Omaha+Beach

On June 6th 1944, the battle at Omaha Beach took place. On D-Day, American, British, and Canadian forces landed on five separate beaches in the north of France. Omaha, attacked by American troops, was in between Utah Beach (Americans) and Gold Beach (Brits). The plan was to break the German defenses, retake France, and move closer to Germany.

The soldiers landed by a Duplex-Drive. It was a boat that can be driven. The Germans had a good defense - snipers and concrete machine gun nests that explosives could not break. The soldiers that arrived on Omaha beach were Troops from the battle hardened U.S. 1st Infantry Division, the green and untested 29th Infantry Division, and nine companies of Army Rangers. The ground troops were supported by the US Navy and the British Royal Navy.

The first wave of the assault, made up of tanks, infantry, and combat engineers, was designed to reduce the German defenses along the coast, allowing further waves of troops access to the beaches. The plan was to secure five miles of coastline, connecting to Utah and Gold Beaches. The first wave struggled to clear the obstacles on the beach. Communication was down, tanks and half tracks were lost, and engineers took heavy fire. Casualties were very high.

Eventually, small groups of survivors made improvised assaults on German bunkers, scaling the cliffs between the heavily defended points. It took a few days longer than planned, but the American forces were successful, and the objectives of D-Day were met.

When the Allied forces won, they prevented the Germans from sending troops to the west. In the final months of World War II, with the Allied forces closing in on them, there were mass suicides in Germany. Over 7,000 people killed themselves with cyanide pills or with guns. If it wasn't for D-Day the end of World War II could have been delayed. There is a museum dedicated to this invasion. The memorial is called, Musée Mémorial d'Omaha Beach. They have artifacts and weapons currently on display.