D-Day : June 6, 1944 -- The Climactic Battle of WWII

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Summary: D-Day book review
Review: D-Day us about the biggest battle of World War II. D-Day was that day the Allies invaded Normandy.
he Allies broke through the Atlantic Wall, Hitler's so called impenetrable defense. D-Day happened on June 6th, 1944. The Aliess had planned this full force invasion of Normandy months before it was carried out. hey trained day in and day out preparing for the biggest invasion in world history. The Allies thought that when they got to the beach that they could just walk right across because some B52's had bombed the wall, but they were wrong. The wall was barely damage and when they set foot on the beach they were hit with a barrage of machine gun and mortar fire. Although the Germans fought their best so did the Allies. On Omaha beach the casualties were extremely high! The British however, had brought in their special floating tabks so they practically walked across Sword Beach. The Canadians were hit pretty hard, but not as hard as the Americans on Omaha and Utah beaches. In the end the Allies won the battle at a heavy price. Thousands of soldiers lost their lives, a lot of them getting off the boats. Some of the others died of blood loss. The rest wre shot in vital spots such as the head or heart. But in the end D-Day was a big success.

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Summary: A warning to 'Allied' readers
Review: While this book claims to be the definitive account of D-Day, paying all those involved their due, you only have to glimpse at the other reviews on this site to realise this is not the case. Ambrose was Director of The Eisenhower Center, an organisation that, among other things, collects first-hand accounts of primarily American veterans; he was a staunch supporter of the National D-Day Museum, whose `mission is to remind the American people of the day when the fury of an aroused democracy was hurled against Nazi-occupied Europe, and to inspire future generations by showing that there is nothing this Republic cannot do when everyone gets on the team'; and in his acknowledgements he writes of his book, `I like to think that General Eisenhower would have approved'. How ANYBODY can believe that he could write an objective account of a man he was clearly in awe of and a D-Day that involved more than just members of `this Republic', is beyond me. Having read `Crazy Horse and Custer' and `Pegasus Bridge', I felt Ambrose was a fine historian, but in this instance he has failed to honour his duty to those who died, and those who came back to tell a tale completely different to his.

I am not a patriotic Brit; I do not define myself by my nationality; and yet, as I read this book, I became more and more annoyed by the sidelining of the non-American forces, and the ridiculing of their bravery and efficiency. Whereas most writers are free to expound their prejudices, historians have a sacred duty to be objective and to honour the people of the past. I am not saying that historians don't have opinions or prejudices, but better authors prove their point by allowing the facts to speak for themselves. At The Eisenhower Center, Ambrose had access to over a thousand first-hand accounts from American D-Day veterans. His utilisation of those accounts is impressive, and he clearly put in tremendous effort reading and editing them into a story, but a sincere lack of effort has gone into researching the forces allied to the US. As a result throughout this book, pages and pages are devoted to American activities, with a couple of lines here and there saying: `the experience of America's Allies were pretty much the same'. 75,000 British and Canadian troops went into battle compared with 57,000 American soldiers, not to mention that more than half the ships were Royal Navy and two-thirds of the planes were RAF, but reading this book you'd think that only the American GIs, the USN and the USAAF were involved. What's worse, in his dealing with the upper echelons of power, everything is viewed from Eisenhower's perspective, from his memoirs, his notes, his diary and journal; Ambrose does not allow Churchill, Montgomery, Harris, Leigh-Mallory, or any of the other Allied COs to speak for themselves, or to defend themselves. Indeed, Eisenhower is set up as beyond reproach. From the offing, therefore, the `definitive' account of D-Day is poorly balanced.

I'm not in favour of the American-bashing reviews here, and I have no complaint with an American author writing about the American involvement in D-Day, but this book is not marketed as such. I don't have any problems with his book `Citizen Soldiers: The US Army from the Normandy Beaches to the Surrender of Germany' because that achieves what it sets out to achieve. Had this book been entitled: `D-Day: the American Involvement' I would have no problem with it; instead, Ambrose ambitiously makes his aim to cover D-Day in its entirety, and overstretches himself. Lacking in research, he makes derogative statements without any evidence to back up his claims. With D-Day veterans in every town in Britain, and with memorials to the myriad honoured dead scattered throughout the countryside, Ambrose's snide comments aimed at the `allied' forces and civilians, their leaders, even their food, quickly undermine any credibility he creates with his reasonable treatment of American sources. As a result, in this `definitive' account, opinion is offered up as fact, and the allied forces play the Three Stooges to Ambrose's infallible superhero Eisenhower.

Putting aside the jingoistic Americana, Ambrose is able to `make history come alive' with his writing. All too often, books like this become bogged down with statistical data, losing the human impact (a la Anthony Beever), or, conversely, they become so emotionally over-the-top that they lose all credibility. Ambrose never fails to keep his writing utterly enthralling, providing a careful balance of information and human drama, and, nicely, allows mainly the American, but also some British and German, soldiers present to tell the story in their own words. But while it's well-written, I just can't forgive that one of my grandfathers, who was a Pathfinder in the RAF aerial bombardment of Ouistreham in the early hours of June 6, and my other grandfather, who was a signalman who landed in the second wave at Gold Beach, and all the other British, Canadian, French, Polish, Czech, Australian and New Zealand soldiers and civilians who helped make D-Day happen, aren't recognised for their efforts. So a word of warning to those readers from `allied' nations: if you're easily offended, and know your country's history well enough to spot when somebody else doesn't, avoid this book like the plague.

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Summary: As Ambrose's Star Rose, Leftists Seethed with Envy
Review: Richard Nixon once supposedly referred to Mr. Ambrose as a Leftist historian. At the time, then, Mr. Nixon's comment kept Mr. Ambrose in the good graces of the Church of Liberalism.

But as the public loved "D-Day" and realized that Mr. Ambrose was filling the shoes of accessible history that historians have largely abandoned, THEN LIBERALS TRAINED THEIR GUNS ON AMBROSE.

The book illustrates, through soldiers that were there, as well as other sources, one of America's finest hours. The maps keep the reader oriented. Mr. Ambrose's run up to the invasion is filled with tension and uncertainty. The massiveness of the difficulty comes at the reader like a hammer blow.

MODERN LIBERALS RELISH MILITARY HISTORY THAT HIGHLIGHTS AMERICA'S MILITARY FAILURES in order to discredit the American enterprise. As far as the Church of Liberalism was concerned, Mr. Ambrose's account of "D-Day" marked his ex-communication.

The huge popularity of the book and the effectiveness of Mr. Ambrose's subsequent success indicated an audience (HORRORS!) that yearned to read more about AMERICAN SUCCESSES.

"History that's accessible?! Popular?! We'll have none of that!"
The sneering and catcalls at Mr. Ambrose rose to a fever pitch when questions arose as to Mr. Ambrose's failure to dot every I and cross every T concerning sources.

Truth and accuracy in citation of source DO matter in historical writing. Yet, one sensed an overdose of Leftist Schadenfreude concerning Mr. Ambrose and his success.

One reviewer (clearly in a fit of academic catiness) in the New York Times Book Review of a subsequent book of Mr. Ambrose's said Mr. Ambrose had "soldier envy." THAT WAS ONE BIG POT CALLING THE KETTLE BLACK!

Apparently, for the Intellectual Elite Snobs, a Thank You to the men of D-Day is "simply not clevah enough daahhling" (and leaves these putrid Snobs out of their preciously needed limelight).


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Summary: Long, but rewarding
Review: I have no idea why so many are hostile to his book. It is after all the first historical item I, an American, have ever read about D-Day that doesn't just cover the American efforts; no, a significant portion is devoted to the British and Canadian landings as well.

One problem--not the book's per se--is that a lot of the events in D-Day overlap with Ambrose's Band Of Brothers. But, that is very minor.

And lastly I have to say that I am sick of anything good about America being labeled as jingoistic or a "flag waver". America has heroes in its past as well--the rest of the world really needs to get over it, because it isn't going to go away.

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Summary: Participant oral histories
Review: Fourteen days after the 60th Anniversary of D-Day I stood on Omaha Beach and visited Cimetiere Americain at Colleville-sur-mer. Experiences that lead me back to my bookshelf to Ambrose's D-Day best seller. I had tried once before to read it and stopped after 100 or so pages. I did that again this year stopping to read "Public Enemies". The first 100 pages of this book just are not very well written. But I was determined to read on and it was well worth the effort as the book gets increasingly more interesting as it goes on. Ambrose really has woven together participant oral histories from the Eisenhower Center along with an overview of each aspect of the battle, planning to execution, and a critique of the results. Once your through the book you have a great overall picture of what took place and at least how the survivors tell their stories about it. (It did always enter my mind that no one could tell the story of those who died that day, the one in two in the first wave at Omaha Beach who were experiencing combat for the first time.) This is not a classic and it does dwell a lot on unit names, ranks and stories that seem to have punch line endings, but it is a very memorable telling of this grand and awful day in history. May it not need to be repeated?

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Summary: Wonderful account of that day in history!
Review: Great book and filled with personal accounts of D-Day. It does tend to lean toward the American accounts, but Stephen Ambrose is an American historian after all. It is one of the longer books that I've read. My only complaint is that there are only a handful of maps to show the battles. I often became a bit lost in where a particular town or combat zone was located. Mr. Ambrose gives a historian's account of the pre-landing build up and planning on both the Allied and German sides. He also debates the arguments of if the landings were the key defining moment of the war. Also, this book focuses only of the build up and the actual day of June 6th. The majority of the book is about the landings and combat, but it doesn't go into any details of actions after the first day. All-in-all, I highly recommend it especially to anyone wanting to read about it for the first time.

Also highly recommend "Band of Brothers" by Stephen Ambrose (five stars!)

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Summary: Excellent account of the war's biggest day
Review: This is an excellent account of the preparation for and the actual landings that took place on D-Day. The late Ambrose, who many considered to be one of America's best WW II historians, doesn't disappoint. The book offers up plenty of details and statistics that history scholars love, such as the 175,000 troops, nearly 11,000 airplanes and 5,333 ships used during D-Day - history's largest amphibious landing.

Ambrose also writes about the ME-262, the Volksdeutsche, Midge Gillars, Cherokee Code Talkers, and so much more. This book is a terrific start for a WW II beginner, and it offers plenty of facts and interesting information for historians not new to European Theater study.

The author was not particularly known for gripping prose, and this book is further confirmation of that. Some passages alternate between very causal prose, almost conversational, and then Ambrose will throw in a "sine qua non." When he does the latter, it almost appears as if he's showing off, but that's his style, and almost all the time, it's highly effective.

On balance, this is a must read for any enthusiast of WW II, and if you traditionally enjoy Ambrose books (as I do), this book is essential.