JUNE 6

 There's something very compelling about May and June, 1944. England was an armed fortress. The streets of London were populated by young men in uniform from all over the world. American Airborne soldiers were so primed that men of the 82 and 101st Airborne could not drink in the same bar without a fight breaking out. 

General Dwight Eisenhower, a mid-level general at the Pentagon before the war, was plucked from obscurity by George Marshall, Chief of Staff of t US Army. Ike was selected to be the Supreme Commander of Allied Forces in part because he got along with the British, and President Roosevelt didn't want Marhsall leaving Washington. 

Marshall in Washington; Eisenhower in Europe; General Douglas McArthur in the Pacific; Admirals Halsey and King and Kincaid in the Pacific, and slowly, very slowly the US was awakening as a force for freedom. 

As May ended, the weather in Europe deteriorated.  There were only a few days every month when the moon and tide would be in alignment sufficient to allow the invasion of France to proceed.  On June 4, the day before the invasion was scheduled, as nearly three million men were pulled taught like a bow, the weather got worse, and Ike called for a 24-hour delay.  That decision was momentous. Eisenhower literally had the weight of the world on his shoulders. On June 5 Ike was told there would be a break in the weather on June 6 to allow the invasion to proceed under the minimally accepted conditions.  Saying that a further delay was too biter to contemplate, Ike gave the go-ahead. 

18 and 19 year old boys, members of the 82 and 101 Airborne divisions, their bodies hard from a year of training, many of them with shaved heads and mohawks, trudged on to planes with a hundred pounds of equipment. They were told they needed to give three days of fighting and then they would be relieved. It ended up being close to a month. 

Ike and the Airborne on D-Day -1 

Some of those men looked outside the planes they were on and saw a sight never before seen in history and never to be repeated. Hundreds of ships with hundreds of thousands of men steaming towards five beaches in Normandy, France. 

On Omaha Beach, later called "Bloody Omaha" because the first, second, and third waves of troops were pinned down, mostly by one well positioned German 75mm gun with machine gun support, thousands of men- men who had spent three hours in small landing crafts and then were dumped into the surf seasick and scared, were slaughtered. Those that made it ashore were pinned down. 

Omaha Beach June 6, 1944 

In stepped a man -perhaps the oldest man on Omah Beach that morning. Not as famous as Ike or Patton or Bradley, Brigadier General Norman "Dutch" Cota, 51, leading the 29th Infantry division, was not surprised by what he saw. He knew invasions rarely went as planned and he instructed his staff on what to expect. Cota made it to the seawall and saw men being slaughtered. But he knew great generals lead from the front, so he stood up, bullets flying around him- he later admitted he was scared to death- and he began yelling at the men- urging them to go over the wall and fight inland. Cota came upon a squadron of Rangers and bellowed "I know you Rangers won't let me down. If Rangers lead the way then start fucking leading..." A Ranger captain, angered by Cota, jumped up, told Cota he would lead his men, and off they went. 

Check out our D-Day post on General Cota four years ago, here. 

Slowly, very slowly, men up and down Omaha Beach began to move inland. Yards at a time, the full history of their bravery will never be truly known. But one by one, American boys, from farms and cities the year before, began to fight as citizen soldiers against the best professional army in the world. 

And they won. 

D-Day fascinates us. The decisions facing Eisenhower; the individual bravery of the Airborne, scattered across Normandy, they did what Americans do best- they improvised, and then they fought and accomplished their mission.  And then there were the boys on the ships, many of whom died in the surf and at the water's edge. 

These American boys invaded France, seeking only to free Europe and then go home. The ones who made it home, like Captain Dick Winters of the 506 PIR of the 101st Airborne, (made famous from the book and show Band of Brothers) raised families and lived successful lives. 

This the 79th Anniversary of D-Day. If there is nothing else we can do, then hopefully we can do this and pause on June 6 and remember their sacrifice. And hopefully on the 80th and 90th and 100th anniversary of D-day the world will pause just a moment and remember a time when people joined together to fight for a just cause. 

GENERAL NORMAN COTA

Those who have a limited understanding of history will pause on June 6 and give lip service to the Normandy invasion, and then move on. Most likely they thought little of what occurred in France on June 6 as the years passed into the 1960's, 1970's, 80's 90's, and beyond. But the current daily intrusion by electronic media caught their eye this week, and they paused with  faint praise this Friday, without understanding the significance of the day or the men who fought on the Cotentin Peninsula or the sacrifices made. This faint praise includes this blog yesterday, for which we offer an apology. D-Day should never be mentioned in a line or two  as an afterthought on a post about some pedantic local politics. Neither should Antietam, Gettysburg, Meuse-Argonne, The Somme,  Iwo Jima, Guadalcanal, Midway, Bastogne, The Chosin Reservoir, or Khe Sanh, to name other important battles in American history. 

On D-Day + 75 years, we've decided to  examine General Norman Cota. Cota was 50 years old on D-Day. He landed on Omaha Beach at H hour plus one. As a One Star General he was one of the highest ranking officers to land on the beach on D- Day. Cota landed with the 29th Division, which was led by a cadre of West Point Cadets and had a nickname of "The Blue and Grey" division. Prior to the landings, Cota was heavily involved in the planning, and highly critical of the invasion's plan. Most presciently, Cota did not believe the bombing and naval shelling would destroy the German fortifications and that when the 1st and 29th divisions landed at Omaha Beach they would face heavy opposition. 

Cota was correct. While the 4th Division which landed at Utah Beach suffered less  than 200 casulaties during the landings, V Corps (the 29th Division and the 1st Division nicknamed The Big Red One )  suffered close to 5,000 casulaties at Omaha Beach, giving rise to the nickname "Bloody Omaha."

The First wave at Omaha floundered completely. Some units lost over 90% of their men. Cota landed in the second wave around 7:30 am, with the 116 Regiment of the 29th Division at a portion of the Beach known as Dog White.  At Dog Green, to the right of Dog White, the Second Rangers batallion lost two thirds of their men during the landings. The earlier support of tanks and naval bombardment had failed to materialize and the Dog Green landing  was a disatser.  

Meanwhile, at Dog White Cota and his regiment had also landed without much support.  Lt. Colonel Max Ferguson Schneider, the commander ot the Fifth Rangers batallion  in a landing craft behind Cota recognized the sitiuation at Dog Green and ordered his boats diverted to Dog White. 

There is a small sea-wall separating the beach from the road at Dog White and Dog Green. Directly across the road is a small bluff, rising perhaps two hundred to three hundred feet. At the base and  top of the bluff, the Germans were dug in and well armed. To the right, at one of the exits off the beach on a road leading in land, was a German bunker (see below) that had a clear view of Omaha Beach and had survived the bombings and was laying down a deadly stream of fire. 

Cota and the members of the 116 of the 29th huddled under the beach wall. Wave after wave of men landing on the beach behind them  were being cut down and killed. The tide was now beginning to come in , and those men who were wounded at the water's edge began to drown. It was almost 8 am, June 6, 1944, and something needed to be done. 

Cota called for Bangalore torpedoes to attack the fortifications at the base of the bluffs. Slowly the equipment came forward and holes were blown in the barbed wire and some of the defenses at the base of the bluffs were neutralized. 

Lt. Colonel Max Schneider bumped into General Cota. Cota asked Schneider what outfit he was leading. "5th Rangers" came the reply. 

Now came two quotes that Cota is remembered for. But beyond the words, it is the action of this one American that turned the tide at Omaha Beach. 

When Schneider told Cota he was was with the Rangers, Cota stood up and pointed to the holes the Bangalores had blown open and shouted "Rangers lead the way!". Schneider's Rangers charged though the holes and up the bluffs and engaged and defeated the German defenders.
Rangers Lead The Way!  has gone down in history and now is the motto of the Rangers. 

At some point Cota began walking along the beach wall, ignoring the bullets, and rousing his men huddled behind the wall- shouting the second phrase he is remembered for: "Gentlemen, we're being killed on the beaches. Lets get up there and be killed in-land." 
Slowly Cota led his men off the beaches and up the bluffs. Once the Germans at the top were cleaned out, the Rangers headed towards Point Du Hoc to meet up with the battalion that was scaling what later became the famous cliffs. Cota led the 29th in land to achieve the objectives of the 29th division. 

Your faithful blogger has stood several times at the precise spot on Dog White where General Cota and Lt. Colonel Max Schneider met. There are peaceful beach homes at the base of the bluffs  that belie the carnage of the beach on June 6, 1944. Rumpole has walked up (mostly crawled) the steep bluffs behind the sea wall and hiked from Dog White all the way to Point Du Hoc. Every American should visit Normandy once in her or his life. 

For his actions on Omaha Beach  General Norman "Dutch" Cota received the Distinguished Service Cross for bravery under fire (the only higher award is the Congressional Medal Of Honor). Lt. Colonel Max Schneider was also awarded the DSC for his actions on Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944. 

Cota was later given command of the 28th Division and was part of the liberation of Paris, and then took part in the invasion and liberation of Belgium. He was awarded the Croix de guerre with Palm by France, the Croix de guerre with Palm  by Belgium. The Croix de Guerre is awarded to an individual or unit that distinguishes themselves with heroism under fire. Field Marshall Montgomery pinned the British Distiguished Service Order on Cota. The DSO is awarded only to military officers who distinguish themselves under fire in combat. 

Cota died on October 4, 1971 and is buried in the West Point Cemetary. 

Gen. Dutch Cota- A true American Hero.  The Beast Of Omaha:  One of the defending Germans at Omaha Beach  was MG42 gunner Lance Corporal Heinrich Severloh who was in a well emplaced bunker; "Widerstandsnest 62" with good fields of fire. Severloh was instructed to target the US troops while they were still wading towards the beach. That Bunker still stands today and you can visit it. Severloh engaged the landing Americans for 9 hours, firing 12,000 rounds before his ammunition ran out and according to some historical analysts, Severloh may have been responsible for up to 3,000 of the casualties taken by the American forces. Severloh was nicknamed the "Beast of Omaha" by US survivors of the landing