![]() ![]() The British Perspective: Lowering the Strategic Priority of D-Day In all likelihood, two outlooks would have prevailed between the Anglo-American nations. While in reality Allied leadership would be at a collective fault, it is unfortunately not the nature of politics to assume and proceed from such a rationale conclusion. With a loss the magnitude of a D-Day failure, the finger pointing and blame would have extended far and wide. A failure of D-Day, and the need to renew their commitment to liberating Western Europe would have entailed an ever greater cost of life. The United States and Great Britain each lost over 350,000 members of their armed forces during the war. The decision to undertake an even greater effort would have then faced the people of the Allied powers. Had D-Day failed, an even higher sacrifice would be required to achieve a desirable and favorable victory in Europe. Many historians debate if a true liberal representative democracy could emerge victorious and intact when faced with a total war. Eisenhower, United States Army D-Day & Democracy During Total War If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone.” The troops, the air and the Navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do. My decision to attack at this time and place was based on the best information available. ![]() “Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. So, what if D-Day failed? Unthinkable Fallout This piece postulates what turns the war may have taken if Germany had succeeded in repelling the Normandy attack, squashing the Allied invasion, and leaving the Second Front stillborn. As we take a moment today to honor their sacrifice, let’s consider what that other course of history may have entailed. To appreciate the sacrifice of those who boldly attacked the Atlantic Wall 73 years ago today, one must consider the world they risked their life to avoid. On the other hand had it failed, world history would have become unrecognizable compared to our own. Yet with profound conviction Allied leaders accepted the risk because success might ensure the freedom of humanity from one of the greatest evils it had ever faced. Overlord’s architects who planned and executed the offensive understood that their efforts may have instead been mourned as one of the greatest disasters in military history. However, that belief could not be further from the truth. Through its mythologized retelling, countless consider the landing’s success a historical inevitability. Today, D-Day is rightly remembered as a day of heroes with forces from every Allied nation assaulting the heavily defended beaches of Normandy. If D-Day failed however, none of this, or even history as we know it would have come to fruition. Their presence also guaranteed that Soviet influence would not extend beyond their furthest reach in the occupied eastern portion of Central Europe. It’s success ensured the defeat of Nazism by creating a western Second Front in Europe opposite the Soviet Union’s Red Army in the east. On Jthe Western Allies launched Operation Overlord – better known as D-Day – an amphibious invasion of northern France that was a dramatic and unprecedented gamble for the future of Western Europe. ![]()
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