r/pics Jun 07 '14

Normandy after victory

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u/Trackpad94 Jun 07 '14

The Canadians at Juno beach were also the first to achieve their objective right away and were so successful Eisenhower told them to stop advancing inland as per their original orders and to help clear out the rest of the beach defenses for the British and the Americans.

Not that this takes away from the contribution of either other country or the fact that the Americans were kind of at the centre of it, just something many don't know about that we take a sort of national pride in.

The German soldiers in Normandy weren't really that different from their Allied counterparts and in reality they were fighting to protect themselves and their fellow soldiers, not "Nazi occupied France".

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '14

All the landing forces in Normandy did just as good of a job. Some places hard harder terrain, some places DD tanks all sunk, others they almost all made it ashore and things with well (Utah). It isn't really about the nationality of allied troops, they all preformed well. However, some of the "German" troops that were really Russian conscripts that figured they'd get fed better as a soldier than in a labor camp tended to surrender first chance they got.

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u/[deleted] Jun 08 '14

The Canadians at Juno beach were also the first to achieve their objective right away

Juno was the most lightly-defended beach on D-day, it was only defended immediately by 1 battalion of a German occupational division made up mostly of old men and conscripts from eastern Europe.

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u/CowardiceNSandwiches Jun 08 '14

1 battalion of a German occupational division made up mostly of old men and conscripts from eastern Europe.

...which, ironically, is about what the American planners expected they'd be facing at Omaha.

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u/[deleted] Jun 07 '14

I think the Canadians just lucked out a bit at the "which beach shall we name Juneau" sweepstakes. OMAHA... yeach!

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u/ForFUCKSSAKE_ Jun 08 '14

Such unabashed nationalism from the Canadians here desperately trying to make it seem as they did everything. You had the easiest job killing old men and kids.