I prepared this accurate account of the “D-Day Disaster” as a letter to the editor to help people understand the media stories of Fallujah as they are being invented.
“The allies finally began the second front promised to the Soviets in 1942, as forces landed on the Normandy beaches. The British failed to capture the critical objective of Caen and the U.S. 1st Infantry was been decimated on Omaha beach. The allies suffered many unnecessary casualties because bombers struck innocent civilians behind the beaches instead of Nazi fortifications. Because of an intelligence failure, U.S. Rangers were needlessly slaughtered at Pointe-du-Hoc, when they discovered the artillery they were sent to destroy was never installed. Paratroop drops the night before scattered soldiers so badly few found their objectives by morning and over half are still missing. Back in England un-named sources say General Eisenhower abandoned SHAEF headquarters early in the evening of the 5th. On D-Day they say he appeared at 21 Army Group headquarters to ask a few questions, but took no active part in decisions as landings proceeded. Retired Major General Noel Hopkins (invented name) a veteran the Somme said attempting this landing when the weather is so unpredictable invites a major counter-offensive precisely when allied air power is grounded. A spokesman for SHAEF says the landings have been successful and the buildup is proceeding on schedule”.
By the way the below story I wrote up covers what Ike was doing when he “abandoned” SHAEF headqrarters.
On the night of June 5, 23,400 American and British paratroopers dropped behind the D-Day beaches from 2395 aircraft and 867 gliders. This air assault was attempted just 17 years after Charles Lindberg flew across the Atlantic for the first time. To the last moment Ike’s air commander Leigh-Mallory saw only tragedy from air assault, predicting hundreds of planes and gliders would be lost, and surviving paratroopers would be isolated and killed. He had specific intelligence the German 9tst Air Landing Division, specialists in fighting paratroopers, and the 6th Parachute Regiment had inexplicably moved into the area around St. Mere-Eglise, where the American divisions were to land. Ike remained strategically committed, but compassionately devoted to the men.
The evening before D-Day, Eisenhower left SHAEF headquarters at 6 PM, traveling to Newbury where the 101st Airborne was boarding for its first combat assignment. Ike arrived at 8 PM and did not leave until the last C-47 was airborne over three hours later.
In My Three Years with Eisenhower Captain Harry C. Butcher says, “We saw hundreds of paratroopers with blackened and grotesque faces, packing up for the big hop and jump. Ike wandered through them, stepping over, packs, guns, and a variety of equipment such as only paratroop people can devise, chinning with this and that one. All were put at ease. He was promised a job after the war by a Texan who said he roped, not dallied, his cows, and at least there was enough to eat in the work. Ike has developed or disclosed an informality and friendliness with troopers that almost amazed me”.
In Crusade in Europe Dwight D. Eisenhower says, “I found the men in fine fettle, many of them joshingly admonishing me that I had no cause for worry, since the 101st was on the job and everything would be taken care of in fine shape. I stayed with them until the last of them were in the air, somewhere about midnight. After a two hour trip back to my own camp, I had only a short time to wait until the first news should come in”.
One of the first D-Day reports was from Air Chief Marshall Leigh-Mallory with news only 29 of 1,250 C-47’s were missing and only four gliders were unaccounted for. That morning Leigh-Mallory sent Ike a message frankly saying it is sometimes difficult to admit that one is wrong, but he had never had a greater pleasure than in doing so on this occasion. He congratulated Ike on the wisdom of his command decision.
I have no time for those who dismiss Dwight D. Eisenhower as merely a political general.
You are welcome——we did what had to be done!