NORMANDY D-DAY JOUR-J

                                Typical countryside where paratroopers landed early morning June 6

                                              Driveway inside the gates of La Porte Rouge

A 90-minute flight from Munich brings us to Paris. Once inside Europe there are no more customs or passport checks, like flying in the U.S. The rental cars are near the airport exit and it should be easy to pick up a vehicle. You will most likely get a manual transmission with no air-conditioning.  I was lucky to get a large, automatic sedan with air and GPS – in English, no less.

But I got even more: a car covered in bird poop as if a Pterodactyl had flown over.  I asked the agent if someone could clean it up, and he replied “No, I’m the only one here.  You can wait an hour if you want another car.” This is French customer disservice, quite common throughout the country. We see signs in the U.S. of an evolution away from ‘The customer is always right’, but in France it’s guaranteed you’ll get pushback from consumer complaints.

 The 3 ½ hour trip to Normandy turned into 6 hours with traffic, stop for lunch (the restaurant on the tollway overpass was surprisingly excellent) and coffee breaks; we didn’t arrive at Michael and Michele’s place until early evening. They are 20 minutes from the coast in remote farmland hidden behind tall hedges – the explicit directions from Michael and GPS were perfect. Follow an arrow on a small blue sign showing the house number, drive through a tunnel of trees and bushes, and arrive at a gate with another sign “please keep closed”.

                                                  La Porte Rouge main living quarters

 I’ve only seen close up pictures of them sitting in front of their house, and was amazed at the immense structure surrounded by acres of manicured lawn, artistically placed bushes, plants and trees bursting with color. The manor consists of four two-story rectangular stone buildings, each one forming a side of a large courtyard.  It was built in the 1800’s and up until the end of the 20^th century had no running water inside. Since they bought the property from Michele’s mother in 1985, they have undertaken extensive renovation to create a pleasing modern home out of the stone and wood beam framework.

                    Interior Courtyard showing garage, storage and possible spaces for renovation

Small section of the garden.   The bread/pizza oven inside, building restored to include an office area.

 “What was the purpose of the courtyard in the original design?” I asked Michele. “This was a working farm.  All the animals, cows, horses, chickens, maybe pigs, goats and sheep were kept in the courtyard and the poop piled up in the middle to fertilize the fields.” “But why live with that stench all the time”.  “There were no machines so it would have been too much work to create a pile down the road and then move it again for fertilizing fields.”

 Michele’s mother was 16 during the occupation; the family had three daughters and three sons and they harbored three other boys from a nearby village. Her grandparents were very protective of the girls while the boys had to be kept out of sight and unknown to the Germans.  “Didn’t the Germans occupy the house?”, I asked. “No, they took all the chateaux and comfortable houses.”  “So, what was life like for your mother and her family?”

 She described: The Germans controlled all the farms and took what they needed for provisions.  They counted all the animals to assure that none were slaughtered without them there.  When a patrol would arrive, they’d pick out which animals they wanted, took most of the meat and left the unwanted parts for the family. My family had to be careful when patrols came to hide the boys in the haystacks because they would have been taken for slave labor.  We still have a bread oven, used now for pizza, which would be fired up every Sunday and the neighbors would come around with their dough to cook up loaves for the week.  They were lucky to be on a farm, they could grow enough food to feed the enemy and themselves, but people in the cities were starving.

                                       Panoramic view of Utah Beach - this is at low tide

                        Restored landing craft, tank in background, statues depicting landing

We started our day driving 12 miles to Utah Beach, touring the grounds and the Museum. From Utah Beach and looking eastward on a map, there's Point-du-Hoc, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword Beaches for about 50 miles of coastline with a dozen museums along the way. To appreciate the enormity of the Allied undertaking, one needs a full 2 or 3 days to see all the beaches, the German fortifications, the museums, the still standing remnants of the artificial harbor, and to shop for souvenirs which is the industry of this area now. The most extensive museum showing the full planning and operations is found at Omaha Beach.

                             Monument on the high ground overlooking the beach

                                              Artifacts inside the museum

In a nutshell, the landings succeeded due to Hitler’s insistence that Calais would be the location, (an intensive Allied misinformation campaign helped) while Rommell, who was responsible for the Atlantic Wall defense, was unable to get the supplies, troops and infrastructure completed in Normandy due to the depletion of German resources on the Eastern front with Russia.  In fact, Rommell was in Berlin on June 6 for his wife’s birthday. The German meteorological services predicted storms for two weeks, so many officers and their men were given leave at that time.

Church at Ste. Mere Eglise where John Steele got hung up - he's still up there. Letter of 18 June from DeGaulle to all the French people after surrender of France. (Google for translation)

The French Resistance and Allied bombers for a month prior were destroying bridges, rail lines, communication centers, and electrical facilities. Eisenhower’s strategy was to have the paratroopers land a few miles from the coast at midnight, have the beaches taken in the morning and by the end the day have the entire coast and nearby inland linked up and secured by Allied troops.  It took a week just to link up all the beaches, and it took well over 6 weeks to overtake all the German defenses in the area, complete the artificial ports for delivery of troops and material and move out to liberate Paris.

 

Some blockhouses received direct hits.  Bomb craters still visible after 80 years.

                                    These are the 100 foot cliffs the US Rangers had to climb up.

Just as I had seen at Gettysburg, to understand the battle one needs to be on the ground to view the terrain and here feel the weather conditions.  It is 3 months after June, but at all times of the year, the winds are nasty, clouds come and go quickly and tides swiftly shift.  For paratroopers and landing craft, the majority were tossed miles away from their objective. Paratroopers had to confront fields that were purposely flooded and many drowned or died from being dropped too close to the ground. Once they landed, they were scattered in small fields surrounded by impenetrable hedgerows where the only exit was covered by German machine guns. Landing at Utah Beach was the lesser of all evils, as the high tides were close to the shallow coastal hills; however, the land mines, barbed wire, anti-tank defenses and German gunners posed a mighty threat.

      Dozens of blockhouses dot the landscape still intact despite heavy bombardment.

Point-du-Hoc and Omaha Beach were the other two American landing sites which fared far worse for the combatants.  200 Rangers scaled the nearly 100-foot cliffs at Point-du-Hoc with ropes and ladders.  When one rope was cut, they’d grab for another and keep climbing to the top, eventually overtaking the enemy and destroying the big guns aimed at the other beaches.  But it is a secluded location and they had to hold out for two days for reinforcements. When they ran out of ammunition, they used German guns which made a different sound; unfortunately, some were killed in friendly fire as they were thought to be Germans. Of the 200 men, 135 were killed or wounded.

 

                                             Acres of graves. A rainbow shines overhead

Omaha Beach was the bloodiest and hence, is the location of the American Cemetery on the high ground overlooking the beach. It is a wide beach with a steep rise and had clear lines of sight for the Germans from top to bottom.  In addition, the sands shift rapidly and many landing craft were stranded with men jumping into water and drowning.  There were 32 amphibious tanks and only 5 made it shore, which didn’t leave much cover for the advancing soldiers.  The cemetery is sobering: beautifully manicured acres of precision rows of headstones, mostly white crosses with some instead as posts bearing the Star of David.

 

                                           Panorama of the cemetery.

                                                View from the highlands of Omaha Beach

                                        Tableau depicting the beach landings

My friends Michael and Michele were there at the 75^th anniversary celebration and spoke of the fervor still alive in the French people for the Americans’ sacrifices and help to win this war.  80 years later, there are fewer people living who witnessed this tragedy, the greatest military operation in history, never again to occur.  Not because we are smart enough to avoid war, but modern technology would not allow it.  Einstein was asked what kind of weapons would they have for WWIII. He replied, “I don’t know, but WWIV will be fought with sticks and rocks.”

We are witness to the aftermath, the European Economic Community, where cooperation overcomes belligerence.  Though don’t you believe because there are no passports nor customs officers, nor currency exchanges that everyone is happy.  I see and speak with others about the discordance throughout Europe and it reminds me of my own home country.  Right wing versus left wing in angry disagreement destined to crash hard into a wall someday lest we learn a new way of life that humanity has yet to discover.