Old story, new deduction

Commemoration of the coming 60th anniversary of the Normandy landings (1)

There are not so many campaigns that can leave behind a code name in a kind of language, the Normandy Landing 60 years ago is such a campaign. The "D-Day", in most English dictionaries, at least has the following two implications: 1.Normandy Landing; 2.the day witnessing the beginning of major actions. According to textual research by American linguists, the term "D-Day" first appeared in WWI. But because there was later the Normandy Landing, people used this term to represent this great campaign that changed the process of WWII.

The significance of "D-Day" is not limited to its influence on languages, it left behind a profound impress also on military, literature, journalism, arts, movie, philosophy, etc. There are several thousand kinds of "D-Day"-related books, picture albums, audio-video products, and there are countless of works that concern this campaign.

These works contain both researches conducted on the basis of the latest historical materials and descriptions of the original historical records given from different angles. For instance, the book, Fortitude: The D-Day Deception Campaign, published in 2001, was derived from a secret plan in the same name. The author Roger Hesketh was the director of this plan. The writer discovered that the successful creation of a false situation is an important reason for "D-Day" victory. The "D-Day Paratroopers" published several years ago is a reminiscences on airborne troops. In addition, in Britain, France, Canada and Germany, there are works describing and analyzing this campaign.

Stephen E. Ambrose, a famous American historian on WWII and writer wrote the book "D-Day" after having had interviews with over 1,400 officers and men with experience in the "D-Day". The book became a best seller immediately after its publication 10 years ago. Later in his books, like "The Victors and "Band of Brothers, Ambrose made detailed descriptions of the "D-Day". At the beginning of the Chapter on Omaha Beach Landing in the book-The Victor, Ambrose wrote: If the German army should really block the Allied Forces from landing somewhere, that place could only be Omaha Beach. A landing boat, soon after it opened its front cabin door, was furiously attacked by the enemies, 30 fighters were all killed before they had time to walk out of the cabin.

Commemoration for the 60th anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy

On the eve of the 60th anniversary of the "D-Day", there was the publication of another batch of new books about the "D-Day". "The D-Day Companion" compiled by Jane Penrose received much concern. The analyses of the then strategy made in the book by some noted experts in WWII history from the visual angle of today contain a lot of original ideas. An article in which views Normandy as a big gamble, it says if the landing by the Allied Forces should fail, then the 20th century world history would be rewritten. Because judged from the then prevailing situation, the Soviet Red Army was strong enough to independently defeat the German Nazi and pushed up to the west of the Rhine River, in that case, there would be no balance between the two postwar military blocs.

Owing to different visual angles, views on this campaign are not completely the same. After WWII, some experts were of the opinion that the "D-Day" was a political mistake, saying that despite victory in the campaign, the Allied Forces suffered heavy casualties. The Allied Forces should first get in contact with some anti-Nazi generals within the German Army, then disintegrated the German Army through giving them support, so as to win the greatest victory with the least losses. This question is raised in the book - "Unexplained Mysteries of World War II" - by Breuer William. The book says that Winston Churchill later also expressed his regret over the failure to heed the resistance force within the German Army.

Some British experts are quite dissatisfied with the playing up of US troops in such works as the "Saving Private Ryan", they worry that these works depict British men as negligible minor characters and people are liable to confuse movie with history. It is also held that the US soldiers paid a heavy price on Omaha Beach because they lacked coordination. Although the British forces met with more stubborn blocking action than US troops did, they suffered far fewer losses than the latter, because the British forces were good at coordination in military operations. In his book, The great battles of World War II, British correspondent Henry Maule painstakingly described the process of how British forces pinned down the German Army, thus creating conditions for the landing of US troops.

The advancement of times and society is deepening and changing people's understanding of the "D-Day". Changes have also taken place in the angle of the descriptions of that campaign given by European and American experts, scholars and writers. Director Steven Spielberg used big scene to set off ordinary fighters and paid more attention to displaying the fate of an individual in the war, which, from an aspect, reflects changes in Americans' war concept after the Vietnam war.

"The Bedford Boys: One American Town's Ultimate D-Day Sacrifice" published last year also embodies such a war concept. Bedford is a small town with a population of 3,000 in Virginia. On the "D-Day", 21 young men from this town laid down lives on Omaha Beach. The writer Alex Kershaw completed this book only after having had interviews with many veteran soldiers during WWII and collected lots of letters and diaries prevailing at that time.

The progress of modern science and technology has also created more imaginative rooms for the "D-Day" story. The deepest impression the film "Saving Private Ryan" gave the audiences was the scene of the 20-minute landing. That was far ahead the film "The Longest Day" shot by Hollywood in 1962. In addition, the appearance of the 3D (3-dimensional) game with exquisite design and life-like picture also helps children worldwide to familiarize themselves with the campaign broken out in Europe 60 years ago. They "play" this campaign in the form of a game, of course they have completely different understanding of those factual stories. The explanations of the "D-Day" are different from generation to generation, over the past 60 years, the "D-Day" seems to be an endless story which will go on in an unending manner.

The above article is carried on Page 7 of People's Daily June 4, 2004 and translated by People's Daily Online.