Now, as this Seventy-ninth Congress meets, we have reached the most critical phase of the war.
The greatest victory of the last year was, of course, the successful breach on June 6, 1944, of the German “impregnable” seawall of Europe and the victorious sweep of the Allied forces through France and Belgium and Luxembourg--almost to the Rhine itself.
The cross-channel invasion of the Allied armies was the greatest amphibious operation in the history of the world. It overshadowed all other operations in this or any other war in its immensity. Its success is a tribute to the fighting courage of the soldiers who stormed the beaches--to the sailors and merchant seamen who put the soldiers ashore and kept them supplied--and to the military and naval leaders who achieved a real miracle of planning and execution. And it is also a tribute to the ability of two Nations, Britain and America, to plan together, and work together, and fight together in perfect cooperation and perfect harmony.
This cross-channel invasion was followed in August by a second great amphibious operation, landing troops in southern France. In this, the same cooperation and the same harmony existed between the American, French, and other Allied forces based in North Africa and Italy.
The success of the two invasions is a tribute also to the ability of many men and women to maintain silence, when a few careless words would have imperiled the lives of hundreds of thousands, and would have jeopardized the whole vast undertakings.
These two great operations were made possible by success in the Battle of the Atlantic.
Without this success over German submarines, we could not have built up our invasion forces or air forces in Great Britain, nor could we have kept a steady stream of supplies flowing to them after they had landed in France.
The Nazis, however, may succeed in improving their submarines and their crews. They have recently increased their U-boat activity. The Battle of the Atlantic--like all campaigns in this war--demands eternal vigilance. But the British, Canadian, and other Allied navies, together with our own, are constantly on the alert.
The tremendous operations in western Europe have overshadowed in the public mind the less spectacular but vitally important Italian front. Its place in the strategic conduct of the war in Europe has been obscured, and--by some people unfortunately--underrated.
It is important that any misconception on that score be corrected--now.