‘Chutists disrupt enemy rear lines
Record-setting number of airborne heralds of invasion leap ‘Atlantic Wall’
By Frederick Graham
London, England – (June 6)
The greatest airborne invasion of all time accompanied the Allied assault on Hitler’s “Atlantic Wall” today. And tonight, almost 24 hours after the first airborne troops had hit French soil behind the German lines, the operation appears to have been spectacularly successful.
Thousands of tough, specially-trained U.S. and British airborne troops who floated to earth under silk parachutes or swooped down in gliders, bringing hundreds of tons of heavy equipment, arms and supplies with them, are now consolidating in the enemy’s rear areas.
Only the barest facts of the gigantic airborne operations, which dwarf similar efforts by the Germans in Crete and the Allies in Burma, have been released by Allied headquarters. But those facts are enough to show the skeleton of one of the most amazing stories of the first day’s operations.
Losses of men and planes, which some military men had contended would be too costly for the results obtained * if not suicidal – have been surprisingly low. One report is that only about a score of the hundreds of tow planes that participated in the initial “drop” were lost. Glider losses are not more than a small percentage.
Opposition was light
The first airborne troops to hit the ground in France landed early in the morning, and almost two hours later the last were on the ground.
Flying out of bases in Great Britain, the airborne army was transported in planes nine abreast. The formation stretched nearly 230 miles from end to end, and took almost one hour to pass over the target area. Some of the planes carried British and U.S. paratroops; others towed gliders.
Brilliantly and carefully planned, the entire operation was termed by Brig. Gen. Paul E. L. Williams, chief of the 9th Air Force Troop Carrier Command, as a “magnificent success, reflecting credit on pilots and crews.”
Most of the crewmen returning in tow planes reported no flak at all, no fighters and only ground fire from small arms – mostly .50 caliber machine guns.
The first three groups to return reported no losses, and said the landings had been made with neater precision than in practice missions flown here during the past few months. Most of the troops were put down in predetermined “drop zones.”
Doctors go with ‘chutists
The Germans announced that four divisions of airborne troops had been “badly mauled.” There is neither confirmation nor denial of this report here, naturally, but it is known that in addition to the thousands of fighting men, medical men and other troops with equipment and supplies were flown in by gliders shortly after the paratroops had landed. Jeeps, artillery and even motorcycle troops were included in the force now on the ground and fighting.
Col. G. M. Jones, operations officer for the mission and a resident of Lafayette, Louisiana, who worked with Gen. Williams in planning the troop carrier operations in Sicily, said this afternoon, “The whole thing is satisfactory beyond expectations.”
Other veterans of the Sicilian campaign said that the timing, navigation and dropping accuracy surpassed even the best practice tests under chosen weather conditions. To a man, pilots of the tow planes expressed amazement at the weakness of enemy opposition.
Chutists raise havoc in rear
SHAEF, England (AP) –
Prime Minister Churchill told the House of Commons that airborne heralds of the invasion had been “successful” in the final softening up blow against Hitler’s “Western Wall” just before the huge waterborne force surged ashore under naval guns and air bombs.
Wielding sheath knives and Tommy guns, thousands of U.S. and British paratroops and glider troops swept down on sleeping Cherbourg Peninsula out of the pre-dawn blackness and immediately set about the task of disrupting Nazi rear lines by destroying key bridges, railyards and enemy strongpoints.
A military spokesman today praised the troop-carrier planes that had navigated through a rainy, stormy night to drop thousands of these specially-trained soldiers on vital objectives. He said:
The operation was on a very large scale and was carried out with great precision. Our losses in aircraft were extremely small. It was a fine job – very fine indeed.
Attack bombers flying back over the area in which the airborne troops had landed reported seeing a number of demolitions and many burning buildings.
Americans first on the beaches
Aboard HMS Hilary, off the invasion coast (UP) – (June 6)
The first ground forces to land on the French beaches today were Americans. They went ashore at 6:30 a.m., followed by Canadians and British an hour later.