Just returned from Normandy.... Omaha Beach...........

My wife and I joined my brother and his wife for a week in Paris. Last Monday, the 17th, we rented a car and drove over to Normandy. Went to Arromanches, the town on the coast above the port that the allies built a few days after D-Day in order to bring men and supplies ashore. There are still many huge cement parts of the bridge they made 1.5 miles off shore. To the east were the beaches the Brits and Canadians landed on. About 15 kilometers west is Omaha Beach.

Drove up the coast until we came to the American Cemetery near Colleville-sur-Mer. There's a lot of equipment/seating lying around that's being assembled for the 60th Anniversary ceremony that takes place in a few weeks. The grounds are beautiful and very well maintained. There's a small building out front that has some French women inside who's job it is to help folks find a certain grave site. Walking back out, there's a walkway that goes toward the sea. To the right are some semi-circular open walls with maps and information on the landing plans. Between the walls is a statue. As I was walking toward the sea the memorial was on my right and as soon as I saw all those crosses and stars on my left I just choked.

I couldn't look over there. I didn't want to look over there. I didn't want to go over there.

We went in between the memorial walls and looked at the maps. I'd glance over my shoulder and sneak a look at the cemetery.......

We walked down the steps toward the ocean. The tide was out and the beach was huge. Easily 300 yards wide. But the most stunning observation was how far above the beach the main terrain was. We had to be 100 feet above the beach. And there was a good 150-200 yards of jungle between the bluff and the beach. The Army blew 4 exits through the jungle and the bluff so the soldiers could get off the beach. The exit in this area was called The Coleville Draw. This area of Omaha Beach was called "Easy Read Sector." We took a path down through the jungle to the beach. It must have taken 15 minutes to wind our way down. On the beach, I handed my wife 3 small plastic jars. Also, gave my brother one. I shot their pictures while the filled them up with sand.

We walked back up path back to the cemetery. The sight of those rows and rows of perfectly aligned stars and crosses.....over 9,300... is chilling. I thought about bringing a flower from North Carolina and laying it on the grave of a North Carolina boy. But I didn't think it be allowed. Some graves had a few flowers near their markers, however. My brother saw a grave of a boy who was killed on the day my brother was born..... June 24, 1944. That boy was 18 when he died.

Drove farther west past St. Laurent-sur-Mer and it's beaches to Pointe-du-Hoc and stood at the cliffs those rangers scaled that day.

This is a very rural area with no large town very close by. There were about 100 people or so at the cemetery and about the same at Pointe-du-Hoc last Monday afternoon. Just a guess, but I'd say 80% of the people there that day were French.

...for the 50th anniversary. I was stationed in Germany at the time and my unit was called on to help with the ceremonies. You want to talk about an insane logistical nightmare. But it was all worth it. One of the things I am very proud to be able to say I took part in.

Fly to Caen and bus over? Past Bayeux it becomes very, very rural and the roads are quite narrow. I can only imagine how difficult it would be to drive if there were crowds.

I was very happy to be able to go when there weren't crowds. The few people there were so quite....... as French people seem to be anyway...... and respectful.

We had to haul salute guns all the way to the coast. It was definately a pretty area. We got in well before the crowds nad had a chance to see things with only a moderate level of insanity invovled. Then again that is also one of the weeks I spent as someones personal chew toy. 'nuff said about that unplesant experience.

I'm only 41, but I want to go Normandy someday. PBS has been showing a D-Day show (in high definition if you can get it) that shows a 70+ American guy (1st ID vet) meeting a German private and both of them fought at basically the same location (though never met at that time of course) - it was quite moving when they met on camera.

...you would have been spared the sight. Remember, she wanted to go dig them all up and bring them back from the "traitorous" French last year when the French were too smart to support Idiot's war on Iraq.

GOP idiots make me want to puke nearly as much as the waste of war does.

with shrubbie the nazi visiting. :grr:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=578446&mesg_id=578446

the word........ desecrated.

I hope to walk there myself someday.

..want to take a side trip to Normandy. But now I feel a bit hesitant to go there with the way Bush has made us hated all over. We went in Feb. 01--before Bush declared war on the world. How did you find Paris?? We're people as nice and friendly (yes they were) as when we went there or hostile? Did you ever feel in danger?? It's a shame all that Bush destroyed for us. Maybe if more Americans would go "over there" and meet the people Bush pisses on, they would begin to mature and think.

Absolutely delightful. I find it hard to believe American's ever could think of them as rude. But, I must say........ we play by the rules, so to speak. My brother tries very, very hard to speak French and does pretty well. We always say....... Bonjour Monsier/Madam........ not just Bonjour....... when entering a shop or restaurant. And like they do, we spoke very, very quietly regardless as to the amount of vin rouge we consumed.

The man we hired our apartment from was a Brit who'd lived there for 13 years. We asked him if there was any animosity toward American's. He said no. None. First, they very easily separate the government from the people. The detest the Gov't/Bush and like the people ...and secondly, their attitude was that the snit over The Bush invasion (my term, not his) was a year ago and they don't dwell on such things very long..... however, he also said they feel like they were right since the result of Bush's invasion is going so bad.

We had a great time just bantering back and forth.... them in English and us in French-sort-of. Also, some of them liked to work on their English. We split a gut when a waiter came by our table and said, "So is everything OK over here?".... he was working on his "American."

I am Belgian and I was there in March.

I must say I had the same feelings of respect and sadness when I visited Coleville. People in Europe know very well what sacrifices these men and women made. Their memory is as important to us as it is to you.

There were many French schools visiting the sites and all these kids listened the teachers and guides and seemed to understand what happened there.

I don't think there is a real anti-American feeling here in Europe. We know very well who is responsible for all the mess (we have had idiots in our governments too) We just hope this bad dream will be over by the end of the year.

BTW: did you hear about the young Belgian director who won a prize at the Cannes festival for his short film? In his (short) acceptance speech he called upon the American voters and just said: "Don't vote Bush".

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

My Dad was a part of that generation. If things had been different, he might have been there. He was actually fairly safe in the Pacific. Lots is owed to those who died. Our freedom.

or Normandie, as The French spell it, was the men who did the same thing...... charge a well armed enemy up a beach with the ocean at their back..........in The Pacific Theater, don't get the same recognition as the guys did who were in Normandie.

Also, the irony of that movie....."The Longest Day." The actor, Eddie Albert, played an officer who was wishy-washy and wanted to consider abandoning the assault at Omaha Beach. John Wayne, played the tough, grizzled paratrooper who carried on with a broken leg. Yet, in REAL LIFE Eddie Albert was a marine at Tarawa. He drove a beach landing craft through waters filled with body parts at great risk. Wayne, of course, got out of the war by claiming sole support of his mother, though he was a millionaire.

Your post made me remember two things from my childhood. One was the reading of the book "Longest Day", etched in my memory are some of the place names you mentioned.

The other is the memory, now refreshed, of the row upon row of white crosses cascaded upon a Hawaian hillside marking the graves of Pacific theartre soldiers.

Thanks for the post. Always wondered why ol' befree was such a passionate pacifist; it's now somewhat clearer.