By 1944, the
Aliies were clearly winning the war, but the fight was not over. It was clear that no matter how
hard Germany was pounded by aerial attacks, Hitler was not going to surrender until Germany was
taken over inch-by-inch by land.
The Germans were very well aware that the
Allies were going to make an attempt to land in northwest EuropeAllied troops were already in
Italyand the Nazis put massive resources into repelling such an attack.
While
it looks easy and inevitable in hindsight, at the time it was uncertain whether the Allies could
make it through German defenses or how long that would take or how many troops would have to be
sacrificed. There was every fear an assault on the French coast could turn into a replica of the
attempts on both sides in World War I in France to gain a decisive victory: the end results were
a standoff and massive deathsappalling levels of deathsto gain a few uncertain feet of ground.
The Allies did not want to get caught again in such a scenario.
Therefore, it
was important to world history that the Allies were successful in getting a foothold in France
from the start with the well-planned and massive D-Day attack. It hastened
the end of the war, secured continued support for the war on the home front, and gave the Allies
a foothold in Europe that was important to the post-war settlement.
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