[Grace] D-Day Beaches in Normandy

We have been staying in Paris, but since we are staying there for three weeks, we decided to rent a car and drive out to the countryside. We drove to Loire Valley, saw some chateaus, the next day went to Mont Saint-Michel and, finally, in Normandy we went to historical World War II sites.

In preparation for this trip, my dad starting teaching my siblings and I about WW II. I knew the basics of what happened, but most of the events I was unfamiliar with. I learned about Germany's invasion of Europe, their relation/invasion of the Soviet Union and the United States' involvement. I found all of this fascinating, and so I was very excited to go to the D-Day beaches.

For those of you who need a refresher, D-Day was June 6th, 1944. The Allied Forces launched an amphibious attack on 5 Normandy beaches: Utah, Omaha, Juno, Sword and Gold. The American forces were in charge of taking the Utah and Omaha beaches. Four of the beaches were taken relatively easily, Utah beach included. However, at Omaha beach 2000 American men died. The American effort in D-Day was essential for a successful result, which was important because D-Day was the beginning of the end for the Germans.

At 10am my family drove to Utah beach, which was high on our list because of the museum on the shore. Personally, I loved that museum and could have spent hours looking at everything. My favorite thing I read in the Utah Beach Museum was Antoine de Saint-Exupery's "Letter to an American." It's too long to include right here, but I will include excerpt at the end of this blog post. I highly recommend reading it.

After spending some time in the museum, my family walked around outside. It was cold and windy outside, but after learning about the strength of the soldiers during the Utah Beach invasion, I did not feel like I should be complaining.

Kate and Mom at Utah Beach

After Utah Beach, we drove a little while to Pointe du Hoc. Pointe du Hoc was not a beach involved in the D-Day invasion, but it also an important for the overall plan. There was a German base at Pointe du Hoc, with big guns that threatened the Allied invasion. A highly trained, specialized battalion of soldiers called Rangers were sent in to take over the base, which they succeeded in doing (while they took control of the guns within the first day, it still took four days for the Rangers to have control over the whole area).

The most memorable things about visiting Pointe du Hoc was the fact that all the craters from the battle have been left intact. Now they are all grassed over, but they are huge and they are everywhere.

The German base sits high up on these cliffs, with guns pointing out towards the sea, threatening Ally ships and possibly Utah Beach. The Rangers, in order to have the best chance of taking over the base, had to climb these cliffs from the beach below.

Kate, Cannon and Dad looking out from the German bunker.

Finally, our family went to the Normandy American Cemetery. To get there, we drove past Omaha beach but didn't have a chance to stop and walk around because we were short on time. The Normandy American cemetery is a monument to all the American troops who gave their lives in Europe. There are over 9,000 soldiers buried there.

JJ Pershing was a senior US Army Officer who served in World War I. When speaking about the American troops who participated in D-Day, he said "Time will not dim the glory of their deeds." It's been 74 years since D-Day, and the sacrifice made by those soldiers is still so honorable and courageous. No matter what the present situation of our country, it would be wrong to forget all the good Americans have done in the world.

Letter to an American - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Friends in America, I would like to do you complete justice. Perhaps, someday, more or less serious disputes will arise between us. Every nation is selfish and every nation considers its selfishness sacred. Perhaps your feeling of power may, someday, lead you to seize advantages for yourselves that we consider unjust to us. Perhaps, sometime in the future, more or less violent disputes may occur between us. If it is true that wars are won by believers, it is also true that peace treaties are sometimes signed by businessmen. If therefore, at some future date, I were to inwardly reproach those American businessmen, I could never forget the high-minded war aims of your country . . . American mothers did not give their sons for the pursuit of material aims. Nor did these boys accept the idea of risking their lives for such material aims. I know - and will later tell my countrymen - that it was a spiritual crusade that led you into the war.

I have two specific proofs of this among others. Here is the first.

During this crossing in convoy, mingling as I did with your soldiers, I was inevitably a witness to the war propaganda they were fed. Any propaganda is by definition amoral, and in other to achieve its aim it makes use of any sentiment, whether noble, vulgar, or base. If the American soldiers had been sent to war merely in order to protect American interests, their propaganda would have insisted heavily on your oil wells, your rubber plantations, your threatened commercial markets. But such subjects were hardly mentioned. If war propaganda stressed other things, it was because your soldiers wanted to hear about other things. And what were they told to justify the sacrifice of their lives in their own eyes? They were told of the hostages hanged in Poland, the hostages shot in France. They were told of a new form of slavery that threatened to stifle part of humanity. Propaganda spoke to them not about themselves, but about others. They were made to feel solidarity with all humanity. The fifty thousand soldiers of this convoy were going to war, not for the citizens of the United States, but for man, for human respect, for man's freedom and greatness.