Operation Neptune

6 June 2017

You probably studied this day in history . . . they likely called it D-Day. The Invasion of Normandy . . . Omaha Beach . . . they refer to the same event. But did you learn the actual

code name? Operation Neptune. They called it Operation Neptune because the attacks on the beaches would come from the sea!

The terms D-Day and H-Hour are used for the day and hour on which a combat attack is to be initiated.

This day was a highly orchestrated attack which was preceded by several other military operations under the code name Operation Bodyguard . . . deception plans that would redirect the attention of the German military. It had three main goals:

• To make the Pas de Calais appear to be the main invasion target
• To mask the actual date and time of the assault
• To keep German reinforcements in Pas de Calais for at least two weeks after landing

Yep . . . it worked . . . we lost a lot of men on those beaches . . . but it worked!

There were 5 beaches: Omaha, Utah, Gold, Juno, and Sword.

There were 13 Allied Forces: United State, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Free France, Greece, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, and Poland.

There were 156,000 Allied military troops.

There were 10,000+ Allied casualties . . . 4414 confirmed dead (this number may/may not be accurate).

Do you want to know what the average age of the soldiers was? 26. But there were 17 year old boys who became men that day as well . . . facing unimaginable fears . . . spilling out of those amphibious vehicles into near-certain death . . . still wet behind the ears. I watched an interview with a Normandy survivor one time . . . he was 17 when he hit that beach . . . three men in front of him shot dead . . . those bodies falling backward and burying him face down in the sand . . . their blood running down his back. He was too terrorized to get back up and carried a tremendous amount of guilt for not doing so. He was 17!

I don't know if you'll choose a military career, but if you do, choose it with conviction . . . choose it because you love this country . . . choose it because you find purpose in it.

In 2013 two artists, Jamie Wardley and Andy Moss, began an art project that impacted so many people around the world. With dozens of volunteers wielding stencils and rakes, they etched 9000 silhouettes into the sand.

"There is one great thing you men will all be able to say after this war is over and you are home once again. You may be thankful that twenty years from now when you are sitting by the fireplace with your grandson on your knee and he asks you what you did in the great World War II, you won't have to cough, shift him to the other knee and say, "Well, your granddaddy shoveled shit in Louisiana." ~ General George S Patton, Jr to his troops on June 5, 1944