The ceremony marking the 76th anniversary of the Allied landings in Normandy in the Second World War was held today modestly without veterans and in an official atmosphere due to the coronavirus epidemic, the Agence France-Presse reported, with the assessment that it is a big contrast compared to the ceremony in 2019.
On the beach of Vierville-sur-Mer (Omaha Beach), where the landing took place, a modest ceremony was held with the plane flying over in the presence of about 100 people, among whom were the ambassadors of eight allied countries, namely the USA, Canada, Denmark, Great Britain, Poland, Belgium, Norway and the Netherlands. The German ambassador was also present.
French President Emmanuel Macron stated on Twitter that the "Supreme Battle" began on June 6, 1944. "I am thinking of those who are several thousand kilometers away from us and fought to liberate France together with our resistance fighters. Let us unite in the name of Freedom, and never forget the heroes," Macron said.
Exactly 76 years ago, the operation known as D-Day began, and one of the key battles for the victory over Nazi Germany. The Normandy landings, codenamed "Operation Overlord", was the largest naval invasion in the history of warfare.
Allied landing forces consisted of 73.000 American, more than 60.000 British and over 20.000 Canadian soldiers, supported by French commandos.
The landing along the 80-kilometer coast began with a night parachute landing of 23.000 men, a large-scale artillery attack from the air and sea, which was followed on June 6, 1944 by a successful amphibious landing on the strategically important Pegasus Bridge, near Cannes.
Estimates of the number of Allied casualties on the first day of the landings vary: from 2.500 to 5.000.
During the entire three-month operation, about 215.000 Allied soldiers, and an estimated XNUMX German soldiers, were killed, wounded or missing in Normandy.
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