Putting soldiers on beaches was definitely the essence of the whole enterprise, and popular culture understandably focuses on them. They naturally make for memorable cinema sequences like Steven Spielberg’s masterpiece or the amazing aerial long takes in The Longest Day (1962). The original commander of 1st Battalion, Major H.D. Stacey’s 1946 history of 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion in Normandy describes the expectations of high command chillingly. The historian Dan Hartigan, son of a 1st Battalion vet of the same name, describes a close shave for Sgt.

Source: National Post June 06, 2019 10:30 UTC