it is a sad commentary when you cannot walk on the streets or in the parks in the large cities of our country. >> former vice president richard xon defeated vice president hubert humphrey and alabama governor george wallace, who was running as the american independent party candidate. watch historic presidential elections, saturdays at 7 p.m. eastern on american history tv on c-span2. >> if you are enjoying american history tv, then sign up for our newsletter using the qr code on the screen to receive weekly highlights of upcoming programs like lectures in history, american artifacts, the presidency, and more. sign up for the ahtv newsletter today ever sign up online at c- span .org/history. >> weekends on c-span2 are an intellectual feast.

every saturday, american history tv documents america's story and on sundays, book tv brings you the latest in nonfiction books and authors. funding for c-span2 comes from the television companies and more including buckeye broadband . a really nice mix of important themes that are goin buckeye broadband, along with these television companies, b supports c-span2 as a public broadcast service. >> we think we have a really nice mix of important themes that are going to be outlined today by some of the best speakers we could possibly find. so what i am going to do right now rather than make any talk myself is give you brief, brief

introductions to all three of our speakers, and then susan eisenhower will lead off for us, followed by doug and then general mats. okay? so let me start with susan. and please understand, each of these individuals have had such profound careers, i could spend quite a lot of time talking about each of them. i will try to be as innocent as i can be. susan eisenhower has had a versatile and impactful career as an educator, author, soviet expert, and administrator. her resume is far too expensive then to do more than highlight a few aspects of her professional life. i will simply mention her work on arms control during and after the cold war. american russian partnership in space. leadership of the original eisenhower institute. her best-selling book is about her grandmother maimai, and her

grandfather, ike, respectively. susan's talk today will focus on early planning. our second speakers dr. doug downs, who has forged a distinguished career as a military officer and an if-18 pilot in iraq before moving on to work in the pentagon specifically as a chief speechwriter for the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. doug downs' current responsibility is at the u.s. army war college, and some of you might recognize him. i think those of you who have watched the equivalent of a history channel as a talking head on various documentaries. we it that, folks, relating to wars. his topic today will focus on

the german defense at normandy, which tends to be overlooked, and we are not overlooking it . and her cleanup hitter is general william max jr. major general william matz. he is no stranger to this campus. he is a 1961 graduate of gettysburg college, and he subsequently went on to a very distinguished five decade military career, including a stint as a company commander with the ninth infantry division in vietnam, where he was wounded in the 1968 offensive. general later served as general secondary to two secretaries of defense. he worked in the defense industry before retiring from the army in 1995. i should say on retiring from the army in 1995. and he has served on a number of important national commissions. as a capstone to his career, in 2018, president donald trump appointed him as secretary of the american battle monuments

commission. that position he held until march of 2021. for our panel this morning, general mats will speak about allied operations in normandy on d-day. so, with that, susan, the floor is yours. >> mike, thank you very much for that kind introduction. i would like to think the eisenhower society and tracy and everyone who has made this possible. i too was on this committee, and i was delighted by the extraordinary talent we have presenting today. i am going to take a slightly different tactic as we had such an extraordinary overview. thank you very much, dr. it was memorable in every way. and i think you have got an excellent grounding in so many of the issues that were underway at that time.

i would like to use this opportunity to say and has been a real honor of mine over the 15 years i have been engaging actively with a student group selected every year competitively to take five to the normandy beaches. and, when i go there now, you know, there are so many people in normandy that are tremendously worried about whether this story is over because our beloved veterans are passing away. and i keep telling them that the veterans who are here would so admire any attempt to cast the story, again, as a story of young people and what they accomplished. i tell my students who are on the beaches of normandy, if you think about it, everyone coming onshore was your age. and when we go to the american cemetery, i now say we are standing in a kids' cemetery. i don't want to call you "kids" kids, but the sacrifices borne

by that age group are extraordinary born on decisions are arrived at by their elders. so it is with that note i would like to talk about one of those elders. i wrote a book. this really satisfied a lot of things for me, both combined and what i knew about him, personally, but, also, it satisfied a lot of my interest in strategic leadership. regrettably, a piece of leadership i don't think we have nearly enough of today. this is the capacity to bring together a million moving parts. the most efficient and effective way. now, this is not an easy efficient and effective way. this is not an easy thing to do or i think we would be, in many places, much better in contemporary life but we were so blessed with a level of talent during that war that i personally am doing everything i can to see if i can help young people think about a set of complicated problems in a different way.

i say to them, imagine the time we are talking about, no computers, no google maps, no long-distance phone calls, no augmented data analysis. no ai. all of the planning for this phenomenal invasion that required bringing meaningful work to 16 million americans, that in addition to that, bringing together sources of different cultural backgrounds, and by the way, a different view of strategy together for the first time in warfare to accomplish a set of goals. i would add to the many things l that this operation led to was the dawn of a new way of war t fighting. not just an alliance based war fighting, but a nationally integrated command and this was

the first. that means we have the british and the french in many cases and all of our allies were sitting in a completely integrated office where there was no difference between your nationality. imagine what that took to come into this job a little late in the day and to try to refashion an entire organizational culture in the short time that was still available for planning the invasion of normandy. so, this legacy also created a complete change in our military united states that led to the whole concept of the joint chief of staff and certainly during the eisenhower administration there were two major reforms in the defense department designed to realign the defense department in a way that would put civilians in charge of interservice rivalry and to management -- manage

that process. finally, it brings us to the point of my discussion this evening about -- or this morning, sorry -- about who was this man, whose legacy during the war extended all the way to 1961 and beyond? he was a man who had strategic gifts but he was also a middle child. okay? he had a very outspoken, outsized older brother and he was one of seven boys. he was the middle child who managed to reconcile family differences and so he brought that talent to the european theater. let's back up again because it really wasn't discussed this morning because i was next up. but one of the things that's really impressive about the general strategy for world war

two was that they had to make a decision about where they were going to concentrate resources, obviously. if you read eisenhower's diary,i he complains of this, about having to go out and argue for the level of resources for the normandy invasion because we had a two front war. two wars he calls them. having said that, it was very clear u.s. policy and strategy was europe first which took a lot of courage when you think that the united states of america was attacked initially by the japanese. adolf hitler made the fatal mistake of declaring war on the united states and that opened the way for an assessment that if we could defeat hitler it would significantly weaken the japanese. in any case, the numbers are legendary of how many people participated in d-day. forces include 12,000 airplanes, 7000 vessels, 24,000

paratroopers, 160,000 soldiers. inc. about the logistical challenges of getting all of them food and water and rations. emergency medical supplies that they carried with them. and imagine, out of all of these numbers, only 15% of them were veteran combat soldiers. only 15%. the rest had not been in combat before. so, as i say to my students when we get to this, the vast percentage of people who came onshore on that day didn't know who they were and they found out in an instant. they didn't know if they were brave, they didn't know if they were cowards, they didn't know whether they could manage their stress and they didn't know if they would live through the day. can you imagine? can you imagine? only 15%, from what i

understand the way we integrated those 15% with the other soldiers to provide some security in each of these units, that still is extraordinary. let me say, something about the kinds of struggles, the man who took responsibility for the entire operation managed. just described, where in some of the most existential moments they would ever experience in their lives. you could say eisenhower was in an existential moment over the future of his career and what i think is moving about the research when i wrote my book is that he cared not one whit about how he was remembered. i know that sounds like it's too good to be true but actually if you read his musings and his diary, really the place to go because

eisenhower thought nobody would ever be reading them. he of course, they are now published and you can read them everywhere. but he muses about what he called the shortsightedness of the average human and their care about the -- promoting their intense personal outlook that most officers have, even in such a critical thing as war. how many times he went on to say that his principal effort was going to do his duty no matter where it led and in doing so, he would be meeting a higher calling which was to serve something larger than himself. now, this is not too good to be true because this was deeply embedded in his religious beliefs that were fostered right here in pennsylvania not far from his father grew up not far from harrisburg as a matter

of fact. but these deep-seated feelings of self-sacrifice can be seen in how he handled so many of the arguments undertaken by the allies. there are so many crises that we started to talk about today but, let me say that the difficulty of bringing together a multinational group for the first time can be as simple as what kind of language are we going to use? are we going to call it the trunk of a car or are we going to call it a boot? and not understanding which set of vocabulary words to use took a tremendous amount of effort. there were also differences between the way the british looked at strategy and available resources which had an enormous impact on what choices they wanted to make. the ones that they could

afford. the ones that made sense for them. but then there was the american viewpoint and america has never -- something it didn't like. we are very oriented toward staying focused on direct action whereas the british are always more interested in going around in a different, more indirect way. in any case, the effort to bring all of those together underscored, in a way, one of the biggest problems eisenhower faced and that was that the united states was becoming -- over its founding country and britain was beginning to lose its grip on its empire and the war, just one of the subtexts of the war was to try to keep that empire from imploding. so without getting into too much of those sorts of slightly

off subject details, let me just say eisenhower's main personal objective as i understand it, his main job wasi what he called unity of purpose, to bring together in that upper echelon, alliance, unity of purpose. and then, in reading diaries and other research, there were times when i read it and i wanted to say, stand up for yourself, granddad. for heaven sakes, stand up for yourself. but then i realized he had a different way of going about it. probably the same way he managed dinnertable conversations when we were growing up and certainly in the home that he grew up and that was to let some people win a few minor things to hold back a bit, be an active listener, and then when you really analyze the problems he was facing, he

won every fight. he won every fight. so here is the short list of the headaches he had to deal fu with and i know the people coming after me will give you the full detail on it but first of all he had to deal with the skepticism of the plan. the british did not like the idea of invading normandy and winston churchill didn't come around until within weeks of the actual deployment in normandy. can you imagine having a boss that has no confidence that you are going to pull it off? f so that was one thing. then, the invasion force. he fought a huge battle at the very early stage. are we going to have three beaches or five with two divisions in reserve. he fought that battle and he did it through general montgomery. very smart. send out the guy that churchill respects and is looking to for this kind of information.

then again, the airborne decision that was described earlier, he says in his diaries he was very worried but he understood that the airborne assault was the linchpin of the operation. the transportation plan, the british war cabinet absolutely rejected this idea. and eisenhower had to say, sorry, we are doing it. so he knew when to soften up and when to put the metal to the petal. as i said in my book, i said on reflection, i think he was a genius at knowing when to support his ego and when to suppress it. finally, we have the fight over strategic bombing which was related to the transportation plan, logistical problems, not enough landing craft going into an invasion already on the

calendar, shortage of ammunition at the very last moment and then a big fight about operation anvil. i don't know how many of you realize in conjunction with d- day there was to be an invasion from france that would support the operation and the british were opposed to it. matter of fact, by the time i finally talked him into it, churchill had proposed operation -- i'm sorry, it's such a british word. then, the germans who were not only strengthening their defenses there along the normandy coast, were also moving divisions into the area and the french, and we have not discussed the deep divisions in france but this created a very important diplomatic strategic, and operational decision. you could say of course in the end the weather forecast was

the most vexing but if you take the weather forecast in the context of using those airborne troops, this was one of the greatest things i think we will remember in history. and so, early in the war, i'm going to close by saying early in the war, he complained it that the british press was describing him as timid and he says, i'm looking for the quote here, he said it worries me to be thought of as timid. when i have had to do things that were so risky as to be almost crazy. the fact is and this is how i'm going to end my talk, he didn't show it. he didn't show how risky he thought it was. he had this capacity to project optimism and for all the veterans i've met and he went out and visited as many people as he could when we were

preparing for the invasions, i wish i had the list in front of me but every possible moment he went out and talked to them and exuded this kind of optimism but even more important, he projected that optimism to his british comrades and to our other allies. and so, it's not surprising actually, given the fact that he fought for every one of those things that he was given. in the end, that, on june 5th, the evening of june 5th, he wrote a note that said my division attack at this time and place was based on the best information available. the troops, the air and the navy did all bravery and devotion to duty can do. -- to the attempt, it is mine alone. that is the man who led d-day.

thank you. good morning. i would like to thank the ng eisenhower society, institute and members for the opportunity to engage with you all today. this morning we are going to take a look at the other side, it's often valuable to stand in the adversary shoes. we use a design methodology to try to understand the environment what guidance they were given, how they divided the problem and what approach they chose to use so how are things looking tonight in 1944 for germany? let's go all the way back to frederick the great and they have a germany problem which is the middle of europe and they are surrounding and in this case by an alliance of strange fellows who share one thing in common, they want the defeat of germany. if we think about what the extent of that empire is in both europe and north africa it

will slowly start to be rolled back starting november of 1943 with 42 of the invasion of north africa, the first time american troops invade germany and churchill would routinely remind us, you haven't been to war until you fought the gr germans. it would be until february 1943 that we would see the turnaround of stalingrad, the high tide of the german advance in the east and would continue to drive the germans back on the east for the rest of the war. then in may, 1943, this would be the battle the atlantic finally turned between may and october 1943 the allies think 145 u-boats. if you think back prior to that point they had 153. this is how that turned. n this gives the allies naval supremacy. it is a prerequisite necessary for the invasion of northwest europe. the combined bomber offensive with the british bombing at night, american bombing during the day, following up point

blank directive that says you will target the german aircraft industry. what it does is force german aircraft to come into the air. what does that translate to? a between january and may of 1944 theirs 2283 german pilots. of those, 2262 of them will be shot down. that's a 99% turnover. this is the allies and real supremacy. another prerequisite for the invasion of northwest africa. you will find in july of 1943, england and the united states invade sicily. in september they will -- this will force italy to surrender. this breaks the agreement, italy is out of the war. that forces 10 divisions to go under the italian peninsula. finally in the spring of 1944, n advances all the way across the east means there are 200 german

divisions fighting on a front between the celtic and the black sea. if you are keep track at home, of the 13 divisions in norway that gives you 58 divisions less and while all this is happening in the east with not a whole lot left to go, the idea is something is going to happen here so what we find on top of all of this is, democracy is supplying not only the united states but all of our allies. s so, it really starts in march 1942 which hitler directed 40 said let's build a wall. at this point it's truly just propaganda and you get a bunch of these pictures. that's a 1760 mile coastline you have to defend and that's a problem. by the way, that isn't your principal response right now. it's actually in the east. one thing that happened early 1942, field marshal garrett van roush in the army at 68 years old is the last depression.

he will do a study because he is a good professional and realize the atlantic wall is a sham, write a report, send it back to berlin and say hitler should really read this and at that time in the war he actually does which is going to lead to number 51 in november 1943 which says, he warns of the catastrophic consequences of the allies gaining a foothold in northwest europe. that's the problem statement. and the response to that or the approach should be strength in the western defenses and be prepared to drive the enemy back into the sea. to that end, the same directive will also sign a field marshal, the youngest in the german army, and his staff to go to and assessment of the atlantic wall and they will agree it's a sham. with that, -- will assign -- command of the two army groups responsible for normandy, this is when the atlantic wall really starts to be built. as was start -- brought up earlier, there's a lot of discussion of where it is. how are we going to defend? he who defends everything

defends nothing. so therefore they prioritize forts. that's where the predominant mount goes. moreover, for all the reasons we talked about besides being under air cover, closeness to berlin, the idea that is the most likely landing and the most consequential one, most of the responses or resources go to calais. when they start to build an atlantic wall, this is strengthening atlantic forces. when you see these concrete bunkers they're going to build 15,000s of them. 1.2 million tons of german steel. 5% is found in the rebar in those bunkers. think about this as the bones of this defensive beast. the bones would be connected by trench lines, those are the ligaments that hold it together.

you see these artillery pieces? 8000 artillery pieces from 20 countries to 20 different calibri's and at this point you go those germans are so creative to use all our captured artillery that they found from all those countries they occupied. true, except how do you resupply 20 different calibers of artillery? by spare parts for them? logistically it's a mess. nonetheless, this is the muscle of the beast. then think about the eyes. they are going to build radar stations. how do we see that they are coming? 92 radar stations between calais and -- of which 5% will still be standing on june 6 but nonetheless, these are the eye of the beast. then we should think about what is the skin of the beast. this ends up being the 6.5 million miles. 500,000 beach obstacles in three lines between the low tide bar and the high tide mark. this is 325,000 -- six foot tall telephone poles put in every field for which they

think the allies might land -- l on top of that they flood the fields to reduce the mobility and remove the ability of allies who might land. that is the beast and the blood that flows through it are the german troops that are there. let's talk about these for a moment. 800,000 of them in his command of the west except that the germans have reached the bottom of the manpower barrel. so they are recruiting -- average age is 36. 352nd regiment mentioned average age 18 1/2. one sixth of those troops are -- look at these faces. they are not aryan. they are from kazakhstan. so you have a problem with language and readiness. are they going to fight well? it's a mixed bag. ul some fight very well and others can't wait to surrender.

but what we should think about this, this is to reinforce the western offensive. what this means when we said this is only an act in progress, only 18% of the atlantic wall is built in normandy at the time the allies -- okay. so, let's talk about the other decision we have to make. how do we drive them back into the city -- see? the best we've got are about 10 divisions. this is what you think about r, when you think about the german army in world war two. mechanized and motorized forces that fight with combined arms, operations that can combine in war whereas of the 50th division, 23 of them are static defending the atlantic wall and operations and are not mobile. the panderer divisions are. how do we use them? there's two different approaches. the first one is proposed by o the commander of the west and his attack dog is this guy, and

both of their experiences fighting in the east against the russians. what they would propose is the atlantic wall is just a tripwire. outpost defense. minor delay. what onwe should do is use a traditional approach of using mass mobile reserves made up of mass -- that once the allies commit to where they are going to land we launch them in a counterattack. there's assumptions in this. the german air force be able to support that counterattack. moreover the thing we feared more than anything is allied naval gunfire. an advantage for which we have no real response. it was proven with the counterattacks in sicily as well as italy, that's a problem, therefore don't put all that armor up front. leave it in the back around paris to account for a potential airborne drop but also to be able to flow to calais or normandy depending where they land. one approach. the other approach, this one, largely the brainchild of w

rommel. his experience is different. where did he get his experience? fighting the british in north africa. he is an army man too but he will say the war has changed. you don't understand. allied air is destroying us. ve we can't do that approach. all those reserves put in the rear will never make it to the front allied air will ensure they do not. therefore we need a new approach. we need to put that armor up front. that atlantic wall is not a tripwire, that is the battle line. we have site at the coast. if the allies land for more than 48 hours, we will lose. the assumptions inherent to this is we have no german navy k and we have no german air force. that's a debate that goes back and forth. truth be told, these guys are going to push back. hey, rommel, that's mildly interesting. there 66 days of cloud cover in northwest europe. allied area isn't going to be

that effective. look at the rolling terrain. this cover and concealment. allies won't be nearly that effective. nonetheless as this debate continues it goes up to adolf hitler to make the choice and what choice does he make? what he is going to do is give some of those divisions to rommel. two of them to calais, most likely the most consequential he will put toward normandy. army group g in the south. and four of the divisions are given to schweppenburg around paris with the idea that they would execute the plan, the traditional approach. but here is the limitation. you can't move them until hitler releases them. for schweppenburg, he goes you are killing me. you are stealing my focus of p effort, my mass panders which should be able to counterattack now split up all across the country so therefore, they get

neither the advantages of one or the other approach. so, the whole problem is exacerbated moreover by a very convoluted chain of command. so, you've got adolf hitler at the top, army, navy, and air force commander. like schweppenburg said, his naval and air commander don't report to him. they report back to berlin which means he has neither the authority nor the necessary cooperation of those two commanders. that translates to all his commanders are responsible for defending those beaches for which they are going to land. if you think about all the -- in france, they report to himmler, they are not even in the army. that goes straight to hitler too. on top of this hitler will routinely reach past all the

chain of command directly to the people he wants to talk to and he's given them the authority to reach back to him. many of the german commanders who sit in normandy called it command by confusion. and even chief of staff von roush would say, this is the problem of every tyrannical leader. you don't want to give too much power to anyone leader but this command and control system effectively slow down the decision-making of the german war machine on june 6th and thereafter. so what are the results of all of this? first of all the germans only have one domain response to the allied invasion. how do you defend normandy if all you have is an army? that's the first problem. the second one is, we don't have a common operational approach about how we use our best troops. not in intent, not in posture and not in how we use those. next, unbelievable to everybody around in 1940 we have a hierarchical rigid chain of command that disempowers the board of commanders to be able to act and react at the speed of the problem so ultimately for the german defense and europe in world war two, they don't have enough resources. there's a fair amount of german

senior officers that -- traditional cultural proclivity of mass armored reserves that failed to recognize that the allies are now a force who can fight in air, land and sea and harmonious activities that are well trained and well -- and that traditional chain of approaches no longer suitable to dthe environment. the lesson we should take today is, are the united states and our allies capable of responding to a radically changing national security environment and more important for those in the armed forces that served today, are we able to learn from the past, anticipate the future and react to the ever-changing accelerating changing character of war. thank you.

>> okay, folks. it's time to put the parachutes on. we are going to jump in. i'm bill matz. delighted to be with all these experts and professionals that spent so much time studying, researching, and on this particular battle, d-day, giving it to us today. i'm going to discuss the airborne operation. the allied airborne operations that took place on d-day. it was part of operation neptune. neptune was the assault base of overlord and consisted of amphibious invasion and parachute operation. neptune lasted six through 30, june and i will talk about the airborne operation consisted of three airborne divisions, the

first which i had the opportunity to spend nine years with when i was on active duty and of course six british airborne. the airborne troops totaled 23,400 13,400 u.s. parachuted in and about another 3900 4000 came in by assault glider. 6000 brits came in. just as eisenhower and his weatherman were so concerned about the sea state and getting across the channel and getting two people on the beaches, the weather plays a major role in every major operation also. the biggest thing we worried about was the wind. wind is a killer. that was not a major issue here. what was the major issue, the second that we worried about was the cloud cover, density and the fog and we did get that

and the existing weather conditions were really worse over france than they were over england and the channel. okay. so, when considering the airborne plan, as someone already e pointed out, we had t take care of the very vulnerable flights. the airborne operation took place here. so you had the eastern front and the western flank. here is your beaches that the assault forces came across. that was a major consideration and eisenhower was a little skeptical on mass tactical drops of the airborne after the debacle we had in operation husky in sicily. we learned a lot of lessons learned there on that one and i will tell you a little bit more detail on that after but the airport operation consists of say 80 seconds, american patch,

screaming eagles and pegasus patch. this is general matthew ridgway, maxwell taylor and this is wendy gale, the brit. these two folks participated in the early airport operations in sicily and in -- taylor was with the 82nd georgia operation and matt ridgway was a commander. under him was the abc, general gavin. a real airport trooper. at let me discuss a couple things here. there was a diversionary plan as part of the airborne operation and it was called operation titanic. it consisted of dropping about 500. guys in land off areas away from the actual landing zones.

they actually dropped them in an arc like this. they were dropped by the brits and they called them -- god bless the british, they gave them the name of rupert after rupert the bear, the comic strip article there so 500 of them jumped in with some troops and it's interesting, they had r some little notes attached to some of these. there you see one there. a lot of airborne museums. about 3 1/2 feet high, wrapped in cloth with -- and so forth to fill them out. rn they attached little notes on their saying as they drop in your early morning hours in er this area here, good morning hans, we have arrived. good morning, we have arrived. it is very interesting. but anyway, that was very successful because it did draw

some of the german units to go investigate that. in particular, it drew off a couple units that were close to where the 101st would eventually jump into. let me show you the roots here f that were used. so, the 82nd came out in this area here, flew straight south almost when they got to the channel they went to 450 feet altitude to get under german radar. that's pretty low, folks for those big heavy airplanes. when they got to this point here, there was a boat there with a light on and the pilots could hone in on that. it had the code name of -- at that point they made a left turn and came in from the west across the french coast there and they dropped the paratroopers right in this area. the glider troops followed this route then turned here and came

in here. the glider troops did not come in until about 4:00, 4:30 in the morning. when they hit the coast here, is when the weather turned. extremely cloudy and navigation was very difficult as a couple of our speakers already mentioned. the german aircraft started to open up on them there. as a result of that, there were 1047 aircraft. 1047, see 46 aircraft coming in there. they had to disperse. some flying high, some left or right, some dips low which is one reason he will see what i show you, the jump pattern as to why some of the troops did not land on their drop zones. this came in here. they were outside also, they did not fly right over the landing features like they did in sicily. that was one of the mistakes

they did in sicily and the 50 fifth went into sicily, the 50 fourth had friendly aircraft shot down by naval gunfire because the assault of the air force were right over the beaches. they also did not use pathfinders on that operation. these are some of the lessons that were learned and eisenhower insisted that they make those changes. he was very skeptical after that operation in sicily so here on the western part, the british came in here. they flew in what they called a v formation so you see three aircraft in each v formation and then there was -- that's how they both approach the 101st and the 82nd. let me mention here, now, real

quickly, the british air force. if you go up the map here, historic beach. there were two critical bridges that had to be taken prior to the assaults on the beaches. this was the bonneville and -- bridge later renamed pegasus for the brits after the british troop carrier here, but this was a very daring operation and in my view one of the best operations ever conceived and planned in world war two. it consisted of six gliders. you see them here, two, three, four, five, six, actually never made it. he took the wrong barrier and ended up four miles away. but these gliders landed right in this area here and that's

about 2/10 of a mile distance from bridge to bridge. six gliders landed at the zero 16 minutes after midnight, led by major john howard, the brit. here you see the british loading one of these gliders. they would carry about 28 men. they were larger than the american gliders that carried about 17 or 18 men. but within 15 minutes after they had landed, they land totally took the small garrison by surprise. it was a small garrison here, they say about 20 german soldiers,, hans schmidt was a major, he was the commander of that garrison. of course, gliders, there's no engine, no noise, they sat right down here, howard was in the first glider only a few meters from the bridge. they got out quickly and

knocked the germans out, and they only had two casualties. one lieutenant was killed, a british lieutenant was killed as he was crossing the pegasus bridge and one of the soldiers inside one of the gliders was killed when the glider landed hard and broke his neck. two people lost and they took that. this was a major, in my view, a major operation that sealed off these two bridges. this is a high-speed avenue of approach and there were a number of units out here that could have easily come in and hit the beaches. the landing went well and eventually the rest of the british airborne then jumped in this area here so very successful operation. it was operation dead stick. you don't learn much about it

but they are so proud of that operation and they should be. he would come around when i was a young officer in the 80s, howard would come around onto her and he would talk to us no about this operation. next chart. let's go back to the u.s. airborne plan now. we had the western sector and this chart shows you, this is the 82nd area here. this was about 10 square mile area and this is the 101st. closer to the beach they had about a 15 square mile area. the daisies are shown here, three for each division. remember, the aircraft came in this way from the west. they did not come across this way.

so they come in and dislodged the troops that way. the photos you see here, this is one of the american see 37's and you can see doing a final check. these are 101st troop, 82nd troopers here. up here you see the two troopers from the 101st. this chapel here is the chapel at the st. mary dumont and it's got a very unusual steeple and of course the troops who jumpedh miles away could see that steeple and it helped bring them in. so, the first to jump was the 101st. and they came in, as i say, in this area here, their objectives were from the beaches to take these causeways that came in land.

there were four of them. also this german artillery man had four guns and could very easily range utah beach was another objective of the 101st.j this town here was a very critical objective which they picked up than they had four bridges over the river there which they were responsible for taking. so that gives you an idea of the objectives and of course always to link up with their sister division the 82nd over here. the 82nd jumped in and their objectives were -- which we all know about. five or six roads coming together. three or four headquarters there most of the time. they were also responsible for two key bridges. this is the river that flows south. there were two key highway

bridges there. one at lapeer and one down here. they had to get those to prevent any kind of a german counterattack coming into the area of operations. so, the 82nd operation was actually called boston. they came in with about 6400 troopers and 370 see 47's. the 101st was about 69 paratroopers so they were a little bit bigger. so remember that before i show you the next charge. preceding the drop of the major airborne units, there were three-man teams and there were three teams came in for each stop zone. okay, folks. where did they actually land? they are going to tell you so

about how when they hit the coast the aircraft hit them and the cloud cover was bad. some pilots were better than others, some had a steady hand and continued through it, some tried to evade it. so this is, real quickly here, this will show you where they landed. the 101st started 48 minutes after midnight and went through 140. each dot represents a stick print each stick is one airplane load and each airplane load has 15 to 18 paratroopers to give you an idea. so you can see in some cases this is the drop zone. this is drop zone alpha. the aircraft are coming over. this aircraft that was supposed to go across here came here so this stick of dark circles you see here should have jumped in there. the other two drop zones, 101st

did a pretty good job. these are pretty tight jumps. you can see that here. this was perhaps the best here. each of these drop zones is about a mile across the long axis. general max battalion lien -- landed in this area here. just to give you an idea. also, you will see some of these darts off on the side this way. this way, down here. these are troops that landed anywhere from 10, 15, 20 miles away. yeah. so, you know, that's how they were scattered. 10 to 15 to 20 miles away. not many of them but some of them as a result of trying to evade the flat, trying to find a hole through the air cover, the pilots released one or two

were actually -- one or two sticks were actually released over the english channel. so, those paratroopers died. the 82nd started their operation about 10 minutes after the last of the 101st. they were coming in this way here. this is the 506. calvin was with this group. they actually jumped right on -- and some of them did land right in the town. you know the story of the er paratrooper who got tangled in the steeple for about two hours. but these guys got out of their harnesses quickly and carried on with their own objectives. these did not fare too well. look how empty the drop zones are.

this one in particular, they dropped a little bit late so this huge group you see here, the dark dots here belong in drop zone tango. these folks, it's a shame, they were -- they dropped in the marshy area along the river. couldn't get out of their chutes, only two or three people. many of those troopers died and this one down here, this drop zone down here, they didn't fare much better. they were scattered all over and some of their troops t actually landed even down here you see a few dots and sticks down here around carrington. i will tell you those troops that dropped, that distance, the germans pick them up in most cases. you can see where some of these troops landed right off this way, way off this way.

take a look at that, folks. take a look at where the planned drop zones were. they were a mile inland and you can see where the two drops where. really, really it's -- it really wasn't too bad. when you get right down to it. my last chart here, i want to discuss real quickly. lessons learned. a lot of lessons were learned from the salerno and sicily drops. one is the pathfinder. this is the pathfinder patch here. they didn't use pathfinder's for the sicily drop. they did use them in the 82nd and the 101st and they were on this eureka radar, portable radar station, they jumped it with and then set it up and it

sent a signal to the pilots coming in. that helped tremendously in navigation but not in all cases when they jumped in did that equipment work. complications it crashed to the ground and didn't work. so they were not able to set up the drop zones the way they wanted to but obviously the pilots of the aircraft didn't make the exact drop point. here's a picture of the sea 37. you will notice white stripes. here is p 38 on sicily. there was no designation to the friendly below, they couldn't tell whether it was an enemy or friendly aircraft so here they made sure they did. they enabled gunners down in the channel to easily distinguish that with the two tales. great lessons learned here. eisenhower pushed this and incidentally, when they were looking at, shall we use --

airborne again after the sicily drop one of the biggest proponents was montgomery, the commander. he really pushed it. the objective and the missions. where the objective and the missions accomplished? i say, yes they were. troops moving through there shortly thereafter. that was taken by the 50 fifth and it was in our hands by 4:30 that morning. this is the german battery that i showed you. this was located here and the 101st took that out very quick before the first beach at utah beach. had those guns been in operation we would've lost more than 200 people the first day. so that was accomplished. this is a famous bridge. if you've ever been over there

and walked normandy and walked the historic trails, you probably crossed this bridge. it's a real tourist spot upriver here. that was taken but only after, before the fight. a great number lost their life and were injured. but they took that. they also took, the bridges along the river here and they were able to take the other bridge that was south right at this point here. they also closed off the western sector with small pockets of infantry to alert or take care of any enemies that might be coming in from the west. so, and of course, the main thing is, they very quickly got these four exit areas, utah

beach across the marsh, 101st got them real quickly which allowed utah beach fourth infantry to get in there and get their infantry up rather quickly across the causeway's ol into the fight. so that's just a quick rundown on the objective. the major objectives. they were really in fact taking care of by dd +1. on balance, there was 50% casualties. every report you look at, every book you read, you will see different casualty numbers so roughly it was the two airborne divisions, u.s. airborne division took about 50% casualties on the first night, five or six and this included the killed in action, missing

in action, wounded and imprisoned. paratroopers accomplished their objective really. they used these eureka radar beacons and the germans really were clearly disorganized by the random drops. not able to counterattack, mind you, in any coordinated fashion for the first two or three days. i think the germans lacked -- this is bill masses opinion when you look at it and read it. the germans lacked a general officer presence and leadership at that time. because of the bad weather, many had gone to a major meeting they were going to have two discuss the landings and they were away from their units and off in the town so they weren't there and of course, the 91st division commander 508

got him and he was killed down here so the germans were lacking, in my view of good ef leadership. another thing i think we need to mention here is the sabotage efforts by the french resistance. it was very good there in normandy. they assisted tremendously. once the paratroopers got on the ground, et cetera. they were a force multiplier, i think, in taking them down. the other thing i want to mention is the courage and tenacity and bravery, the individual initiative of the young trooper and we teach that in army basic training. it's not this is what you will do. we teach the young trooper to think and these young troopers landing on drop zones that they weren't familiar with or landing and not seeing their buddy or not finding their officer. they marshaled together and got together and used two, three or

four and started moving toward the objective. to me this was a major force multiplier on how that young trooper responded there and was very influential in the success of the airborne operations. and of course, american airborne leadership was the best. it was the best. when you have the likes of ridgeway, alvin and matthew taylor, these are all names you heard later on and they all went through the war. two of them became chiefs of staff in the army. these were great leaders. so i think this major difference here. i want to end by saying this here, i want to read a real quick quote from a german commander. a commanding officer of the

1/25. colonel hans ulrich. and a good friend of mine interviewed him many years ago. in the interview, when he was asked about how his unit reacted or asked about the normandy invasion, this is what he said. my regiment was left to -- it was madness. no one knew how many paratroopers had landed or even where they landed or even where they were. it was a matter of guessing where they were or where they would be. you cannot imagine the confusion i had to deal with. my soldiers did not know where to fight. so, thank you, folks.

>> the floor is open for questions. the one thing we want to say is if you have a question, please wait until our student gets to you with the microphone so that we can all hear you. let's see if there's a hand up there. i see a hand in the way back but we have to wait until sam gets to you. >> this is a question spurred on by what general matz spoke about. the stragglers from 101st 82nd captured because they were so widely dispersed and away from their unit. this is on a personal side, my canadian mother's classmate at mcgill university was third infantry division soldier who came ashore in normandy. the canadians made it about as eight miles inland and he was captured and within 24 hours of landing in france he was

executed by members of the 12th. he and 17 other soldiers were in the -- let out one by one and shot in the head. the question for you, sir is, do you know of any guidance as to p.o.w.s, how they were to be treated versus the ss under a separate command chain? >> can you hear me? is hello, hello. okay. there are a couple of things they can do that. ss units are different.

they are fanatical, rather than as they said they are not going to stop until our unconditional surrender, i'm going to fight for my homeland. those are philosophically two different people. in france, for the first two years of the war, it is the backwater of the war. when you're units were destroyed fighting the russians of the soviets, that is where you would rest, recuperate and recover, gaia replacements before we sent you back. that brutal fighting is the background for many of those people who are out there. anything about the brutality of the eastern theater, this is the mind-set of any of the soldiers who fought. this is out there. the commando order that basically hitler gives about commandos. they should be executed. these are special operators now that are operating between, behind the lines, interfering with governments, and all of those things. they have orders to kill.

this is a matter of those ss people. keeping this in context. it is also their own rules. we are not taking any german prisoners below the rank of age. this is about the escalating brutality of war. you take extremely ordinary people who have a fundamental set of values, and you put them in extraordinary stances -- circumstances. they are reacting to the environment they are in. those stories tend to be the exception rather than the rule. instead, everyone has a value underpinning that everyone there is largely christian. when you are wounded, the stories of wounded stories from one side to the other helping the other, the paratroopers, british paratroopers taking care of german ones, those stories are more ubiquitous than those heinous acts that you just brought up. >> question right there.

yes ma'am. >> whoever would like to address this, feel free to do so. can someone elaborate a little bit, moving inland, why did -- overlook the geographic significance and obstacles that were going to be presented by the country? >> what i would offer is, they know it is there. allied aircraft flyover. they have pictures. the famous four square-mile picture. eight individual thousand square field. julius caesar wrote about the country. it is known. this is about the amphibious landings in particular. first of all, you start off with zero combat power. minute one, it is a race to

build up combat power. you have to establish a foothold, build a beach head, then building up combat power to break out. what is one thing that most lenders are worried about? landing. how do we get on the beach and secure a beach head? it was not spent in breakout. those ended up being very difficult lessons learned as soldiers adapt to the environment. now you find these combined infantry, engineer, and armory teams as they start to fight through. they are learning in real time. >> we have a question over here. please, everybody, i'm trying to get a couple more in. make your questions short. >> i'm not picking on dr. james. during the sixth of june, 21st panzer division, made quite a deep foray into the beach head. can you talk to that and what

impact it had on the overall landing? >> it is an interesting one. this is one division had up front. when they realized the airborne operation started to happen, they actually leaned to the east. they are on the wrong side of the river. now they have got to stop. you have to go all the way back to the southern side before you can launch this counterattack. when they launch the counterattack, you are right. ultimately, they will get within the site of the beach. they were so strong out with who was on their flanks, as dr. mcmanus brought up, but canadians literal responsibility from the orders, stop the german panzer attack. they are completely set up with armor, artillery, to go ahead and drive that back. what they find is, there is truly not enough weight for the german to take advantage of that advance. all the way to the beach. those guys are almost cut off. they will have to pull back. it is a small window of opportunity that we can play. what if there was more mass?

what if he had been given more divisions? it is an interesting snapshot about those armored divisions on d-day. will >> right down here, triggered short. >> excuse my voice. i lost it. i do tours at the eisenhower memorial. what made montgomery so confident that the paratrooper drops would be successful, as opposed to eisenhower, who was skeptical? >> hello. i think, montgomery, of all of the planets, and he was the ground commander, he recognized right up front, the vulnerability of the flanks. i think perhaps more so than

some of the others. everybody was fixated on just coming across the beaches, and not the other way. montgomery, was smart that way. who else could do it any better than the parachute troopers? he pushed for them. as it was brought out by one of the earlier speakers. the air marshal, did not join on it. there are a good three or four paragraphs on just particularly that decision. while i have the microphone, one other thing. one battalion of canadian parachutes. they did a great job. >> quick, final question, before we go to lunch.

yes sir. >> this is a logical follow-up to the one that was just answered. after they took their objectives, were they supposed to move towards the water? just stay where they were? >> rally on the drop zone. in this case, as you say, so many were dispersed. in fact, 82nd guys, dropping over to the 101st. the adaptability, the ingenuity, and the initiative of these young kids to get together. they knew where the objectives were. finally, they pick up an officer. this will be to go to the inland most point of those causeways. take a look at that.

>> before we bring the session to a close, i just wanted to get back to the question. to see into a general just said about this ingenuity, part of the way it gets sorted out, is with the innovation of a farmer from the midwest. he wanted to put a device on the front of these tags, to clear the way. somehow, from that level, all the way up the food chain, it rose rapidly. it is a remarkable story of how open-minded these commanders were, to new ideas. >> we should be thinking -- thanking our panel for their

time. >> [ applause ] read