Q1. Explain the ways in which British forces prepared for D-Day
By 1994 the Germans were having major problems after they were pushed out of North Africa, and were retreating further back into Europe. However Hitler’s forces were still in one piece and strong. Britain’s RAF were dominating the skies while Germany were lacking in artillery for example planes and fuel. The German economy at this time was also not good, they lost support from Ukraine and Russia. Although Germany had control of most of Europe, the British looked on top. The next major attack by the British on Germany would be D-Day.
Winston Churchill, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin held a series of meetings, in November of 1943 in Iran, discussing military strategies. From this it was decided that there was to be a major offensive in spring 1944. However, Roosevelt argued that any attempt to land troops in Western Europe would result in heavy casualties. At Teheran, Stalin reminded Churchill and Roosevelt of a previous promise of landing troops in Western Europe in 1942. Later they postponed it to spring of 1943. Stalin complained that it was now November and there was still no sign of an allied invasion of France. Therefore after lengthy discussions it was agreed that the Allies would mount a major offensive in the spring of 1944. But the question was, where to attack? Stalin wanted to attack France because they were an ally country under control by Germany and would help with the attack in their own country as well as they were allies. Normandy was chosen for the attack because the Germans expected them to attack the easiest place for Britain, Calais. This is because Calais was the quickest and easiest place to get to in France from Britain, as it was the shortest distance to travel for the British and so they would be detected as easily. To get ready for the suspected attack on Calais the Germans barricaded the town and sent numerous amounts of artillery and soldiers there. As the Allies expected the Germans would think this, they chose the next best place to attack, Normandy. This was the next best place as it had long beaches, easy access on onto land and easy access from Portsmouth Harbour.
