Anniversaries are useful moments to pause and reflect . For the 70th anniversary of D-Day and subsequent campaign in northern France , it is also an opportunity to look at the past in detail and ask how much of what we think we know is true and how much is well-entrenched myth . Not only is it more interesting , it is also of greater worth as we plan for the future and pray there will never be a conflict like World War II again . 1 . MYTH : D-Day was predominantly an American operation . REALITY : For many people , D-Day is defined by the bloodshed at Omaha -- the codename for one of the five beaches where Allied forces landed -- and the American airborne drops . Even in Germany , the perception is still that D-Day was a largely American show ; in the recent German TV mini-series , `` Generation War , '' there was a reference to the `` American landings '' in France . But despite `` Band of Brothers , '' despite `` Saving Private Ryan , '' despite those 11 photographs taken by Robert Capa in the swell on that morning of June 6 1944 , D-Day was not a predominantly American effort . Rather , it was an Allied effort with , if anything , Britain taking the lead . Yes , Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower , the supreme Allied commander , was American , but his deputy , Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder was British , as were all three service chiefs . Air Marshal Sir Arthur `` Mary '' Coningham , commander of the tactical air forces , was also British . The plan for Operation Overlord -- as D-Day was codenamed -- was largely that of Gen. Bernard Montgomery , the land force commander . The Royal Navy had overall responsibility for Operation Neptune , the naval plan . Of the 1,213 warships involved , 200 were American and 892 were British ; of the 4,126 landing craft involved , 805 were American and 3,261 were British . Share your family 's D-Day stories . Indeed , 31 % of all U.S. supplies used during D-Day came directly from Britain , while two-thirds of the 12,000 aircraft involved were also British , as were two-thirds of those that landed in occupied France . Despite the initial slaughter at Omaha , casualties across the American and British beaches were much the same . This is not to belittle the U.S. effort but rather to add context and a wider , 360-degree view . History needs to teach as well as entertain . 2 . MYTH : American forces were ill-prepared . REALITY : By the end of World War II the United States had the best armed services in the world . The 77-day Normandy campaign did much to help them reach this point . Northern France was a showcase for American tactical and operational flexibility . At the start of the campaign , the Americans found themselves fighting through the Norman `` bocage , '' an area of small fields lined with thick , raised hedgerows and narrow , sunken lanes . They had n't trained for this ; instead they expected that the Germans would quickly retreat after a successful Allied landing . For the Germans , the bocage offered cover and ambush opportunities for mortar teams and machine guns . Even the American 30-ton Sherman tanks could n't get through these hedgerows . Then a U.S. sergeant came up with the ingenious solution of attaching a hedge-cutting tool built from German beach obstacles to the front of a Sherman . Gen. Omar Bradley , the U.S. First Army commander , was impressed ; within a fortnight , the device had been fitted to 60 % of all U.S. Shermans in Normandy . This was but one example . During the campaign huge developments also were made in close air support , as well as in coordination between infantry , artillery and armor . Medical services advanced so much that one in four casualties returned to the battlefield after treatment , remarkable for 1944 . 3 . MYTH : The Allies became bogged down in Normandy . REALITY : In the pre-invasion estimates for the Normandy campaign , the Allies expected to be roughly 50 miles inland after 17 days , based on German retreats in North Africa and Italy . But Adolf Hitler ordered his forces to fight as close to the French coast as possible and not give an inch . On paper it seemed that the Allies were n't making much progress , but in reality the German strategy worked to the Allies ' advantage as they pounded the enemy with offshore naval guns . For by 1944 the Allies had realized that German tactics -- which dated back more than 100 years -- were rigidly predictable . Striking back once the enemy had overextended itself was central to German DNA throughout World War II . The Allies soon realized that this penchant for counterattack meant that the Germans would eventually move into the open and get hammered . By the end of the Normandy campaign the Germans were hemorrhaging men and machines , with two armies all but destroyed . True , a handful of Germans did escape the attempted encirclement around Falaise , but it was still a massive Allied victory . In the rapid advance that followed , the Allies moved more quickly than Germans had in the opposite direction four years before , during the invasion of France . 4 . MYTH : German soldiers were better trained than their Allied counterparts . REALITY : At the start of World War II the best German units were more than a match for their Allied opposition -- but by 1944 that had changed radically . There were a few exceptions , such as the Panzer Lehr , but come D-Day most German units were not as well trained as the Allies . Some Allied units in Normandy had been preparing for four years for this campaign . In contrast , many German troops had had little more than a few weeks ' notice . The German ad hoc battle groups known as kampfgruppen are traditionally regarded as showcasing tactical flexibility , but even these were borne of extreme shortages and desperation toward the end of the war . The German paratroopers , or fallschirmjäger , were acknowledged to be among the best of their armed forces , yet one veteran I interviewed recalled how he had barely any training , save a few route marches and practice at laying mines . He never trained with a tank , had no transport and had to march 200 miles from Brittany when sent to the front . His case was not atypical : All infantry divisions in Normandy were expected to move by either foot or horse-drawn cart . The veteran I spoke to reached Saint-Lô , a major Normandy town , on June 12 with a company of 120 men . When he was captured on August 19 he was one of just nine men still standing . The Germans had a doctrine during World War II called auftragstaktik -- best described as the ability to use one 's initiative -- which has been hailed as what set their soldiers apart . But the paratrooper I spoke to knew nothing of it . By that stage of the war , German training was so skimpy that it was impossible to implement . 5 . MYTH : The Germans had stronger tactical skills . REALITY : The dogged determination of the Germans to fight during D-Day is often confused with tactical skill . It should n't . The best analogy is with more recent conflicts like Afghanistan or even Vietnam , when Western forces had the best training and kit yet struggled to defeat a massively inferior enemy . As the Taliban have shown , it is very difficult to completely defeat your enemy if they do n't want to be defeated . The only way to do that is to kill them all . This is why the Germans took so long to be defeated in Normandy and , subsequently , despite a lack of training , they were still a very dangerous and deadly enemy with plenty of powerful weapons and a fierce determination to keep fighting . This was for a number of reasons : Nazi indoctrination , a profound sense of duty and the threat of execution for deserters . In World War I the Germans executed 48 men for desertion ; during World War II that figure rose to 30,000 . 6 . MYTH : America and Britain got off lightly in World War II . REALITY : Allied frontline troops suffered horrifically during World War II . Democracies such as Britain and America tried to achieve victory with as few casualties as possible . For the most part , they did this very successfully using technology and machinery to shield lives wherever they could . However , short distances still had to be won by the infantry , tank units and artillery . Although technology meant the Allies needed fewer forces than a generation earlier , those in the firing line still pulled the very short straw . Losses to frontline troops were proportionally worse during the 77-day Normandy campaign than they were during the major battles along the Western Front during World War I. D-Day veteran : I do n't want them to be forgotten .
D-Day signalled the start of the campaign which ended World War II in Europe . The first wave of Allied troops landed on D-Day, June 6, 1944, and by July 6, they had taken over all but a few miles of Normandy coastline. James Holland says Operation Overlord was not just an American venture . He also argues that German soldiers were not better trained than the Allies .