War progressed, often his function was to coordinate an effort with the allies, british or canadian, and that was one of the things he did at dday. Ford asked if stevens would not mind working with the british to help shore up their filmmaking effort, and i believe the ships that stevens arrived on the ship that stevens arrived on was a british ship. He was kind. His greatest blunder was this. He thought he could break up our partnership, but we are bonded together by fighting for one great cause in one great team, a team in which you were an indispensable and working member. That spirit of free people working, fighting, and living together in one great cause has served us well on the western front. We will pray that that spirit of comradeship will persist forever among the free people of the united nations. The world war ii dday invasion of normandy took place 70 years ago on june 6, 1944. Coming up in one hour at 1230 historianuthor and symonds looks at his book. Then in one hour, our discussion with him from earlier today, including responses to your calls, tweets, and facebook posts. Thank you. I appreciate the introduction. It is very kind. I learned just before we came into the auditorium tonight that there is a hidden storm expected heavy storm expected outside and it reminded me of the dilemma the Dwight Eisenhower faced on the fourth of june about the timing of the dday invasion. There was a very narrow window when the tide and circumstances were such that he thought the allied force had a good chance of getting ashore, but the weather needed to be just so and alas, the forecast for the fifth of june, when the landing was originally scheduled, was not good. So he decided to postpone that, which is why we now observe the sixth of june, 1944, as dday. It was put in mind of that. What a brave group you are to come out in this storm despite the forecast to talk about dday. Some of you, i suspect most of you, have probably seen both the longest day and Steven Spielbergs film, saving private ryan, which has very moving scenes of the landing at normandy beach. Saving private the landing at omaha beach. It is one of the most moving scenes in all of Motion Picture history. Like most great historic events, it has a big back story. That is what i want to address with you tonight. To find the beginning of it, it goes back to the beginning of the second world war. Certainly goes back to may of 1940 when the german war machine sliced through belgium and france and drove the british to the beaches of dunkirk, from which they were forced to evacuate, because that was when the british, and soon enough the americans as well, again thinking about the circumstances necessary and the conditions under which it would become possible to go back into europe. Because before that could happen , if indeed it could happen at all, the allies first had to recruit the enormous armies, trained the men, build the tanks, thehe artillery pieces. And above all, they would need to build be ships that would carry 2 million americans across the ocean and across the channel with all of their supplies and their mood tally out and their materiel and their hardware. And then they would have to cross with the predations of the german u boats, and still keep those men supplied. Bullets,with bombs and but also cocacola and hershey bars, newspapers, cigarettes. And then warships, very specialized ships that could take that force, bring it across the channel, and landed on a post beach. And then they would need more ships, thousands warships to fight another war in the pacific ocean, halfway around the world, against the japanese. The voracious demand for shipping in particular was the single greatest impediment, the single most important bottleneck in allied planning and execution of the dday landing. Ships, planning for any of that was an exercise in futility. In short, the story of dday is not that her terrific 20minute scene we see at the beginning of thatng private ryan, moment on unimaginable heroism and sacrifice on the landing beaches. It was also the years of planning, building, training, as well as the landing, and that is a story i want to talk about tonight. It falls into three parts rather naturally. The first element is a strategic one. That is the decision to do it. It,particularly when to do which, as you will see, became quite a conversation, followed with the logistical problem of planes and tanks, assembling the materiel, and finally there is the operations story of getting it done. Collectively, all of that, all of that prestory, all of that back story to Operation Overlord was called operation neptune. Let me start the story with the strategic planning. Just how did the angloamerican allies decide to do this, how do they make the decision . There is an awful lot of talk about the special relationship british and the the americans. And despite the ties of a common heritage, a common language, more or less, a common foe certainly, the allied partnership was nonetheless marked by disagreements, intense, sometimes even bitter arguments between the partners. With this image. They say a picture is worth 1000 words. This one may be worth at least 2000. I certainly plan to spend at least 2000 talking about it. You all know the is two guys in front. There is fdr on the left, flashing his famous smile. From the beginning of the war roosevelt had supported britain in its unequal contest with nazi germany, and he did so not just with words, but supplies and equipment, stretching the law and arguably the constitution to the breaking point to ensure the british could hold out against the nazis. And he did that a great Political Risk for american isolationists including popular spokesmen like charles lindbergh. Clerics. Most republicans. And even roosevelts own ambassador to the court of st. James, joseph kennedy, the father of the future president , all opposed him. One of the reasons they did this was they believed such support violated the spirit, if not the letter, of american neutrality. In addition, most of them were convinced britain would not be able to hold out in any case, and that meant that when hitler won the war against the british, all of the supplies we were sending across the atlantic would end up in his pocket anyway. Fdr bet that britain and he wasout, determined to do all that he could to make sure that it did. Ofconvinced a majority americans, mostly through those famous fireside chats on the radio that britains survival was essential to americas own security. And he got his way on most of these issues, including crucially lindleys, the program that allowed britain to survive, though barely, through those dark days of 1940 and 1941. Throughding crucially lendlease. E and Winston Churchill, without puckish smile on his face. His determination and guess what aziism, asalled n though the root of the word was not shut. What he really wanted was active american participation in the war. Consequently throughout the time of american neutrality and even after the United States joined the war, churchill was a supplicant in their relationship, and roosevelt was the one being glued one being wooed. This photo was taken in august of 1941. This is four months before pearl harbor. The two men are on board a british battleship, the hms prince of wales, which parenthetically would be sunk four months later by japanese aircraft. To arrange the meeting between himself and churchill, roosevelt had sneaked away from washington, keeping his intentions hidden and completely secret even, incredibly enough, from the secret service. If you could imagine such a thing happening today. At this time, when the photo was taken, roosevelt still hoped the United States might be able to limit its involvement in the war to what he called being the arsenal of democracy. In fact he wanted the u. S. To provide the materiel of war so britain and her commonwealth australia, newa, zealand could not only holdout, but eventually with american support when. With american support win. Became more realistic after hitlers fallujah and in fatalght completely decision to invade the soviet union in summer 1941. That made churchill at least think it was possible, just barely possible, that with american money time a russian american money, russian blood, and british grit, it might the decided without the United States having to get into the war. The strategic landscape changed dramatically after pearl harbor. Churchill was thrilled to have the United States finally as a full ally, that he feared that given the character of the publice attack, American Opinion would force Franklin Roosevelt to direct the energy of the United States to the pacific, rather than against germany. He neednt have worried. At least not about that. In the months, before pearl harbor, from the time this photograph was taken and the japanese attack, the United States had settled on a plan thategic land hitlers germany was by far the more serious threat in the world and it would have to be defeated before the United States turned to deal with japan. It was an american admiral, harold stark, who was also in this photo there he is near the right hand of the image there, the fellow with all of the stripes on his sleeve. Star, with the unusual Naval Academy nickname. It was he who drafted the policy which becameirst, the center of not only american, but angloamerican war planning. Churchill was relieved to hear it. On the other hand, churchill also learned that the americans took the view that since germany was to be the first targets of angloamerican ferocity, the best possible thing to do was to attack it immediately. Now. Well, maybe tomorrow, but it wants. But at once. This is a characteristic american attitude. We are not, as a rule, patient people. When we decide what we want, we decide we must have it at once. The british view was, yes, that is all well and good, but after all we must be practical about these things. Their preference was to postpone any reintegration of the consonants if firet until the nazi was on the brink of collapse. This difference in view between american expectations and british hesitancy, if i can use that word, became a running dispute that lasted for most of two full years. The principal advocate of an immediate, well, approximate cupied invasion of nazioc europe was the chief of staff george c. Marshall. He is also in that photograph. He is the guy over churchills i guess that is his right soldier, between the two heads of state. Talking to actually, it looks like he is listening to the american chief of naval whoations, ernest j. King, is standing directly behind fdr. You also has a lot of stripes on his sleeve. King was skeptical of the Germany First strategy. Not officially. He would not openly contradict the president or his policy. But king was also determined to ensure the japanese did not get a chance to consolidate their conquest in the western specific pearl harbor,er because that would make the subsequent and eventual reconquest of those islands more costly and more difficult. Result, marshall had to convince not only churchill and the british that an early invasion of europe was a good idea. He had to make sure that king and the navy were on the same page as he was. Note the fellow just to marshall for a left. That is to the right. Between marshall and star in this photograph. He is looking somewhat suspiciously at marshall and king, it seems to me. I love the expression on his face. It is like he is trying to listen in on their conversation. And well he might. That is british general sir john and churchill had brought them along on this trip and on subsequent trips to the United States. Stayed behindll and washington to serve as a kind of liaison between the englishspeaking allies. Was anrshall, dill underappreciated player in the contrivance of allied grand strategy and in fact the running of the war generally, because he was able to smooth over many of those rough patches between the allies. He was willing to talk back to his own superiors in london when it was necessary, and gracefully represent the british view in washington. Alas, did not live to see the fruit of his labors. He died in 1944 before the invasion. But he is one of very few nonamericans to be buried at Arlington National cemetery with full honors. Not pictured in this photograph are the russians. Bearinghis time were the full brunt of the war against the armies of germany and were positively frantic for the angloamericans to open a second front in france to take some of the pressure off them. Stalin suspected, and not without justification, the churchills opposition to an early second front in europe was because churchill was willing to fight the germans to the very last russian. [laughter] might have said to thefight the nazis very last communist. Before i leave this slide, there are two more characters i want to point out. They are on the left. They are talking to one another, having their own private conversation. The fellow with his hands behind his back is harry hopkins. Hopkins would prove to be as important in Holding Together the englishspeaking allies as dill, and maybe even more so. Hopkins was roosevelts most trusted personal advisor, second only to eleanor herself. Hopkins was a sick leave rake of a man. He was a cancer survivor. Most of the stomach had been cut out of him. He was unable to process food drop relay. Easily exhausted. None of that kept him from regularly. Hour weeks roosevelt, who was inhibited in his mobility of course, sent him to any place in the world where conversations needed to take place in an effort to hold together the often fragile anti axis coalition. The workload probably killed him. Although he at least live to see in end of the war, dying january 1940 six at the age of 55. That handsome fella whispering averillns ear is harriman, who fdr had sent to court. Notchill may or may have been aware that the 50yearold, married harriman was having a torrid affair with churchills. 1yearold daughterinlaw decades later, after everyone else in this photograph was long averill and pamela would marry and decades after that, Pamela Harriman will become John Kennedys choice as the United States ambassador to france. That is our cast of characters. Negotiations between the americans and the british not so much about whether to invade zioccupied europe. That was never in question. A little bit about where, but mostly about wind. The where was selfevident. It had to be northern france. There was some backandforth about the pontifical lay versus normandy. The main landing had to be in france. That was evident. It was closest to britain, which would have to be the staging area for the invasion. It was the only place from which land based air could cover the invasion beaches. The wind, that was more problematic. I have noted, the americans were eager to do it as soon as possible. The british, not so much. It was marshall who represented the most serious plan for an invasion scheme. He called on the angloamericans to land in france in may 1943. At the time he did so, the. Ritish offered support somewhat muted perhaps, but support nonetheless, after all this proposed date at that time was still 16 months away. Be plenty of time later to raise objections and concerns are for right now, we just did not want to annoy the americans. Wasmore immediate issue what are we going to do in the meantime . Surely the americans did not intend for the allied forces to sit around for 16 months toiling their thumbs well they build up the wherewithal for a fullscale invasion. Roosevelt knew the americans would not tolerate that. They wanted action. They wanted it immediately. American soldiers had to get in the actions on where al and somewhere else and soon. Of course there was always the pacific, and admiral king was always ready to suggest, well, i have some ideas about how we could use some of that materiel, but roosevelt oppose that. Thelar as it might be with voters, still angry with the pearl harbor attack, it would germanycompromised the first strategy, which roosevelt stop to. No, there had to be some way to use those troops and ships they did have in the european theater prior to may 1942. Unsurprisingly, churchill had a plan ready to hand. He argued that the allies should seize french north africa. Marshall thought this was a terrible idea. There were no germans and french which belong to vichy france, and was technically neutral in the war. At least as important from marshall for a point of view, an invasion of north africa would supplies,d forces, reinforcements, manpower away from what he was convinced was the vital theater. Marshall feared once the allies committed to a campaign in the mediterranean theater, it would force a gravitational that would draw more men and supplies until the 1943 invasion of france became impossible. And he was right. Landings in north africa led inexorably to a campaign into tunisia, which led to an invasion of sicily, which led to an invasion of italy. , itlong before that happens became obvious that exactly as marshall had foreseen, the momentum of event said draw the into the mediterranean, which may in fact have been exactly what Winston Churchill had in mind. So, marshall had been right. Churchill was right, too. For the extended campaign in north africa and mistreated more clearly than any british argument could have done that the angloamerican allies were simply not ready for the kind of effort that wouldve been necessary to invade northern france in 1943. It almost certainly would have been a disaster. Beenandings in morocco had haphazard. The campaign into tunisia marked with blunders and reversals. None of them worse than a humiliating american effete in february 1943. Demonstrated how unready the americans were to take on the wehrmacht. Besides, there was still the whole shipping problem. Now in addressing that we move from the strategic argument to be logistical problem. Before pearl harbor, the United States had embarked on a truly historic Shipbuilding Program. In 1941, before pearl harbor, the United States produced just over one million tons of shipping. Was, inve as that february 1942, roosevelt told the u. S. Maritime convention they expected him to build 8 million tons of shipping that year and 10 million more the next year. These numbers were staggering. Incredulity among the british who could barely conceive of such numbers. And yet, somehow, it got done. And when it did, roosevelt raised the bar again. Now he wanted 24 million tons of shipping. His attitude seemed to be if you somehow manage to meet the standard i set, i guess i didnt set it high enough. To me these astonishing and unprecedented construction goals, workers at shipyards like this one, the Henry J Kaiser shipyard in portland worked literally around the clock. Ons photograph shows workers the swing shift, the 4 p. M. Until midnight shift, lining up to replace the dayshift workers. They would be replaced by those on the night shift too labored from midnight until 8 a. M. And so it went around the clock, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The welding machines were never turned off. They were simply passed from hand to hand as the ships changed. Shifts changed. The workers that they did here earn . 50 an hour for the work, which after deducting 1. 40 for old age benefits as they were called at the time, the new Social Security program, left 50. 60 for a 40hour work week. Although most of them worked overtime as well. There is a slide which you cannot see over the day i blew it up so you could read what the workers saw just before they entered the plant. The Shipbuilding Program was not manpower orr of woman powered, since wendy the welder like rosie the river for dissipated in this riveter participate in this program. The United States remains the symbol of democracy but even its resources were not implement infinite. One bottleneck was steel plate. Pressed for the needs for war, they increase the production of steel plate by 300 between 1940 and 1943, but shipbuilding increased by more than 1500 in that same timeframe. The american war production board had to decide which programs got preferred access to these scarce raw materials. No ship could be built without it. Battle ships, aircraft carriers, cruisers, destroyers. But the principal rivals for these vital resources were two ship types that are too often overlooked in the heroic stories between 1941 sea and 1945. These are the liberty ships that carry the cargoes, supplies, they kept the armies and our the landingied, and ship tank, best known by its initials as the lst. The lst was the Ugly Duckling of the war. It was in effect a big selfpropelled bop box, shaped more or less like a bathtub. Its our like old could carry hold could carry 20 sherman tanks, plus as many as 40 jeeps and likght trucks. Because it had a flat bottom, it did seem right up onto a beach, and it could discharge trucks right out onto the sand. Made thate could be the lst was the most important ship of the second world war. And yet almost no one loved or admired them. They were very poor sailors. Bow tod a blunt accommodate those doors and a flat bottom so they could get up on that beach and they wallow terribly, even in a calm sea. In any kind of mild shop, they slanted down heavily on every successive wave with a kind of teetheatening rattling them. One of my favorite quotations in lstaring this book was the sailor wrote some ships go over the waves. Some go through the waves. Go under the waves. But an lst just clubs them to death. [laughter] that, they became the industrial and logistical bottleneck of the allied cause in world war ii. There are three reasons why this was the case. First, the lst had to compete for resources, especially steel plate, with other ship types including the liberty ships. They had to compete for space on the nation for all finite building ways 11 ways. Most were built not along the coastline, but on americas inland rivers, especially the ohio. This is a photo of an lst being launched from the neville shipyard beloved pittsburgh, which constructed 143 of them during the war. Sites includeding evansville, indiana and seneca, illinois. A second problem was, once it became obvious in 1943 invasion was not really going to be with the vortex of the black hole in the mediterranean, many of these shipyards that had been constructed to produce lst s were retooled to produce destroyers for the battle of the atlantic. By the time the priority was shifted back to lsts a year later, it was nearly too late because changing the products of a shipyard is not like throwing a switch. Components fabricated for destroyers or liberty ships had to be set aside in new components fabricated from the beginning of a logistic chain before they got to the shipyard. An lst requires 30,000 different Component Parts and they had to start over from the beginning of that supply chain. The lst production was slowed by arguments about what to do with them once they were inlt. The navy needed them the pacific. Elsewhere. Allied forces in the mediterranean needed them to land in sicily and italy. Of course, there were the losses to the german uboats as those some sailors actually claimed that the lst stood for large slow target. There were944, simply not enough lsts and british waters to ensure a margin of safety for an invasion of northern france. Then it got worse. Throughout the winter and spring of 1944, hundreds of thousands of men who had been transported for the invasion engaged in constant training exercises, mostly on the coast of britain. This is a training exercise. A lcv, a higgins boat, Landing Craft. Of 1944, with the landings only a month or six weeks away, the allies prepared to carryout what was called exercise tiger, a fullscale rehearsal landing by the forces that were to land on utah beach. The night they set out, that same night, the german commander of a squadron of small torpedo boats inled fast for a patrol. I got the germans in there just for you. You are welcome. Onthe middle of the night april 18, 1944, the german ofoats encountered a convoy eight fully loaded american lsts, packed in their main hold with tanks and trucks, fully fueled and 350 soldiers and the ks along the starboard port sides of each ship. In pitchused battle blackness, the torpedo boats nearlyo lsts and very sunk a third, the lst to 89, which despite looking like this, made it back to port. More than 700 americans were killed in this training exercise. And thats more than were killed in the actual landings on utah beach on dday. What concerned eyes and house are almost as much was the loss of three lsts on the ee of the invasion, before there were literally none to spare. He immediately notified the joint chiefs that he needed three more lsts and of course there were none to be had, and even if there were, they could not get there in time. In the end for this and other reasons, dday was postponed from may until the first week of june, and even then, the dearth critical came a remains a critical concern. At last we come to the operational phase and you have been very patient to wait to get to this. The traditional explanation of allied success on dday is the allied armada was so huge in the plan was so perfect and so detailed, the germans were simply overwhelmed by the power and the size of it. That is mostly true, counting these smaller Landing Craft, the socalled higgins boats. Counting the smaller Landing Craft, the socalled higgins boats, 5000 boats depart. It was by far the largest Maritime Force ever assembled at sea for any purpose. That did not guarantee success. As it happened, the landings, especially on omaha beach were a very near run thing. Attackers weree very nearly driven into the sea. The germans had 81 preestablished machine gun positions on a line of blocks about a half mile into the beach that covered every inch of that shingle. The invading soldiers found the with mindcrowded abstractions and soon it was littered with rocks and dead or dying men. The first wave went ashore at 6 almostthe morning and instantly ran into a hurricane of violence. This is one of those photos taken on the day. You see the beach in the foreground and the high bluffs the on bit in the distance beyond it in the distance. In the morning it had become so bad that the commanders offshore were notified to stop the landings. Less than two hours after it started, the invasion of omaha beach had stalled. Was a handful of american and british destroyers. The official mission of the destroyers in the invasion armada that day was to screen the landing ships from any possible interference by the fast boats i showed you a minute ago or submarines or other german naval units. But with the crisis on omaha beach, a dozen destroyers were ordered to provide close and gunfire support. We have no photographs of that. This is a drawing that was made u. S. Coast guardsmen have his name here. I apologize to the artist. Onboard oned artist of the offshore ships. I want to mention coast guard officers, coast guard manned ships and coast guard vessels played a significant role at dday and throughout the invasion. I mentioned that in particular in testimony at this wonderful exhibit in the lobby about the coast guard that we say. Firing one uss doyle those high bluffs in the distance. The american destroyers responded with such enthusiasm, almost too much enthusiasm. Toward the beach of wolfsburg, taking up positions only 800 yards off the surf and at that distance, the destroyers probably had no more than three or four inches under their keel, and they were so close to the beach, they were being hit by rifle fire from shore. Fired their fiveinch guns at directed targets. In one particular case, a few allied tanks that made it onto the beach use their guns to direct the fire of the destroyers offshore who could then direct to their fiveinch shells to specific targets. They fired so fast, the gun barrels grew cherry red with heat, had to be hosed down with seawater, but they kept firing anyway. As one soldier on the beach recalled, the destroyers came right in there, popped over on their side and lasted those german gun emplacements. Bradley himself reported the navy saved our hides. None of this should take any credit from the soldiers who into words that horrible landing on the beach. They would have been among be first to acknowledge the conquest at omaha beach was a joint effort. And it wasnt over yet. The key to allied success in overlordneptune was not merely seizing the beach. It was not simply gaining that so holds. It was maintaining a constant stream of men, equipment, and supplies in order to build up a force capable of conquering a continent and keeping that force applied. To do that, the allies needed a functioning seaport. Because of that, the neptune plan targeted the nearby seaport board. Ed work share senior in an aerial seen here in an aerial photograph. The first objective job two weeks. Although it was eventually successful, the nazis with their usual efficiency completely wrecked the harbor facilities, making them unusable for at least a month. But the allies had a backup plan. An aerialt of shot of the artificial harbor known as a mulberry. This is one off the british invasion beach. In the very bottom of the slide, you see those flat barges cutting across the lower corner. Those are the phoenix units. Giant concrete structures as high as a six Story Building tote across, built in advance, towed across the channel and some templates to create a breakwater. In board of them are for liberty ships, which you can see are using the protected water there. You can see peers reaching out reaching outiers from the shore. It was a very clever and quite complicated artificial harbor. The construction was a remarkable accomplishment and many historians have credited the mulberries with allied success. But i think at least some of that is wishful thinking. Having invested so much money, so much materiel in their construction, it was psychologically impaired up to credit them with having played a major role in the successful invasion. Days after the american mulberry was completed, a storm came ripping down the channel and completely wrecked the mulberry off omaha beach, which had to be abandoned. Uph no access to the smashed harbor and with the mulberry wrecked by the storm, the americans had to fall back on the lsts. Which over the next avril weeks ral week cyclese in a continuous cycle, bringing trucks, supplies to explode that the chat and carrying away the wounded and the prisoners, some in the same ships. So efficiently did they do this, the amount of men and supplies offloaded onto omaha beach in the time after the storm actually exceeded the amount brought ashore when the mulberry was fully functional. Allied soldierth came ashore on normandy on july 4. And three weeks later the allies executed operation cobra, the breakout of the enclave in normandy and brittany to race across the countryside toward paris, which fell on august 25. Y to that remarkable success was not only the courage of the allied soldiers, admirable as that was, but also the long history of compromise, strategy, the Lessons Learned in africa and in italy, and above americanbility of factories and shipyards to turn out the unprecedented numbers of ships to get that done. Even then, it dday might not triumph butred in for the willingness to adjust that inevitably became evident on june 6. So Committee Final tribute us to go to the men themselves, those sailors soldiers and who drove the Landing Craft on to those beach instructions, who crossed the beach, despite that merciless machinegun fire, to gain a toehold. That was the first step on the road to paris and eventually to berlin. So, thank you very much. I look forward to your questions. [applause] i will add one more thing about the questions. When you raise your hand, if you will stand up in state who you are before you ask your question. First question. Ok. Dont be shy. [indiscernible] yes, sir . Sailer. Dr. Uld like to ask symonds to compare the size of for thesion force invasion of sicily with normandy. Were they similar or vastly different. Obviously they were similar in terms of the fact that they defendeding on a beach, but the defenses in sicily were nowhere near as serious a problem as they were in normandy. Hitler had spent a lot of money building what was building what was touted as the atlantic wall. A lot of money went into preparations at normandy. The allies worked very hard to keep that a secret, where the landing would be. The defenses at calais were much stronger than at normandy, but a were much stronger compared to sicily. Sicily was a matter of logistics. Getting the men as sure and keeping them supplied. They did not have to seize the beach in the same jerk only in way as at norman for in way as at normandy. In Amphibious Force protected the divisions that landed in sicily. It was a large force. Seven divisions went ashore in sicily and five divisions on dday, so technically you could argue it was a larger force that went ashore, but on different parts of the sicilian coast. But there the problem was, as i say, a logistical one. It was getting them ashore, keeping their reforms thats reinforcements, maintaining supplies rather than grappling waterse enemy at the edge and seizing the beachfront the way it had to be done in normandy. And the size of the fleet. You can see the photograph on the screen now. Its almost unimaginable. The one Common Thread i have seen in the oral histories the sailors left behind, the soldiers, too, as they looked around at what was called piccadilly circus, the point in the channel and all of the ships toe together before the dash the normandy beaches was what an astonishing view that was to see 5000, 6000 ships spread out across the verizon as far as the as far as the eye could see. Wasvery size of this overwhelming. I began by talking about movements. You may recall a scene from the longest today. You all look old enough to remember that movie. Day, there is a Sergeant Schultz sort of figure carrying a payload milk a pail of milk. The morning mist slowly rises and clears and here is this vast panorama of ships, more than he can possibly imagine any drops and runs for it. That sense of all was very characteristic of everyone who saw this. To make a comparison between the sicilian landings in the dday landings, it is a matter of scale, a matter of size, as well as a matter of resistance from the germans. There . , dr. Symonds, i work at the Naval Historical Center translating captured german documents. Bless you, sir. Yeah. Document, the documents of the german general staff in operation torch, and there was a german intercept an communication in which the germans learned it was a request by stalin to open up the second front to take the pressure off stalingrad. In operation torch, stoll and requested an invasion in the last to take the pressure off stalingrad, but it still had not occurred until dday. How muchve any idea cooperation or communication there was between the western allies and stalin and the Eastern Front . Very little. Very little. Did that contribute to the soviet suspicion absolutely. Without a doubt. The famous visit, the one that molotov made. Stalin sent molotov to the ted states, stopping up stopping off in london first to talk to churchill in 1942. And he had one mission and that was to get a commitment from either churchill or roosevelt, preferably both, but there would be an allied second front in 1942. 1940 of course there was never much of a serious plant. There was a backup plan called Operation Roundup for an in case thetuation soviet union was about to collapse or maybe if germany was about to collapse. But roundup was never really a the alliedion in quiver. Nonetheless, when molotov came to the white house, where interestingly there was a curious moment. , stuart, housekeeper in the white house was unpacking his luggage and he found that he brought with him a great big fat sausage and a chunk of brown bread. Apparently assuming the white house meals would not be trustworthy. You never knew what might be enough food. And also a loaded handgun. Its more serious. There is a loaded handgun in the white house and possession of a representative of a foreign country. He went to his boss and said what do i do about this . Dont say anything. Put it back in the suitcase and keep your mouth shut. Story suggests something about molotovs own suspicions, doubts, uncertainties about how allied these allies really were and in a meeting with the president , which of course had to take place in a very awkward sort of way, translating slowly in an awkward give and take, but marshall was in the room. And molotov asked roosevelt, i i july, face to face, are you going to open a second front in 1942 . Roosevelt turned to marshall and said, have we advanced our plans enough to tell mr. Molotov we will open a second front question mark are so answered with one word. Yes. And roosevelt turned back to molotov and said, you may tell a. Stalin that we will open second front in 1942. You can imagine what marshall was thinking. Then roosevelt said, for sure, for sure, 1943. Not 1943 there. Now main 1944. We really mean it this time. Well, maybe june. Right . The overall global plan was for stalin to launch an offensive along the Eastern Front at the same time the allies were coming ashore at normandy, but that russian offensive to place on russian on june 22. It may be, as stalin claimed, it he chose that date because it was the anniversary of hitlers invasion of the soviet union. I find that quite credible. But also, it might have been, i am going to wait and make sure these guys are really doing this. You are absolutely right. The distrust, as much as there was back and forth between the british and the americans with the british and americans and the russians, that was a vast gulf of disagreement. Much suspicion. One of the reasons churchill was reluctant to go into europe was because he did not think it would be possible, but as soon as it looked like the russians might get to berlin first, now he is in a hurry. It is not only helping the russians. It is eating the russians that is part of his grand geopolitical thinking. They were not so much allies as on the same side. That is a different thing. Thats absolutely fed into the cold war attitude. Anybody else . Joe geldof. I work with the merchant marines. I was curious if you could amplify a little bit on communication, two aspects. The shoreseems like on normandy was like. Theyarly see the clearly show the bombardment. Could you amplify a little bit on the communication between the canadian, british, u. S. , and i suppose the french participants in the invasion question like that but yeah, thats great. Let me do me do the naval gunfire support question first. Its absolutely possible they have learned specific lessons about inadequate gunfire support. They figured thered be no one left by the time it was over and they found out that was not the case. It was clear you had to have very specific targeted bombardment, and extended bombardment. It must last for hours, days. Several days. Rs, the problem is if you are attacking an island that is wide, you can take your time. In france when to start bombarding that beach, the germans go, now i know where they are coming and they can vector in panzer units to the beach. It was a serious and lengthy discussion and the decision was quite deliberate. Were going to have a brief, but extraordinarily intense naval gunfire, but just for about an hour. What secretary rumsfeld would later call shock awe. O just enough to make the germans died. Dive. It was not so much they would destroy the defenses as they would demoralize the defenders. Quite a different objective. Yes, the naval gunfire support was too brief and it did not work. We know now that those shells, even the big 14and shells from the american battleships did not destroy the heart and life on any of the beach hardly begun siphon any of the beaches. A lot of them were subsequently taken out because of the pinpoint accuracy, providing radio controlled close and gunfire support. But the preliminary compartment was too sure. I will add to that what you did not ask, and that was the aerial bombardment, which was supposed , and overwhelming as well particularly in omaha, it had to be done quickly, and right before the men got ashore. But they were coming in on the channel perpendicular to the beach. If you are a little early, you are going to hit your own people. So, they waited an extra five to 10 seconds, which means the , and landed well inland they missed their target as well. It is not that they did not know a longer preliminary bombardment would be helpful, but they made the decision that they would quickly all at once, right before the landing rather than an extended bombardment which would tip the germans off to what was coming. Remind me your second question . [inaudible] the ally communications. One of the great contributions of eisenhower to this effort was his political savvy. Eisenhower knew from day one he had to command a truly allied army, not an associated army of some british, some canadian, some american, some norwegians and others. To do that he absolutely laid down the law. You are in one army. Do not make fun of the other guy. I know some of those guys wear skirts. Dont make jokes about it. What you got under that killed, buddy, none of that stuff. He was ferocious and defending that. He said, i dont mind if a soldier calls another soldier a son of a bitch. But if you call him a british son of a bitch, you are going home. Crucial. Tude was all of his subordinate commands, they were british commanders. It was an overall american command, but all british officers in the middle echelon. And of course within one of the british units, the Canadian Third Division as well. Happened was in the year prior to the invasion, eisenhower was successful in creating this notion of we are one army. That did not mean there was not given taken difficulties back and forth, but he hammered out a lot of that stuff before it could ever get bad. . K question mark ok anybody else . Question just a quick question about admiral ramsay. Could you give it a quick assessment of his role in operation neptune . Holmes, sir bertrand ramsay. One of the Great British names. But ramsay was of the old school. He had to do brothers, both of whom were Army Generals and becomes royal family where he knows what he is doing. He served for half a century in uniform. Probablynk ramsay was as good a joint