Changes

==The invasion==

==The invasion==

As the day of the invasion approached, the weather in the English Channel became stormy. Heavy winds, a five-foot swell at sea, and lowering skies compelled Eisenhower to postpone the assault from 5 to 6 June. Conditions remained poor, but when weathermen predicted that the winds would abate and the cloud cover rise enough on the scheduled day of the attack to permit a go-ahead, Eisenhower reluctantly gave the command. Expecting casualties of up to 80 percent among the airborne forces, he traveled to an air base at Newbury to bid farewell to the members of the 101st Airborne Division before their tow planes and gliders carried them off to battle. A newspaper man who accompanied Eisenhower later told friends he had seen tears in the general's eyes.  

As the day of the invasion approached, the weather in the English Channel became stormy. Heavy winds, a five-foot swell at sea, and lowering skies compelled Eisenhower to postpone the assault from 5 to 6 June. Conditions remained poor, but when weathermen predicted that the winds would abate and the cloud cover rise enough on the scheduled day of the attack to permit a go-ahead, Eisenhower reluctantly gave the command. Expecting casualties of up to 80 percent among the airborne forces, he traveled to an air base at [[Newbury]] to bid farewell to the members of the 101st Airborne Division before their tow planes and gliders carried them off to battle. A newspaper man who accompanied Eisenhower later told friends he had seen tears in the general's eyes.  

The weather actually worked to the Allied advantage. The BBC broadcast the lines from Verlaine's poem indicating commencement of the attack — ''"Blessent mon coeur d'une longueur monotone"'' ("The violins of autumn wound my heart with monotonous languor") — a  code alerting the French Resistance that the invasion was imminent. Rommel's Army Group B headquarters in Normandy did nothing. The weather was so foul that no one believed an invasion possible. Indeed, many commanders at 7th Army had already left for Brittany to participate in an exercise designed, ironically, to simulate an Allied landing in Normandy. Rommel himself was in Germany celebrating his wife's birthday.  

The weather actually worked to the Allied advantage. The BBC broadcast the lines from Verlaine's poem indicating commencement of the attack — ''"Blessent mon coeur d'une longueur monotone"'' ("The violins of autumn wound my heart with monotonous languor") — a  code alerting the French Resistance that the invasion was imminent. Rommel's Army Group B headquarters in Normandy did nothing. The weather was so foul that no one believed an invasion possible. Indeed, many commanders at 7th Army had already left for Brittany to participate in an exercise designed, ironically, to simulate an Allied landing in Normandy. Rommel himself was in Germany celebrating his wife's birthday.