The D-Day invasion was the largest seaborne invasion in history and a turning point in World War II. By the end of the Normandy campaign, hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians had been killed or wounded. The greatest risks were borne by American troops who arrived in the first wave, seized clifftop artillery, and set up balloons to defend against aerial attacks. The invasion, codenamed Operation Neptune and remembered as D-Day, sent roughly 156,000 British, Canadian, and American troops to the Nazi-occupied French coast by air and sea, beginning the multi-month Battle of Normandy and the liberation of Western Europe from Hitler's Wehrmacht. Citino described the most perilous jobs American troops performed to help make the D-Day landings a World War II turning point.

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Persons: —, Dwight D, Read, Rob Citino, Citino Organizations: Service, Hitler's Wehrmacht, National WWII Museum Locations: Normandy, France, Nazi, Western Europe