D-Day landings have failed.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

[Ian]

Have you read Stephen Ambrose's essay on this scenario for the What If? popular history books? It's quite good. If you haven't, I've got it at the house.

[klr]

By a creepy coincidence, the first book I picked up earlier today during some spring-cleaning was ... D-Day, by Anthony Beevor.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Have you read Stephen Ambrose's essay on this scenario for the What If? popular history books? It's quite good. If you haven't, I've got it at the house.

Love to see that.

[Jason]

Is this the same Stephen Ambrose?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Is this the same Stephen Ambrose?

Yes.

[mistermack]

What always amazed me about D day was that the greatest military minds of the allies couldn't think of anything better than walking into a hail of bullets, to get the soldiers ashore. They sent men to the moon just a few years later.

They even had to threaten Bomber Harris with the sack, to get him to provide any bombing support, which was shite anyway.
The British forces were always known as lions led by donkeys. Nothing much has changed.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

What always amazed me about D day was that the greatest military minds of the allies couldn't think of anything better than walking into a hail of bullets, to get the soldiers ashore. They sent men to the moon just a few years later.

Whatcha got?

[klr]

What always amazed me about D day was that the greatest military minds of the allies couldn't think of anything better than walking into a hail of bullets, to get the soldiers ashore. They sent men to the moon just a few years later.

They even had to threaten Bomber Harris with the sack, to get him to provide any bombing support, which was shite anyway.
The British forces were always known as lions led by donkeys. Nothing much has changed.

Everything is relative. They landed in the best place possible, taking all relevant factors into account. There were many other parts of the coast much more heavily defended. There were also stretches of coast less well defended, but otherwise much less suitable for landing. They also took great pains to deceive the Germans, and to gain air superiority beforehand.

[Clinton Huxley]

Short of using nerve gas to clear the beachheads of the Germans, not sure what else we could have done.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Applied violence was the best solution to a bad problem.

[MiM]

Who is July, 5

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Who is July, 5

No clue. That missive was written before the attack, so Ike wouldn't have to compose something while dealing with an utter disaster. I therefore suspect they meant JUNE 5.

[Coito ergo sum]

What always amazed me about D day was that the greatest military minds of the allies couldn't think of anything better than walking into a hail of bullets, to get the soldiers ashore. They sent men to the moon just a few years later.

Whatcha got?

I think mistermack underestimates the difficulty of the task. He may be in the "the war was already won by 1942" group of scholars.

Anything "Better" than D-Day? Like what? Doing the invasion in Spain or Portugal? Taking an army over the alps from Italy? Landing them in the north of Russia and marching through the Baltic States to get at Germany from the East? Or, maybe a sustained satellite guided bombing campaign with JDAM missiles, and long range bombers lunched from Diego Garcia and Wyoming to soften up the Germans before we hit the shore....

[Coito ergo sum]

Short of using nerve gas to clear the beachheads of the Germans, not sure what else we could have done.

And, would nerve gas have been deliverable in sufficient quantities with sufficient precision to even do the job? I would bet that if nerve gas would have cleared those beaches of Germans the Merks and the Brits would have dumped it on them like napalm. In 1944, the world had no problem killing Germans, any way shape or form.