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World War 2 Experts

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Rowan
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Interest in HF: I love history, but it's boring in school. Historical fiction brings it alive for me.
Preferred HF: Iron-Age Britain, Roman Britain, Medieval Britain
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World War 2 Experts

Post by Rowan » Tue June 6th, 2017, 6:26 pm

I have a question I'm trying to find the answer for on behalf of a friend. Nothing I've tried on Google or the like has the answer. She asked this question of the museum employees here at the local World War II museum and no one knew the answer. How did the Allies come up with code names used to designate the beaches on D-Day? My guess is that there's not a person alive who really knows why those names were chosen, but I thought I'd try anyway.

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Ludmilla
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Re: World War 2 Experts

Post by Ludmilla » Wed June 7th, 2017, 6:27 pm

There might be something in Cornelius Ryan's Longest Day about it.

SGM
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Re: World War 2 Experts

Post by SGM » Thu June 8th, 2017, 7:13 pm

There were lists of words to be used as codenames and presumably these words came from that list. It would seem that words were used that had absolutely no relation to anything relating to the landings but were words that were distinct enough not to be confused during radio transmission. Police in UK often use code names for certain types of operation. Sometimes they will follow a particular theme (this theme has no relevance, eg rivers, towns, etc etc) and follow an alphabetical chronology, ie a word begining with 'A' for one operation, the next one would have a word beginning with 'B'. I think the whole point was there was to be no discernable logic to the word that could be a give-away to the other side. I cannot verify this information but that has long been my understanding of it but from a very very long time ago. Much too modern for me nowadays.

Of course, you know about the crossword problem that arose from these code names.
Currently reading - Emergence of a Nation State by Alan Smith

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