Cross-Channel Attack

OVERLORD, the cross-Channel attack which hit the German-occupied coast of Normandy on 6 June 1944, was one of the last and by far the biggest of the series of amphibious operations by which the United States and the British Empire came to grips with the German-Italian- Japanese Axis in the course of World War II. But it was more than just another attack. It was the supreme effort of the Western Allies in Europe-the consummation of the grand design to defeat Germany by striking directly at the heart of Hitler’s Reich. One of the last attacks, it was the fruition of some of the first strategic ideas.