Chapters 17-20 Summary and Analysis

"Visitors to Hell" turns the focus to Omaha Beach, equally chaotic but far bloodier. Both sides know its ten kilometers of firm sand is an obvious landing zone. Omaha is a defender's dream: constricted, crescent-shaped, with 300-400 meters exposed at low tide, shrinking to only a few meters at high tide. Next comes a band of shingle (small rounded stones), which is impassible by vehicles, then a seawall 1-4 meters high, then a paved road, then a V-shaped antitank ditch, then a flat swampy area, and finally steep bluffs thirty or more meters high. Five small "draws" (ravines) slope gently up to the tableland, whence roads of various qualities lead inland. Omaha cannot be outflanked and offers natural obstacles that Rommel enhances with more mines than at Utah and heavy weapons on the high ground. Allied planners hate the...