June 6 – The 69th Anniversary of WWII’s D-Day Invasion
Today, June 6, 2013, is the 69th anniversary of the world’s largest amphibious landing in 1944, World War II’s Operation Neptune – D-Day.
It was part of the the European invasion by the Allied forces- Operation Overlord. Over 6,000 ships from eight countries were involved and 160,000 soldiers hit the Normandy beaches of France at low tide. Low tide protected the ships from the beach barricades, but increased the distance the soldiers had to cross the beaches, adding to the death toll.
The areas of conflict were code-named Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword Beaches and the cliffs at Pointe du hoc.
The invasion actually started just before midnight, on June 5th, 1944, when 24,000 British, American and Canadian airborne soldiers parachuted in and rode gliders down in the dark.
The invasion against Adolph Hitler’s Third Reich was a success. Within a year, the War in Europe was over.