D-Day – June 6th, 1944 – Operation Overlord – The Allies Invasion of Normandy, France
June 3, 2026
The Week before D-Day – the buildup day by day and the day. MEGA EPISODE
One of the singular biggest military operations began on June 6th 1944. But how did the week building up to it look like, on both sides of the channel?
Tino Struckmannbuilt up the week with a day by day key events and organizational on both sides with original footage here in one long episode.
And next a D-Day special where he visited every of the main German Normandy Forts which fought on that day and show them today and then, and cover how they fought and fell.
The events of D-Day, June 6, 1944. told on a grand scale from both the Allied and German points of view. Huge international cast in this epic World War II extravaganza.
I used to muse with my World History students when we were covering World War II that June 6, 1944 was the most significant day in the 20th Century. That was because if the Allied invasion of Europe at Normandy failed on that day there would be tragic unforeseen consequences that no one could imagine. I next pointed out that the second most significant day of the 20th Century was June 6, 1952. This remark would draw silence and puzzled looks. “
June 6, 1952, was my birthday.”
And on my birthday in 1963, my World War II veteran Dad took me to see the film, The Longest Day, for which I will be eternally grateful. This monumental movie epic about D-Day features a large international ensemble cast starring John Wayne, Henry Fonda, Robert Mitchum, Sean Connery, Eddie Albert, Robert Ryan, Curd Jürgens, Red Buttons, Jeffrey Hunter, Tom Tryon, Leo Genn, Richard Todd, Richard Burton, Peter Lawford, Steve Forrest, Trevor Reid, Frank Finlay, George Segal, Alexander Knox, Roddy McDowall, Robert Wagner, Paul Anka, Fabian, Peter van Eyck, Tommy Sands, Arletty, Sal Mineo, Rod Steiger, Irina Demick, Gert Fröbe, Edmond O’ Brien, Kenneth More, and many more.
This film is noted for its authentic honesty and brutal portray of war.
Saving Private Ryan
Steven Spielberg directed this powerful, realistic re-creation of WWII’s D-day invasion and the immediate aftermath.
The story opens with a prologue in which a veteran brings his family to the American cemetery at Normandy, and a flashback then joins Capt. John Miller (Tom Hanks) and GIs in a landing craft making the June 6, 1944, approach to Omaha Beach to face devastating German artillery fire. This mass slaughter of American soldiers is depicted in a compelling, unforgettable 24-minute sequence. Miller’s men slowly move forward to finally take a concrete pillbox. On the beach littered with bodies is one with the name “Ryan” stenciled on his backpack.
Army Chief of Staff Gen. George C. Marshall (Harve Presnell), learning that three Ryan brothers from the same family have all been killed in a single week, requests that the surviving brother, Pvt. James Ryan (Matt Damon), be located and brought back to the United States.
Capt. Miller gets the assignment, and he chooses a translator, Cpl. Upham (Jeremy Davis), skilled in language but not in combat, to join his squad of right-hand man Sgt. Horvath (Tom Sizemore), plus privates Mellish (Adam Goldberg), Medic Wade (Giovanni Ribisi), cynical Reiben (Edward Burns) from Brooklyn, Italian-American Caparzo (Vin Diesel), and religious Southerner Jackson (Barry Pepper), an ace sharpshooter who calls on the Lord while taking aim.
Having previously experienced action in Italy and North Africa, the close-knit squad sets out through areas still thick with Nazis. After they lose one man in a skirmish at a bombed village, some in the group begin to question the logic of losing more lives to save a single soldier. The film’s historical consultant is Stephen E. Ambrose, and the incident is based on a true occurrence in Ambrose’s 1994 bestseller D-Day: June 6, 1944.
June 6th, 1952, is my birthday.
