The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
The Guiding Principles and New Rules document is now in effect.
IT'S NO LONGER D-DAY MOTHERFUCKERS!
Elaro
ApologeticRegistered User regular
ApologeticRegistered User regular
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrJAwCBbnucOn this day 75 years ago, the Western Allies began the invasion of Normandy to liberate it from Nazi Germany. Codenamed operation Neptune, some tens of thousands of British, American and Canadian troops landed on the beaches of Normandy. Some of them had a harder time than others.
Commemorate this day by, I dunno, punching nazis I guess? Actually, I think kicking them might do more damage. OR! Or you could donate to various queer charities and antifa organizations that will punch/kick a nazi for you!
Children's rights are human rights.
Elaro on
0
Posts
Indeed.
The town with the remnants of the allied floating harbour was interesting however.
Oh also, 16 days until the anniversary of Operation Bagration, if you're all about Nazis being fought and beaten a lot.
Like for one, they absolutely thought that these wouldn't be the primary but rather the initial diversionary landings to force a commitment of resources, probably to open Calais. So they didn't counterattack in force for that and other reasons. They also overestimated the amount of airborne troops (four divisions rather than three) and they assumed the main objective would be the closing off of the Western Penninsula in order to secure Cherbourg because they weren't aware of Allied mobile harbour capability. They didn't know that the Utah landings had happened until that evening!
The disinformation campaign prior to Overlord was incredibly successful. Really from a logistics, planning, organisational, military intelligence and counterintelligence point of view it's almost more impressive than the actual beach assault.
Amateurs study tactics, professionals study logistics. D-Day is probably the best example of that.
That’s the most profound thing I’ve read while sitting on the toilet this week
I especially like the story of Juan Pujol Garcia, aka "Garbo", who fooled the Germans into thinking he was working for them, just by his lonesome, all the while asking the Allies if they wanted a piece of this action. I think he was in London when they accepted, but I'm not sure.
Do a big diorama of one of the beaches, play out the battle there.
Or play one of those really complex war games with the little element flags on huge maps.
When I was in high school, a bunch of friends actually did a diorama of one of the beaches for a history assignment, with water effects and little soldiers and everything! It was very impressive!
then i went to the louvre in lens in northeast france near lille and they had a ww2 exhibit which was interesting
I love that guy. He not only got the Germans to buy into his increasingly, outlandishly bullshit reports, but he had the Allies running around trying to find this one super spy after they'd already captured all the real spies.
the account for Bletchly Park has been tweeting real-time decryptions from the day and it's fascinating to see the inconsistency in the information
like there's back to back "all quiet, nothing going on" and "we're covered in paratroopers!"
really gave young teen me more of an idea for the monumental effort the entire operation was, rather than just the horror and glory of the beach landings that get all the focus in history classes
we also talk about other random shit and clown upon each other
They're very somber but they'd have a little parade for all of the vets to take part in, still a quiet and thoughtful thing but also a way to pay respects to those still among us
It was a bigger group back then, it's very sad to see those numbers dwindle
3DS Friend Code: 0216-0898-6512
Switch Friend Code: SW-7437-1538-7786
I was in boot as well, but I didn't get to see it until I graduated a month after it released. However, on the night before I shipped out, my roommates made sure to get me plastered drunk. Oh, and I was forced to watch Full Metal Jacket as well.
Their resolution? They half arsed it. Some units under Rommel near the front, some held near the centre, and also a strategic reserve that Hitler took personal command of, and could only operate under his orders. On the 6th of June, Hitler's aides didn't want to disturb him so he only learned of the landings towards midday, and Rommel had departed back to Germany for various reasons. The Panzers in Northern France were as a result mostly paralysed and unable to be used in any cohesive manner except in one attack against a British Brigade which managed to stop the assault
So not only were the amphibious assaults a masterclass on how to do it right, the defenses were a good example of how you might cock it up!
I hope those ships are cruise ships and they're leisurely crossing and seeing Normandy from afar, with a pina colada in one hand and a daiquiri in the other.
Those bastards deserve nothing less.
I've been to several buffets with Normandy Veterans and I can attest that by the time these ships get to France, literally every single morsel of food and drink will have been consumed, even if it wasn't laid out and was in a storeroom in the back somehow. Those old dudes are machines
gotta be a thing of the depression
he also drank hard before quitting some time in the sixties, I think
My grandpa was much the same.
He was also a 6'2 Swedish dude who fought his way through WWII from North Africa, across Italy (and the attendant beach landings), to finally the Battle of the Bulge, the whole time surviving on canned meat and cigarettes. When he got back home to a country with food aplenty, he swore to never not clean his plate again.
He kept his promise to himself.
Yeah this seems like a good point, and probably why I don't really play wargames at all anymore.
I just feel the need to go and stand there and be quiet for a while. Walk around and feel the sand and see the bunkers. It almost seems like something that violent and something that so radically changed the course of history could almost leave an impression in the air.
I dunno. It's on the list.
my grandpa had a fun story from his time in Vietnam, where the airbase he was in would get hit by rockets roughly once or twice a week. Usually they'd hit nowhere near the actual camp, or they'd be faulty and not blow anything up. They lost a few men to them sometimes, but it was generally something that just kept them on their toes or woke them up at 2am.
One time however a rocket landed squarely in the middle of their refrigeration trailers, and wrecked the fridge units on two of them.
So they had to cram all the food stored in both of them into the other fridges and eat all the really bulky stuff asap so they could fit everything in.
They had like steak and some other thing, I forget exactly but it might have been icecream, stuff that had been stored away for special occasions, for breakfast lunch and dinner for a week straight. The same damn shitty rush-cooked steaks that weren't getting stored very well. By the end of it he couldn't stand the sight of a steak, and it took him like two decades to want to ever eat them again.