Canadians landing at Juno beach.

Juno Beach

On June 6th 1944 the Allied invasion of the beaches of Normandy began. Operation Overlord, the objective, to open up a western front and force Germany to fight on two fronts and then box them in. The landing took place on the coast of Normandy, France. The coast was divided into five beaches; Utah beach, Omaha beach, Gold beach, Sword beach, and lastly Juno beach. Juno beach was assigned to be landed by Canadian troops and their objective was to capture the beach and provide flanking support for the British on Sword and Gold beach. The landing was scheduled to occur at 6 am but was delayed because of rough waters, when Canadian troops did land on Juno beach at 7:30 am, they encountered heavy resistance from the German 716th Division, the bombardment that occurred before the landing prove to have little effect and left Canadian to have to do most of the work. The Canadian had to face multiple MG nests ( Machine Gun positions), however the 30,000 Canadians that landed by the end of the day pushed through the heavy defences and penetrated further into France than any other of it Allies. Along side Utah, the assault on Juno beach by Canadian forces proved to be the most strategically successful. Canada proved its self in D-Day, but Canada did suffer its fair share of casualties, the total count showed 340 killed, 574 wounded, and 47 taken prisoner. Canada showed that it was a force to be reckoned with and showed it by successfully capturing the beach and pushing the Germans back at Juno.