Thunder Over Normandy
Stackpole Books (Verlag)
978-0-8117-7778-0 (ISBN)
By June 1944, Allied air forces were ready to unleash hell on the Germans in occupied France. Massive numbers of bombers and fighters had been assembled in the United Kingdom, as well as more than one million troops poised to invade the continent. Thunder Over Normandy tells the story of the air campaign that began on D-Day, June 6, 1944, and culminated in the liberation of France—one of the largest, most complex, and most successful aerial operations in history.
In April 1944, Allied air forces in Europe—including the vaunted U.S. Eighth Air Force and RAF Bomber Command—were placed under Dwight Eisenhower’s Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force and given a twofold mission to lay the groundwork for D-Day: destroy the Luftwaffe’s battle strength and isolate Normandy from reinforcements. American and British heavy bombers completed these tasks with devastating effectiveness.
D-Day began with the midnight launching of 1,200 transports to drop American and British paratroopers and gliders behind enemy lines in Normandy. In a monumental effort, the U.S. 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions landed behind Utah Beach and fought for towns like Carentan; the British 6th Airborne seized Pegasus Bridge and other crossings near Caen. Toward dawn, 1,000 bombers hammered German positions along the coast, just ahead of the troops who stormed the beaches.
As the fighting moved inland during the next two months, Allied fighters and fighter-bombers swarmed in to provide close support for the ground forces slogging through the hedgerows of Normandy. The bombers continued to strike German industry, but priority was now given to destroying V-1 and V-2 rocket sites as part of Operation Crossbow. Bombers were also used tactically in conjunction with ground operations, including the heavy bombardment that preceded the breakout from Normandy in late July.
By the time Paris was liberated in August 1944, air power—thousands of sorties, hundreds of thousands of tons of bombs—had contributed mightily to Allied victory. Thunder Over Normandy details the air operations that made this happen, from thundering bomb runs and low-level strafing attacks to paratrooper drops, glider flights, and wheeling dogfights with the Luftwaffe. During the summer of 1944, as this stirring account vividly shows, the Allies were truly masters of the air.
Joseph T. MolysonJr. is a thirty-year U.S. Air Force veteran who spent most of his service in intelligence and retired as a colonel. His previous books are Six Air Forces over the Atlantic (Stackpole) and Air Battles before D-Day (Stackpole). He lives outside Atlanta, Georgia.
List of Maps
List of Illustrations
List of Tables
Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1: Air Plans for OVERLORD
Chapter 2: The Oil Plan
Chapter 3: Mistletoe in March
Chapter 4: Arena
Chapter 5: Best Laid Plans
Chapter 6: Festung Europa
Chapter 7: Improving the Odds
Chapter 8: The Outer Rampart
Chapter 9: Postcards
Chapter 10: FORTITUDE
Chapter 11: The Information War
Chapter 12: Wounded Hearts
Chapter 13: Blinded
Chapter 14: Storms
Chapter 15: Unfinished Business
Chapter 16: The Slapton Sands Disaster
Chapter 17: Defending the Coast
Chapter 18: Water’s Edge
Chapter 19: Airborne
Chapter 20: Getting There
Chapter 21: The Eve of Battle
Chapter 22: The Approach
Chapter 23: Over the Cotentin
Chapter 24: Shot Up and Shot Down
Chapter 25: Gliders
Chapter 26: The Paras
Chapter 27: DEADSTICK
Chapter 28: Merville Battery
Chapter 29: Red Devil Tenacity
Chapter 30: The Sky Above
Chapter 31: The Luftwaffe’s Longest D-Day
Chapter 32: Imminent Danger – West
Chapter 33: Bombers Above the Clouds
Chapter 34: Under the Clouds
Chapter 35: When Seagulls Became Eagles
Chapter 36: Air Landing Grounds
Chapter 37: Forward Into France
Chapter 38: Death by Jabo
Chapter 39: Expansion
Chapter 40: COBRA
Chapter 41: Mortain
Chapter 42: The Road to Falaise
Chapter 43: Paris
Chapter 44: Aftermath
Acknowledgments
Appendix 1: Senior Allied Air Commanders and Their Force
Appendix 2: Deceptions and Actual Operations Plans in Support of Operation OVERLORD
Appendix 3: German Radar Installations in the Invasion Area May 1944
Appendix 4: Jagdkorps I Reinforcements from Germany to France June 7, 1944
Appendix 5: Air Landing Grounds Support OVERLORD Air Operations
Bibliography
Endnotes
| Erscheinungsdatum | 07.11.2025 |
|---|---|
| Zusatzinfo | 133 BW Photos, 8 Tables |
| Verlagsort | Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Maße | 152 x 229 mm |
| Gewicht | 642 g |
| Themenwelt | Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Neuzeit (bis 1918) |
| Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► 1918 bis 1945 | |
| Geisteswissenschaften ► Geschichte ► Regional- / Ländergeschichte | |
| Geschichte ► Teilgebiete der Geschichte ► Militärgeschichte | |
| ISBN-10 | 0-8117-7778-2 / 0811777782 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0-8117-7778-0 / 9780811777780 |
| Zustand | Neuware |
| Informationen gemäß Produktsicherheitsverordnung (GPSR) | |
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