D-day... Current generation

Had a talk at work this evening with my coworkers who about 1/2 were prior service. We got onto the topic of D-Day and the current press/generation of soldiers.

Our conclusion was: The WW2 generation went to war with no indication of when or if they were coming home, or HOW for that matter. They went to save the world as the Allies were fighting for and would fight against stupid odds to achieve that goal. The press that were involved, kept their mouths shut, and kept the details of the operation secret till once it was in force.

I will not share our conclusion as to how D-Day would happen today... other than it would have been a massive failure

How do you think D-day would 'happen' if we had to have a similar offensive today?

 

Honestly, it's a bit like comparing Ago to Rossi - different times and different conditions.

We entered the war very reluctantly after Europe had already been at war for 3+ years, and only after we had been attacked. Germany had overrun all of its neighbors and showed no signs of slowing down. They were the same guys we helped defeat in The Great War and they were steamrolling our allies.

Furthermore, US soldiers did not have much of a choice in the matter. I like to think that under similar circumstances, the current generation would similarly rise to the occasion.

 

We would bomb the utter shit out the target first until they were sufficiently softened up....then we would send the troops in.

I mean just like everything else tactics in war evolve over time. Of course we're not going to drop troops onto a beach head with machine gun fire pouring over it.

 

Prior to Pearl Harbor, the majority of the US was against entering the war. Excluding combat, we had been up to our asses in it for several years with lend lease.

9/11 was an example of our response when attacked. If given free reign, I think the military would perform well. Tactics would be drastically different because of technology. Unfortunately, our leadership would most likely tie the hands of those prosecuting the war with less than satisfactory results.

 

I've been thinking about this especially on the incredibly huge manufacturing effort and logistics of it all. I'm having a hard time imagining how the US manufacturing sector could possibly even ramp up on the same scale as quickly as needed if another effort of the same scale was required.

 

We'd just ask israel, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, Yemen, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria, Libya, UAE, El Salvador, Colombia, New Guinea, Phillipines, Maylasia, Kurdistan, and everyone else we gave arms & equipment to to kindly return them.

Then they'd be held up in customs til the war was over.

 

Can't import that stuff dummy.

 

Actually, a general consensus among the troops was about 3-6 months later, tops. The 'stupid krauts' were going to get it...

"Home for X-mas...."

 

That was the MO in '45 also. Navy and Air Force did indeed 'bomb the utter shit of the target'.

Didn't work to well but it was the intent...

 

Very true. From the high altitudes they flew, our bombers had to drop a lot of bombs to get the BDA required to take out the targets.

An older gentleman I worked with was a waist gunner on a B17. Ben was absolutely amazed with accuracy of the laser guided bombs that we used during the first gulf war. He had tears in his eyes when he told me "I wish we had those things in WWII, so many of my friends didn't come back from those suicide missions we had to go on." Ben told me every time he went up he didn't think he would make it back. Freezing his ass off at high altitude in a non pressurized cabin, straight and level to the target with flak bursting all around while being strafed by ME109s and Focke-Wulfs.

God bless all those guys. I have no doubt our young men and women today would step up to the plate if necessary. It would be a much different war...

 

I suspect that is the sentiment for most wars.

 

Fixed.

 

The US has always done propaganda well.

 

Actually, it was the Army that did the bombing back then.
The Airforce was created after the war.

 

You are correct on that sir, I just wanted to separate the payload delivery system.

 

They've been running a show on the history channel regarding unseen footage from D-Day. I thought I knew the events pretty well...uh...no. Turns out the first 2 weeks were as bad, if not worse than June 6th. The hedge row fighting was some of the worst, I mean I knew it was bad, just not how bad.
How those 18/19 YO kids kept going is beyond me. I'm in awe.

My dad flew B24's over the Pacific. The Jap fighters were bad but their Ack Ack was worse (radar controlled according to him). The very worst was their own planes that would quit 700 miles out over the ocean. He lost many buddies as they radioed in that they going in the drink, never to be heard from again. They still kept flying those crates anyway. Same kind of gumption.

 

Since we're picking nits, during WWII it was the Army Air Force, a semi-autonomous division of the Army.

So you're both in a way right.

Kumbaya.

 

^Truth.

 

And may the generals who dictated training and policy rot in hell for condemning all those men. "Straight and level, in formation", what a monument of wasted lives to an ego.

 

If japan bombed us today we would blow the shit out of venezuela