Talk:Battle of Normandy/Archive 01

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

An event mentioned in this article is a June 6 selected anniversary.

/Archive 01 ? — February 2006

Contents 1 Omaha 2 Featured article status and Category:World War II Allied invasion of Normandy 3 Work needed to make Battle of Normandy a featured article 3.1 Proposal to rename/break-down 3.2 Breakdown proposal 4 German initiatives 5 Allied fears 6 Saving Private Ryan 7 Advancing from Juno and Sword beaches 8 Cherbourg and Caen Beachheads 9 PLUTO 10 some missing sub-themes 11 D-Day Casualty Figures (was: An observation...) 12 Surreder or liberation 13 Present tense? 14 Dramatization section 15 Vietnamese? 16 Dramatizations reversion 17 Planning to move Overlord 18 Great map of Neptune 19 Sherman DD 20 Request for references and/or clarification on references 21 Photograph caption...possible error? 22 "necessary" 23 A new coordination template 24 Unknown German Strength? 25 Crossword scare

Omaha

I changed it to 1,000 asshole. It seems that in many of these types of pages people keep stating what were the casaulties as the number killed. As a reminder, when you read in another source that there were X number of casualties it is not referring to the number killed. --Wdywtk 23:56, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Featured article status and Category:World War II Allied invasion of Normandy

It's great to see this article reach Featured status today. :) And the addition of the Normandy invasion category should make it easier to fill in the missing areas of documentation noted below -- thanks Oberiko! Madmagic 18:33, Jun 20, 2004 (UTC)

No problem, glad to help out. Oberiko 18:53, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Work needed to make Battle of Normandy a featured article

Apologies for creating a new section at the top of this Talk page (and please move it to the bottom if I've violated Wikipedia convention) but I thought it worthwhile to draw immediate attention to the featured article nomination of the Battle of Normandy.

The article was nominated at 12:22, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC) and at this time has four Support votes and one Objection. I've copied the Objection and my reply below:

• Object - Too many sections = overwhelming TOC (see Wikipedia:What is a featured article). I suggest an easy fix: Combine all sub-sections under ===Landings=== into one H3 section except for ====German reaction==== which should be promoted to an H3 and eventually expanded a bit. Also, nix the ==Historical significance== section and move that sentence to the end of the lead section (single paragraph sections are bad enough - single sentence ones are horrid). --mav 00:59, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)
• Support, with some reservations. I agree with the esteemed mav that ===Landings=== has too many sub-sections, but disagree on the solution. I'd keep the five D-Day beaches as sub-sections, edit the three parachute landings sections into two (north/south, Brit/US -- roughly) and move the ====Mulberry harbours==== content to ===Special preparations=== earlier in the article. That still leaves seven sub-sections, but I do seriously believe all five beaches and all the major parachute landing sites deserve their own sections; the names of those beaches especially are national icons. Having done recent non-minor editing on ==Historical significance== I agree it should be moved, there's not enough there. However, it is a two sentence para. ;) Finally, as one of the recent contributors to the article, I'm really glad to see it nominated and will try to keep working to make it better. See Talk:Battle of Normandy for further discussion! - Madmagic 08:44, Jun 12, 2004 (UTC)

Comments, ideas? Anyone else willing to do whatever we can, to get this article up to featured status in the next week? Madmagic 21:15, Jun 12, 2004 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. I think we should also flesh out the Utah Beach section to the same size as the others. DJ Clayworth 12:57, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Actually there was one thing I was going to suggest. The article is supposed to be about the Battle of Normandy, but it is in fact almost entirely about the landings. If we expanded the rest of the battle to the same detail the article would be enormous. Should we maybe turn this into Invasion of Normandy or Normandy landings and start a new article 'Battle of Normandy' giving more details about the subsequent battles? DJ Clayworth 13:01, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Good points DJ. I wonder if it would make the most sense to somehow break down and expand the article by chronology? For example, a detailed article or articles on the plans and preparations -- the deception plans and the Mulberry harbours both seem to deserve their own articles, for example -- another on the actual D-Day events, another on the post-D-Day events (Cherbourg, the breakout from the pocket, etc.) Part of the reason why I suggest this is, it would allow preserving the events of June 6th as a whole article. While the day of the landings was only one day in the month+ battle of Normandy, it seems to me many people would come to Wikipedia seeking specific information about D-Day, rather than an overview of the entire battle. Thoughts? Madmagic 08:01, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

Ooops, I wrote too soon. There is already a short article on the Mulberry harbours. As well, it would seem almost all of the objections to this becoming a featured article have been resolved (see link, above.) As before, I don't disagree with your points; but I wonder if it would be best to leave the article mostly as-is for now, and try to work out an overall framework for gradual expansion? Madmagic 08:16, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

Most of the thing you mention have their own article; the beaches do, many of the individual operations (Pointe du Hoc, Pegasus Bridge). I think that's the right thing, though they should also be summarised in the main article, so the we get a good overall picture of the landings without having to jump around.

Proposal to rename/break-down

Support: 3 Oppose: 2

I propose moving this to Invasion of Normandy, and making Battle of Normandy a stub which we then expand to give an overview of the invasion and then describe the rest of the operations. Is it better to do this before or after the article is featured? DJ Clayworth 14:29, 17 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Support. Renaming the current article to Invasion and creating a stub for the Battle sounds good. I'd suggest doing this before the article is featured (assuming it passes by June 20th) to reduce any future confusion. Madmagic 19:17, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

Neither - it's a bad idea. The current article does a very good job of describing both the battle and the campaign. →Raul654 20:17, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

Uh... if it's a bad idea, what is bad about it? You've made a personal judgement on the quality of the article and your judgement does not take into account or respond directly to the specific points DJ raised, above. Please see Misleading vividness and Hasty generalization and especially, Appeal to authority. And please don't misunderstand my disagreement with your objection as a personal attack. I would very much welcome your opinions Raul654 -- but summary personal judgements don't make for better Wikipedia articles, no? Looking forward to hearing what you think, and cheers. Madmagic 23:07, Jun 17, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Raul654, the article should stay. Even though it's weighted towards the invasion, it has the whole picture. If we moved it to Invasion of Normandy and took out what doesn't fit under that topic, it wouldn't look like a featured article (almost) anymore. I understand though that this topic has potential, and will continue to grow, but let's expand this article in place and split off when it grows too big. ✏ Sverdrup 23:15, 17 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Support with suggestion/question. Isn't Operation Overlord the whole enchilda (deception, bombardment, landings/paradrops, initial battles)? If so, then we could have that as the (fairly brief) overview and expand in the various other pages. Oberiko 23:49, 17 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Ok, I've reviewed the article more carefully. It doesn't touch on the campaign as much as it should, however, I do not support moving large sections of text out of here - the article itself is already feature-quality. I would suggest instead *copying* the text from here to relavant subarticles (IE, operation Cobra, the individual beaches, et al). →Raul654 01:49, Jun 18, 2004 (UTC)

Breakdown proposal

It seems to me that we should break this article down into a more hierarchical structure.

The way I see it, it should go as follows: World War II --> European Theatre --> Western Front --> Western European Campaign (1944-1945) --> Normandy Campaign --> Operation Overlord, other events.

The article in its current state seems to encompass the entirety of the Normandy Campaign, and mentions details of the following Southern France Campaign.

Any thoughts? Oberiko 13:37, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

In my mind this makes sense, but within that structure I'd say (as others have) that this article focuses too heavily on the first day of the campaign, the landings. I would suggest sumarizing the landings and linking the new page to Operation Overlord, which would contain much of the content currently in this article. Normandy Campaign, which should redirect to this page, would be expanded to include sumaries of the major battles fought over the summer of 1944, Operation_Epsom, the taking of Caen, etc, ultimately concluding with the Falaise Gap. I'm not sure how much my comment addresses what you want to do, but that's my two cents. Maastrictian 15:39, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I think we're mostly saying the same thing, make Battle of Normandy == Normandy Campaign and create a new page to focus on Overlord, which was just one part (though likely the largest one) of that particular campaign.

I'm not sure how much further we'd expand this page though, as I would have several other campaigns within the Western European Campaign (1944-1945), such as the Northern France Campaign, Southern France Campaign, Rhineland Campaign and the Central Europe Campaign. Retitled to more Allied friendly (instead of American-exclusive) names. Oberiko 16:27, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

German initiatives

Unlike the Allied forces, the German army was not conditioned to take individual initiative, and thus many groups waited for orders, while being overrun by the allies.

Removed this for the time being, as it is misleading. German small unit tactics were based on a very high degree of indiviual initiative. It was the high command - in particular Hitler - who insisted on rigid adherance to orders. The above should go back in, but only when this issue is clarified.

As I understand it the thing that hampered the German units on the beaches was not waiting for orders, but the fact that they had no transport. The Panzer divisions on the other hand could not be released from their reserve positions without explit orders from Hitler. DJ Clayworth 20:59, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Allied fears

Removed 'the Allied worst fears were realised'. The Allied worst fears were that they would be attcked by strong armoured formations on day 1 and pushed back into the sea. This did not happen. DJ Clayworth 17:43, 26 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Saving Private Ryan

[Re the story of ‘Saving Private Ryan’, the real ‘Ryan’ was Sgt. Frederick (Fritz) Niland who, with some other members of the 101st, was inadvertently dropped too far inland. They eventually made their own way back to their unit at Carentan where the Chaplain, Lt. Col. Father Francis Sampson, told Niland about the death of his three brothers. Two at Normandy and one in the Far East. Under the US War Department's Sole Survivor Policy, (brought about following the death of five Sullivan brothers serving on the same ship), Fr. Sampson arranged passage back to Britain and thereafter to his parents, Augusta and Michael Niland, in Tonawanda. There was no behind the lines Ranger rescue mission, ‘Ryan’ was not a simple private, his mother was not a widow nor is she believed to have received all three telegrams together, and, the bother believed killed in the Far East turned out to have been captured and later returned home. Fr. Francis Sampson wrote about Niland and the story of the 101st, in his 1958 book, ‘Look Out Below!’, (ISBN 1877702005).]

I removed the above text from the article, not because its bad text but I think it belongs in Saving Private Ryan or somewhere similar. It's too detailed for this article. DJ Clayworth 16:09, 18 Oct 2003 (UTC)

we went 23 miles the first day

Advancing from Juno and Sword beaches

Sword and Juno beaches: my figure of five miles of advance on the first day comes from Keegan The Second World War (and it's an average, not a maximum). If you have another reference, please discuss. DJ Clayworth 15:24, 13 Jan 2004 (UTC)

Well... the Global Television Network in Canada just ran a one-hour promotional program for D-Day: Juno Beach: Canada's 24 Hours of Destiny which consisted almost entirely of recent interviews with Canadian veterans of D-Day, most of whom were on Juno beach and were part of the advance inland throughout the day. Those veterans repeatedly stated the Canadian forces advanced further inland on June 6th than the British troops who landed at the beachheads on either side of them.

See also the following, from the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's page on D-Day minute by minute:

"1800 (hours) The North Shore Regiment capture St-Aubin. In the next few hours, the Canadians capture Courseulles and Bernieres. Later the Highland Regiment captures Colombiers-sur-seulles and the 1st Hussar reaches its objective 15 kilometres from the beach at the Caen-Bayeux Highway intersection. The Hussars was the only Allied unit to capture its planned final objective on D-Day."

Regarding Keegan, here's another quote, from Juno Beach - The Canadians On D-Day:

"John Keegan, eminent British historian who wrote Six Armies in Normandy, stated the following concerning the Canadian 3rd Division on D-Day: 'At the end of the day, its forward elements stood deeper into France than those of any other division. The opposition the Canadians faced was stronger than that of any other beach save Omaha. That was an accomplishment in which the whole nation could take considerable pride.'"

(I don't mean to stir up inter-national conflict over who-did-what-and-when, but the current Wikipedia Battle of Normandy entry is embarrassingly inaccurate about the contribution of the Canadians. 14,000 Canadian troops landed on June 6th and the first wave suffered a 50% casualty rate; 340 Canadians were killed and 574 wounded over the day. Can we all work together to make this article more accurate, before the 60th anniversary this June?) Madmagic 19:45, Apr 25, 2004 (UTC)

No objection to giving the Canadians their due (check my address). I'd have to cross-check two quotes - that Juno beach advanced the furthest into France, and that Gold beach got closest to their objectives. No reason why both these shouldn't be true, but I'd like to look at the maps again. DJ Clayworth 13:20, 26 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Good stuff. :) The DoD, Veterans Affairs, Juno Beach Centre and CBC all seem to agree on the deepest-advance-of-all--five-beaches issue, as well as a number of other D-Day specific websites I've read, and a number of them cite their bibliographies. Please let me know if there's anything I can do to help you with updating the BoN article, okay? Cheers, Madmagic 14:37, Apr 26, 2004 (UTC)

Cherbourg and Caen Beachheads

``a) create a beachhead that would include the villages of Caen and Cherbourg (for its deep water port);

These are not villages now, and I never heard they were at the time.

They certainly were not. Be bold in editing. DJ Clayworth 15:22, 3 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Fixed. Neither Caen nor Cherbourg were villages, and Caen was not a seaport -- it was a major Normandy transportation hub, inland. Madmagic 02:00, Jun 5, 2004 (UTC)

Thank you. I had confused Caen with Ouistreham briefly. DJ Clayworth 16:41, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

PLUTO

I removed a sentence saying that Port-en-Bessin was the destination of PLUTO, because the entry on PLUTO and other sites don't back it up. The first PLUTO came ashore in Cherbourg, two months after the landings (there may have been others later). DJ Clayworth 18:08, 3 Jun 2004 (UTC)

some missing sub-themes

The article leaves much information and themes out. For example, the civilian casualties (French). The following article gives a taste: http://www.network54.com/Forum/thread?forumid=211833&messageid=1086434296&lp=1086747163

For the numbers of troops I found this at http://www.ddaymuseum.co.uk/faq.htm:

"On D-Day, the Allies landed around 156,000 troops in Normandy. The American forces landed numbered 73,000: 23,250 on Utah Beach, 43,250 on Omaha Beach, and 15,500 airborne troops. In the British and Canadian sector, 83,115 troops were landed (61,715 of them British): 24,970 on Gold Beach, 21,400 on Juno Beach, 28,845 on Sword Beach, and 7900 airborne troops." It seems the Americans had the most soldiers in action (British and Canadian listed as one number), which makes the comment on the John Wayne movie quite odd (Is that important?). Also from the last noted website:

"Total Allied casualties on D-Day are estimated at 10,000, including 2500 dead. British casualties on D-Day have been estimated at approximately 2700. The Canadians lost 946 casualties. The US forces lost 6603 men. Note that the casualty figures for smaller units do not always add up to equal these overall figures exactly, however (this simply reflects the problems of obtaining accurate casualty statistics)." Which puts the Americans as having the greatest losses (back to John Wayne again).

Again the d-day website: "Between 15,000 and 20,000 French civilians were killed, mainly as a result of Allied bombing. Thousands more fled their homes to escape the fighting." It would be interesting to compare all these numbers and statistics with the recent Iraq war.

Also, odd that Charles de Gaulle is not mentioned in the wikipedia article. Apparently the Allies didn't trust him, informing him of the invasion only days before it all occurred. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/wwtwo/allies_at_war_05.shtml

I have nothing as of yet to back this up, but it seems the Polish organized more soldiers for the invasion than the French could. Many "Free French" soldiers were Americans, including my uncle. Whyerd

There is actually a mistake in the math of the numbers given above. The numbers for British and other troops correctly add up to 83,115, the number given (including Sword, Juno, Gold and airborne) but the number of American troops add up to 82,000 (Utah + Omaha +airborne), which is higher than the 73,000 quoted above (but still not as high as the non-American). I suspect the wrong figure is one of the US beach figures (possibly Omaha, which is very high) as the D-Day museum quotes 156,000 as the total number of troops involved, which is 83,000+73,000, meaning there were about 10,000 more non-US troops than US troops. DJ Clayworth 20:51, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

(P.S. the same mistake is on the D-Day museum site DJ Clayworth 20:52, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC))

PPS Britannica gives 34,000 as the number of troops landed on Omaha. [1]. DJ Clayworth 17:13, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

As the author of the John Wayne et al comments on The Longest Day, I was trying to add a this-is-not-NPOV warning to the Dramatisation section and links. If there's a better way to express this point, I'd be glad to see it.

I'd also be glad to see more in the article about the Polish contributions, more on the French civilian casualties, and an explanation of the reasons for the lack of a larger French presence in the D-Day landings. The byzantine politics surrounding de Gaulle, the Free French, Vichy, and the internal struggles of the French resistance might require more than a few articles of their own, however. :)

AFAIK, by far the largest contingent of French-speaking troops who landed on D-Day were Francophones serving in the Canadian forces. Apparently the surviving French civilians who greeted the Canadian troops post-landing were astonished when many of the Canucks replied in Quebec French and joual. Cheers, Madmagic 04:41, Sep 20, 2004 (UTC)

Not sure if this beliongs in this section: To state that the Battle of Normandy ended with the surrender of Paris is misleading and inacurate, since the French resistance toppled the regime on August 25 after a 6 day uprising and thus preventing an allied occupation of France. StefanPernar 17:22, Oct 01, 2004 (GMT +8)

D-Day Casualty Figures (was: An observation...)

Juno Beach: The first wave suffered 50 per cent casualties, the highest of any of the five D-Day beachheads except Omaha.

Omaha Beach: The casualty rate for the landing troops was nearly fifty percent.

At first glance, it looked like to me that these statements were in contradiction to each other until I looked closer and noticed that in the case of Juno, the casualty rate referred to the first wave and for Omaha, the casualty rate was overall. Perhaps these should be made more clear? --Bletch 17 Sep 2004

Agreed Oberiko 19:34, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Agreement here too, but I'm confused (and even more so than my usual state of confusion.) ;)

In some missing sub-themes just above, it states the US landed "43,250 on Omaha Beach". Does this mean the US forces landing at Omaha suffered 20,000 casualties on D-Day? Does anyone have information on the reported casualty figures -- at each beach?

Cheers, Madmagic 23:08, Sep 17, 2004 (UTC)

Now I'm even more confused, because to my knowledge Omaha beach casualties were about 2000, out of 2500 total for all beaches, according to http://archive.columbiatribune.com/2004/Jun/20040605News023.asp. --Bletch 15:31, 19 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Me too. :( Although I'd be happier with a more definitive source than a Knight Ridder newspaper article... anyone have a reliable historical cite/site, or cites/sites? Cheers, Madmagic 01:07, Sep 20, 2004 (UTC)

The total casualty figures given above were about 10,000 on the Allied side. The 50% casualty rate was for the first wave, those who landed in the first hours and directly under enemy fire. It is also my belief is that the figure for Omaha beach is wrong; Britannica [2] gives 34,000 as the number of troops landed on Omaha. DJ Clayworth 17:06, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

It would also be nice to also go further into civilian casualties. It seems that other articles of wars (this one comes to mind) have very large sections describing every documented case of civilian casualties. Reading this article in comparison with the one on Afghanistan, you would think that there were few if any French civilian casualties. It seems to violate NPOV to be selective on which articles warrant such narratives. --Bletch 21:40, 22 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Be bold in updating pages! Cheers, Madmagic 22:24, Sep 22, 2004 (UTC)

Surreder or liberation

Shouldn't it be "Liberation of Paris" rather that "Surrender" ? I mean, there was collaboration in France yes, but it doesn't make it an axis country.

Present tense?

The German defenders positioned on the beaches put up relatively light resistance, being ill-trained and short on transport and equipment, and having been subject to a week of intense bombardment. The exception was the 352nd Infantry division (moved earlier by Rommel from St. Lo — according to Allied intelligence there should be only 2 battalions of 716th Division there)

How did we end up with a portion of this in present tense? Is this article really 60 years old? I would fix it, but I don't have much familiarity with WWII. I'd rather have correct information in incorrect tense than incorrect information in correct tense. Cheers. Evilweevil 16:59, 1 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Dramatization section

I've just done some re-arranging of the edits by [http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target=68.88.221.201 68.88.221.201] of the Dramatization section of the article. The prior version contained the word "Correction" when in fact the numbers cited proved the point previously stated. I'm not entirely happy with my own edits and would welcome someone else doing further cleanup of the language and style, without destroying the original point. Cheers, Madmagic 08:36, Oct 14, 2004 (UTC)

Vietnamese?

I've seen reference to Korean defenders at D-day, with a plausible explanation about how they got there, but Vietnamese? Is there a source for this?

Don't know of a source, but it's quite plausibls given that there were Vietnamese fighting (Vichy) France at the time. Stan 07:19, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I've reworded and removed the 'Vietnamese' reference pending a citation since AFAIK the majority of the non-German defenders at D-Day were Soviet POWS recruited by the Germans, and those recruits largely originated from the southern Republics of the USSR. Cheers, Madmagic 07:26, Nov 3, 2004 (UTC)

In general, outright removal is not such a good idea, unless you have positive evidence that a claim is mistaken. People often summarize scholarly works without providing citations after every word or phrase, so in fact you may have removed correct material without realizing it. Did you check all the referenced works first, and are there no independent sources on the net? There were far more Vietnamese in the Europe of the 1940s than most people realize. Stan 21:03, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I know nothing about any Vietnamese presence at D-Day. However I want to disagree with what you write here. The major problem that afflicts Wikipedia is not lack of information, but wrong information. In general I believe it's better to delete unexplained or suspect information unless it's backed up, or at least explained. It's far to easy to add totally fake info. No other encyclopedia would permit a fact to be entered without two sources of info. DJ Clayworth 23:19, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

But you don't know whether or not there were "two sources of info" in this case. If I summarily deleted every one of your additions that didn't have two different citations in the article, I suspect you'd be plenty mad. In a case like this, the right approach is to raise the question, but leave the article alone for the moment - it may be that the person who added it (do we even know who?) hasn't logged into WP since the question was raised, and thus hasn't had the chance to mention the source; if it's anything like some of the ill-informed deletions I've had to deal with in other articles, that person may come back with "geez, don't any of you know how to read books?" :-) Hairtrigger deleting is just a poor way to resolve problems. Stan 00:17, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Returning to specifics in the discussion, I made the deletion consciously and deliberately. I have seen a number of references to the (comparatively) poor troop quality of most of the defenders at D-Day, with two reasons repeatedly cited.

One, German troops who were for various reasons unfit for duty on the Eastern front; and two, Soviet ex-POWs who were signed up from the POW camps with promises they wouldn't have fight Russians (because they feared re-capture and they feared the Russians.) Most of the latter -- again, from repeated citations -- were troops conscripted from the southern republics of the USSR. They were not well-trained or highly experienced Soviet troops from Russia or the Ukraine or the crack Siberian divisions who fought so well at Stalingrad, for example.

Until this issue was raised recently, I've never *once* heard mention of *any* Vietnamese being at Normandy. I looked at the phrasing and the source (213.254.171.194) carefully, then I removed the reference completely pending citation. I didn't consider my action to be a hairtrigger deletion and I'd invite anyone to view my contributions to this article (and this talk page) as evidence of some knowledge and judgement on this subject, and how to write and edit within Wikipedia style. :) Cheers, Madmagic 05:32, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)

How did you come up with 213.254.171.194 as the source? The change came in with [3], by an anon but along with other OB stuff that looks generally plausible. It's possible that the anon confused "Korean" with "Vietnamese", but the overall character of the edit suggests that the data has a legitimate source. Who's the best authority on German OB? The refs there now are not that detailed. Stan 17:33, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I've researched this a bit more, and I think the editor must have meant "Korean" (the story ultimately originating from the D-Day captures). Although there were Vietnamese fighting both Vichy and Japan in Indochina, any captured persons would have been considered criminals not POWs, and it's highly improbable that any of them would have been transported out of Indochina. Stan 18:38, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

My error re: 213.254.171.194 -- it was actually 62.233.232.173 . Thanks for pointing out the correct author. And I agree with you that this (other) anon's OB edits do largely seem plausible.

Personally, I'd welcome more explanation of the accounts of Korean (or Vietnamese) soldiers defending the beaches -- it sounds like a fascinating story and if true it's well worth an article, or at least a solid explanation within the Battle of Normandy. But again, I stand by my prior edit and by what I've read and heard repeatedly mentioned on TV/film documentaries: the majority of the non-German soldiers defending the Normandy beaches were former Soviet POWs largely recruited from the southern Republics. If anyone would care to dispute this point and provide online or other citations, please do! :) Cheers, Madmagic 19:03, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)

Chapter 1 of Ambrose's book has the Korean story, conveniently reproduced by Amazon: [4] Stan 21:32, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Reading the chapter cited above, I learn the "minority of Vietnamese" were actually four Koreans "... conscripted into the Japanese army in 1938 -- Korea was then a Japanese colony -- captured by the Red Army in the border battles with Japan in 1939, forced into the Red Army, captured by the Wehrmacht in December 1941 outside Moscow, forced into the German army, and sent to France." While this is a fascinating anecdote, I still don't see the point of mentioning this extremely minor Korean presence in the Battle of Normandy.

As Ambrose notes, "By the beginning of 1944, the Wehrmacht had 'volunteers' from France, Italy, Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Asian Russia, North Africa, Russia, Ukraine, Ruthenia, the Muslim republics of the Soviet Union, as well as Volga-Tatars, Volga-Finns, Crimean Tatars, and even Indians." Perhaps this broad representation could be included in the article, if troops from those all countries/ regions were indeed among the defenders of D-Day? But mentioning four Koreans out of multiple divisions of defending troops seems to me silly, at best. Cheers, Madmagic 23:18, Nov 4, 2004 (UTC)

Unimportant? That's a different argument, but sure. I'll note that Ambrose didn't put this bit at the front of his book by accident; the anecdote connects firsthand experience to his main point, that some of the "German" forces were a rather motley crowd. A professional's technique of the sort not often seen in WP articles... Stan 00:42, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Dramatizations reversion

I've just reverted the edits by 68.37.44.162 to the last version by Xezbeth, since the changes seemed to me to be more of an act of vandalism than an attempt at improvement. Discussion is welcome here if needed. Cheers, Madmagic 02:58, Jan 5, 2005 (UTC)

Planning to move Overlord

Based on the discussions above, I think most of us have come to agree that the Battle for Normandy more or less corresponds to the Normandy Campaign. With that in mind, I'd like to relocate the bulk of Operation Overlord to its own page and have this one discuss the full campaign.

One thing I do need help with first though is the casualty figures and so forth. Are they currently for Overlord only? Oberiko 01:40, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Golly, what WOULDN'T you move? I thought from the start that this was better titled "Normandy Invasion", which (though I haven't googled the respective terms) I think is the most common term for it. Sfahey 02:48, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

This article covers all Allied operations from invasion up to the breakout in Goodwood and Cobra. That's basically the Normandy Campaign, which (although not cover much here) is alot more then just the initial invasion. (Check above for an earlier conversation where it seemed like a general consensous was reached) Oberiko 03:10, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I don't see a "consensus" above, and this article was chosen pretty much as it now stands as a featured article, which means that it passed a pretty tough jury. I think this is a cohesive article which would be weakened by breaking it up. I think historians furthermore would see no problem with this article including stuff about the breakout, but like me (and google, I just confirmed) would find "Normandy Invasion" a more appropriate title. IF anything along the lines you suggest needed to be changed, I would suggest abridging things here which seem "beyond" the invasion, and doing the separate article on the "Normandy Campaign".Sfahey 03:25, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

So, what I'm getting is that you believe Battle for Normandy == Operation Overlord and != Normandy Campaign? If that's the case, then we need to move all the non-Overlord related stuff out of here and create a campaign page. I'd like some more input before we do that though, as I was under the impression that those who participated in the earlier discussions believed it was the other way around. Oberiko 05:09, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Well, you certainly have MY head spinning. To begin with, the art. is titled "Battle OF Normandy". It is an FA and I think a good one which should not be disturbed. Nothing would be lost if a separate article on "Normandy campaign" were done, incorporating parts of this article. Neither I, nor the FAC jurors, see any problem with post-invasion stuff being in the "invasion" article. I have no dog in this fight, but I expect if this article is highjacked, a huge edit war will ensue. Sfahey 03:06, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Hi All. I agree that this is a long article and should be split up. It would make sense to have one article about the day of invasion and another about the rest of the the campaign. However if we do, "Operation Overlord" is the wrong title for the article about the day of invasion. Allow me to quote our own article Operation Neptune, which in turn quotes the D-Day museum.

"The armed forces use codenames to refer to the planning and execution of specific military operations. Operation Overlord was the codename for the Allied invasion of north-west Europe. The assault phase of Operation Overlord was known as Operation Neptune. (...) Operation Neptune began on D-Day (6 June 1944) and ended on 30 June 1944. By this time, the Allies had established a firm foothold in Normandy. Operation Overlord also began on D-Day, and continued until Allied forces crossed the River Seine on 19 August 1944."

Virtually everything that is mentioned in this article happened before August 19th, so it's all part of Operation Overlord. Maybe Normandy invasion could cover the day of invasion itself, with references or redirects from D Day, Operation Neptune and others, and Operation Overlord still redirecting to this page.

Actually I guess we should have a section on the codenames in this article.

DJ Clayworth 03:48, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, you're right. What I should have said was that Operation Neptune (The initial landings) should be summerized and moved out of here.

I'm still not keen on the title "Battle for Normandy" though. It's difficult to discern, via the title, if it refers to Operation Overlord, the Normandy Campaign, or Operation Neptune. Oberiko 15:05, 20 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I argued months ago that (at least in North America) "Normandy Invasion" is by far the most commonly used term for (most of) these events, but once something makes "featured article" it's difficult for a major change. And again, the current title is "Battle OF Normandy". Sfahey 00:42, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Great map of Neptune

There's a great map of Operation Neptune on the Library of Congress website [5]. It's in JPEG 2000 though, so we'd have to convert it to use it.

Sherman DD

I removed the following (about the swimming Shermans) because it's too detailed for this article.

[Previous explanations suggested that they were launched too far from shore - why then did the tanks at the other four beaches suffer no such problems? New research suggests that the Omaha tanks were aiming for a church steeple on the visible horizon behind the cliffs. In order to maintain their line of sight it is believed that the tanks had to turn progressively away from the shore to combat the wavefronts pushing them down the beach, putting their sides virtually parallel with the waves/beach. This meant that the protective canvas flotation devices were easily swamped by the waves. If they had kept going directly forward with the front of the tank headed straight for the beach, they may well have reached it, as did most of the tanks at other beaches; see bleow for url link to more info].

It should go somewhere, but I don't have time to find it a home right now. DJ Clayworth 20:45, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)

There used to be a sizeable section on the Allied preparations for the invasion. Does anyone know what happened to it? DJ Clayworth 14:27, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I went back and resurrected it. A lot of the fumbling with this generally v.good article has to do with its curious title. "Normandy Invasion" would have been less confusing to begin with, and some editors want to equate "overlord" with the battle, "D-day" with the invasion, etc. Sfahey 15:38, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I can't seem to find the article on the swimming Shermans. I thought there was one, but my searches haven't turned it up. Does anyone know where it is, before I create a new one? DJ Clayworth 14:05, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It was at Sherman DD Oberiko 14:54, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)

That's embarrassing, I was the one who deleted it. Probably because it was mostly about hippos when I did. I've restored and copyedited. DJ Clayworth 14:32, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Request for references and/or clarification on references

Hi, I am working to encourage implementation of the goals of the Wikipedia:Verifiability policy. Part of that is to make sure articles cite their sources. This is particularly important for featured articles, since they are a prominent part of Wikipedia.

By references, I mean works that have been read by the page authors and used to add or fact check material in the article. The problem with the word "bibliography" is that it can mean a list of references and also a list of works about the topic (including the possibility that they were not ever consulted by the page authors.)

If some of the works listed in the bibliography section were used to add or check material in the article, please list them in a references section instead, to eliminate the ambiguity. The Fact and Reference Check Project has more information. Thank you, and please leave me a message when a few references have been added to (or clarified in) the article. - Taxman 19:29, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

I did a sizeable bit of expansion on this article a while back. My primary references (i.e. things I used while working on it) were: The Second World War, by John Keegan; The UK D-Day Museum The BBC WW2 website, plus some of my own memory from touring the site a few years ago. DJ Clayworth 13:44, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Well that is a good start. I suspect at least many of the other works in the bibiliography section were used too, but the problem as noted above, is that we can't be sure. Do you mind putting those works you used in a new ==References== section, and formatted according to Wikipedia:Cite sources? If you don't have time, let me know and I'll do it. Thanks - Taxman 13:50, Apr 25, 2005 (UTC)

Hi, fellow wikipedians! I have created a "Sources"-section and moved the sources I have used when reviewing this article (and adding images) there from "Bibliography". I am not sure of what you think of placing av TV documentary as a source (The World at War, episode 17), but this particular documentary is actually very detailed and accurate, and it contains televised interviews with key figures (like Lord Mountbatten - the original chief planner of the Allied invasion in Northern Europe). Dna-Dennis 11:08, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Photograph caption...possible error?

The caption for Eisenhower meeting with troops states that he is addressing them "on D-Day" But, if the paratroopers dropped in on the morning of June 6th (midnight?) did they not leave England the evening of the 5th? If so, Eisenhower is either addressing men who are taking off the evening of the 5th or...there were other paratroopers who left England on the 6th (D-Day) during daylight hours?

You're probably right. Feel free to change the caption. DJ Clayworth 13:22, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

"As daylight mellowed into dusk June 5, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower circulated among 101st troops at England's departure fields to wish them Godspeed, good luck."[6]

—wwoods 16:50, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

we went 23 miles the first day

"necessary"

"a western invasion was not strictly required to defeat the German Reich". This whole paragraph has worried me for a while. While it may be technically correct, the Russians had been demanding a 'second front' for years, and presumably they still were, so I think some mention should be made of this. Does anyone have any information to the contrary. As it stands the passage seems to imply that the Normandy landings were made for the post-war benefit of the Western Allies, which seems unlikely if the Russians were still demanding a second front. DJ Clayworth 23:21, 20 August 2005 (UTC)

I believe most historians would agree with this paragraph. Russian forces probably would have overrun Berlin and eventually the rest of Europe without the Normandy invasion. Also, the Russians kinda got a "second front" in the Italian campaign. This paragraph contains a lot of hindsight, based on the cold war. Sure, the main goal of Normandy was to kick the Germans out of Europe. But allied commanders at the time were also very concerned about the Russians and their post-war intentions in Europe.Beanbatch 18:03, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

The Western Allies had promised Stalin a Western European Second Front in 1941. It was at the 43 Teheran conference that Stalin got his way. John Keegan states in a book I can't quite remember which, that Britain, in particular, wanted to avoid France, mostly due to memories of the 1WW. So, the Casablanca conference determined that Sicilly et al would come first. The Soviets, as far as I know, did not regard Italy as a "second front", unless you have sources to that say o'wise. The key phrase is "second front in Western Europe", maybe this needs an article in itself as it would explain the allies strategic thinking with regards to Operation Overlord, which may include speculation on it's effects on a future europe.80.4.124.205 14:46, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

That's probably mostly true. I think there were a lot of reasons for invading Sicily and Italy before France. France was much better defended and would have needed many more men to assault successfully, while the Americans in particular were still getting their men appropriately trained for amphibious assaults. Also there were already a lot of troops and landing craft in the Mediterranean doing nothing, thanks to victory in North Africa. From the British point of view an invasion of Italy might have pushed italy out of the war (it did) making passage of ships through the Mediterranean, and therefore communication with the Far East suddenly a whole lot easier. DJ Clayworth 16:46, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

A new coordination template

Hi wikipedians!

Due to the LARGE number of articles, operations, places etc. of this LARGE invasion, I have created a new coordination template for "The Battle of Normandy" : Template:Battle of Normandy. It is inspired by the rather small (but nice) Template:Normandy battle beaches. The idea is that this template could replace the contents of all "See also"-sections on all pages concerning the Battle of Normandy, to make it easier for the user/researcher to navigate through the immense amount of information. It serves also as a brief description of the various codes (Chicago, Pluto, Cobra etc.) and who went on which beach etc etc.

The left column lists the operations. I thought it would be logical to have these in chronological order. The middle column lists the key locations (my suggestion is alphabetical order) and the right column lists "See also"-subjects (my suggestion is alphabetical order).

Now, I am far from an expert on the Battle of Normandy; I would therefore appreciate if you guys take a look on it, make additions/changes etc. For starters, I will only put the template (under the "See also":s on the main page and on the pages for the landing points (Utah, Omaha etc.), in case you guys think the template sucks. Of course I would appreciate any opinion on the template.

Regards, Dennis Nilsson. Dna-Dennis 05:11, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Unknown German Strength?

Is the German strength so unknown that there should be a "?" in the summary box? Since it lists 200,000 Germans dead and 200,000 captured, shouldn't we at least list the strength as 400,000? Maybe like this: ">400,000" or "~400,000". What do you think? Regards, --Dna-Dennis ^{talk - contribs} 07:36, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

Crossword scare

I think it would be a good idea to have an article on the Daily Telegraph crossword scare. This is a primary reference [7] but I don't even know what we should call the article. DJ Clayworth 14:36, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Booksworm:

2nd of Feburary 2006

Hello David,

The message about the quote "Les carrotes sont cuites, les dés sont jetés" ("The carrots are cooked, the dice have been thrown") which was broadcast by the BBC on the 5th of June 1944 at 2100 hours. It was found in a "Hors-Série" of the 8-12 year-old magazine "Images Doc", the Hors-Série was printed in March 2004 by Bayard Jeunesse Presse in France; it falls under ISSN 0995-1121 (so you can verify). If you cannot get your hands on this, please tell me, and I will scan the specific page and I will send it

Thank-You

Booksworm

Dear David,

I acknowledge that my article error of Mullberry was signifucant and I will try my best to verify my data from now on, but for instance, I do not always make mistakes. Eg. If you verify on the major train events in the trains portal, under December 11 2005, of which my data there was correct.

Thanks for the information. I wasn't meaning to imply that you always make mistakes, but I was encouraging you to fact-check things very carefully. I would also encourage you to check and article carefully before adding information to it, in case contradictory information is already in the article. What I think would be appropriate here is to copy out the paragraph or so of the book that relates to this message. The problem here is that a different message indicating the imminent invasion is already recorded in the article. It may be of course that what is currently written there is wrong. it may also be (and this seems likely to me) that the BBC broadcast many messages that night, in which case we can't report them all. May I also say this this seems, without evidence, to be an unlikely message, because "les dés sont jetés" is such a well-known phrase associated with being committed to a risky endavour. It would be like using "we're going to invade now" as a codeword for an imminent invasion. DJ Clayworth 16:34, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes I have just re-read the article entirely, the BBC sent these two messages seperatley but, within the same hour, I am currently contacting Bayard Presse to ask them about this. --Booksworm 16:44, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

I have hust verified with my history teacher about the phrase sent by the BBc and he says that the BBC would have sent the message, within another programme (eg. "Les carottes sont cuites" may have been broadcast in a cooking programme. And "Les dés sont jetés" may have been broadcast on a radio-documentery about Casinos or whatnot. I will have this clarified by the end of this month, in which I hope that Bayard Presse will respond. --Booksworm 09:20, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

Could you ask your teacher if he is sure about that? My understanding was that such messages were usually broadcast by the BBC at specific times reserved for such messages. At the appropriate time the announcer would say something like "here are some messages for our friends in occupied Europe", and then read a number of phrases. I've certainly seen documentaries where this is the way it was done. Doing it any other way would probably result in some confusion. The other phrase which is mentioned in connection with telling the Resistance that the invasion was imminent was known by the Germans to be a message to the Resistance - they just didn't know what it meant. DJ Clayworth 16:42, 3 February 2006 (UTC)