even if they didn't hit the openings. And that, I would think, would have been enough to have disrupted the German gunners' efforts significantly. But, as I said, I'm not a military man.

Regards,
Andy

 

[Gamecock]

Sir,

I can see that PTs wouldn't be able to do the job, given rough seas and limited manuverability, but what about P51s? Correct me if I'm all wet, but it seems to me that, providing they knew the locations of the gun placements, experienced pilots could have scored enough hits to send showers of concrete chips flying in all directions, even if they didn't hit the openings. And that, I would think, would have been enough to have disrupted the German gunners' efforts significantly. But, as I said, I'm not a military man.

Regards,
Andy

You assume accuracy that didn't exist.

 

[eveled]

I feel bad for those poor men in the tanks with the canvas sides that were supposed to float. They were drifting off course and turned across the waves to get to the beach they were supposed to be at, and were swamped. I would have been trying to make land any where I could.

 

[Cyrano]

I've thought this for quite a while. We had excellent aerial photos of the Normandy beach areas. We knew the fortifications were there. For some reason the fire plan did not include neutralizing them, by whatever means you wish. Whoever supervised the fire planning also missed this. The staff screwed up and soldiers died as a result.

 

[snowman]

You assume accuracy that didn't exist.

Sir,

That may be, but I listened to a WW2 fighter pilot on a video say that they took out Tiger tanks by firing at the road underneath them and the ricocheting rounds penetrated their undercarriage. Also I've seen footage from their gun cameras which shows them hitting the fuel trailers the tanks were pulling, along with personnel carriers, trucks hauling ammunition, etc. travelling French and German roads. It looks like they used their tracer rounds to get on target. Couldn't they have done that with the bunkers also?

I'm not trying to be difficult here, just wanting to learn things.

Regards,
Andy

 

[Derry 1946]

The National WWII Museum in New Orleans (originally called the D-Day Museum) has a very informative tour aboard a Higgins Boat. My parents, as schoolchildren after the war, made crafts from the left over "Higgins wood." We still have a step stool my mom made.

 

[Gamecock]

The National WWII Museum in New Orleans (originally called the D-Day Museum) has a very informative tour aboard a Higgins Boat. My parents, as schoolchildren after the war, made crafts from the left over "Higgins wood." We still have a step stool my mom made.

Yes, good museum. Worth your time if you are in NO.

 

[cmort666]

I feel bad for those poor men in the tanks with the canvas sides that were supposed to float. They were drifting off course and turned across the waves to get to the beach they were supposed to be at, and were swamped. I would have been trying to make land any where I could.

The Brits were experts at specialist armored vehicles. We ignored a lot of their advice.

1. We turned down a lot of the "funnies" offered to us, relying mostly on the Sherman DD (Duplex Drive).
2. The Sherman DDs were debarked too far from shore and most of them swamped.

Amtracs, especially the gun armed ones would have been a great asset. But then there hadn't been an opposed landing of this size and nature in modern times. I don't think there was much real Army doctrine for one. No doubt there was reluctance to profit from Marine Corps experience as well.