Operation: Overlord

Operation: Overlord
Part of World War II
Date 6 June - 25 August 1944 Location Normandy, France Result Decisive Allied strategic victory
Belligerents
United States United Kingdom Canada Australia Free Belgium Forces Free Czechoslovak Forces Free French Forces French Resistance Free Greek Forces Free Luxembourgish Forces Free Dutch Forces New Zealand Free Norwegian Forces Free Polish Forces Danish sailors	Germany Italian Social Republic
Commanders and leaders
Dwight Eisenhower Arthur Tedder Bernard Montgomery Trafford Leigh-Mallory Bertram Ramsay	Gerd von Rundstedt Erwin Rommel

Operation: Overlord was the code name for the Battle of Normandy, the Allied operation that launched the successful invasion of German-occupied western Europe during World War II. The operation commenced on 6 June 1944 with the Normandy landings (Operation Neptune, commonly known as D-Day). A 1,200-plane airborne assault preceded an amphibious assault involving more than 5,000 vessels. Nearly 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel on 6 June, and more than three million allied troops were in France by the end of August.

Operation: Overlord in "The Garden Gnome Freedom Front"

The 1944 Allied invasion of Normandy appears to have received a good deal of assistance from the Faerie denizens of the region (including garden gnomes), although most history books do not acknowledge this. Alizon Riand is one researcher who has looked into this matter of the "Gnomeandy Invasion".

Operation: Overlord in Joe Steele

During the Basra Conference, Vince Scriabin and Maxim Litvinov got into a row over opening a Second Front in Europe. The Soviets had wanted Britain and the U.S. to invade France in 1943 but it hadn't happened. This invasion was stalled more by British PM Winston Churchill than by U.S. President Joe Steele since the former remembered the bloodbath from the previous war.

In the event, the invasion did take place in 1944. Along with U.S. and British troops, Canadian and Free Polish troops took part. It was planned and led by General Omar Bradley. While bloody, it was successful leading to the eventual liberation of France and the defeat of Germany.

Literary Comment

In the short story, President Steele was reluctant to commit US forces to Operation: Overlord, preferring that Germany and the Soviet Union pound on each other. However, once it was clear that the USSR had the upper hand, Steele pushed ahead with Overlord for fear of Soviet domination in Europe.

Dwight Eisenhower was the supreme commander in the short story as in OTL, rather than Omar Bradley. In the novel Eisenhower leads the Army in the Pacific Theater.

Operation: Overlord in "Ready for the Fatherland"

In the aftermath of the separate peace concluded between Germany and the Soviet Union in 1943, and the redeployment of all Eastern Front Wehrmacht troops to the west, Operation: Overlord proved to be a disaster for US and British forces, who were driven back into the sea.