#omahabeach

Omaha Beach

Omaha Beach was one of two beaches attacked by the US armed forces on D-Day, 6 June 1944. Strong German defences on the bluff overlooking the beach made this area the most difficult of the Normandy landings, but by the end of the day, the beachhead was secure, albeit with more casualties than at any other D-Day beach.

Operation Overlord

The amphibious assault on the Normandy beaches was the first stage of Operation Overlord, which sought to free Western Europe from occupation by Nazi Germany. The supreme commander of the Allied invasion force was General Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969). The commander-in-chief of the Normandy land forces, 39 divisions in all, was the experienced General Bernard Montgomery (1887-1976). Commanding the air element was Air Chief Marshal Trafford Leigh Mallory (1892-1944), with the naval element commanded by Admiral Bertram Ramsay (1883-1945).

Nazi Germany had long prepared for an Allied invasion, but the German high command was unsure where exactly such an invasion would take place. Allied diversionary strategies added to the uncertainty, but the most likely places remained either the Pas de Calais, the closest point to British shores, or Normandy with its wide flat beaches. The Nazi leader Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) attempted to fortify the entire coast from Spain to the Netherlands with a series of bunkers, pillboxes, artillery batteries, and troops, but this Atlantic Wall, as he called it, was far from complete in June 1944. In addition, the wall was thin since there was no real depth to the defences.

Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt (1875-1953), commander-in-chief of the German army in the West, believed it would be impossible to stop an invasion on the coast and so it would be better to hold the bulk of the defensive forces as a mobile reserve to counterattack against enemy beachheads.

Field Marshal Erwin Rommel (1891-1944), commander of Army Group B, disagreed and considered it essential to halt any invasion on the beaches themselves. Further, Rommel believed that Allied air superiority meant that movements of reserves would be severely hampered. Hitler agreed with Rommel, and so the defenders were strung out wherever the fortifications were at their weakest. Rommel improved the static defences and added obstacles to all the larger beaches. In the end, Rundstedt was given a mobile reserve, but the compromise weakened both plans of defence. The German response would not be helped either by their confused command structure, which meant that Rundstedt could not call on any armour (but Rommel, who reported directly to Hitler, could), and neither commander had any control over the paltry naval and air forces available or the separately controlled coastal batteries. Nevertheless, the defences were bulked up around the weaker defences of Normandy to an impressive 31 infantry divisions plus 10 armoured divisions and 7 reserve infantry divisions. The German army had another 13 divisions in other areas of France.

Omaha Beach Residence, Tāwharanui Peninsula, Auckland, New Zealand,

Battle of Normandy, D-Day - Landing transport, Omaha Beach, June 6, 1944

"My God, we're coming in at the right spot, but look at it! No shingle, no wall, no shell holes, no cover. Nothing!" – Lt.  Edward Tidrick, 116th Infantry, 29th Division

On June 6, 1944, from the clifftops at Omaha Beach, the Germans fired anti-tank guns, light artillery, riffles, mortars and machine guns at the arriving U.S. troops.  Omaha Beach had the highest casualty rate of the out of the five allied landing points.  

The transports were timed to arrive midway between high and low tides.  At 6:30 a.m. the ramps dropped.  The men jumped into the water which was waist deep or above a man’s head. The overburden packs dragged the men down.  Some of the men managed to grasp the sides of the boat to stay afloat.

The survivors struggled out of their packs to float with the tide to shore.  The Germans opened fire, ripping apart the approaching men.  The sea turned red. The lightly wounded drowned, still wearing their packs.  

Within seven minutes the first wave is inert.  Most of the officers are dead.  One transport disappeared, leaving only bodies that float ashore.  Within 15 minutes, the first company has not fired a shot. Approximately two thirds never make it off the beach alive.

The transports continue to arrive.  The men who escape drowning, had to cross open sand, using water-filled troughs called runnels.  The next obstacles were a sea wall topped with razor wire, a minefield up to 200 yards long, and scaling cliffs up to 170 feet tall to reach the German positions.