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As the War came to its end it brought about the confirmation that up to that point had been known but not confirmed. That the horrific genocide of a people had gone on throughout Europe. The Deathcamps that were discovered , one by one , by the Allied troops as they moved closer to Germany, from all directions, had practiced such organized, horrific, cruelty, that even these most hardened of war veterans could barely talk about it over 80 years later. Which we will hear when we ask about it. The short answer given by Mr. Hirsch is as powerful a moment as we will hear in these interviews.

We will also hear the radio broadcasts marking the deaths of Franklin Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, and finally the surrender of Germany itself. We will then hear the stories of how pilot Bob Hirsch flew the displaced persons to the new places that they were to go to be housed in, having lost everything, from their homes, and businesses, to their entire families.

Then, just as Bob Hirsch is sent to Paris, France, to pick up his plane to be flown around the World to the Pacific Theater. His orders are suddenly changed, and he and his fellow troops are left to wonder, why?

Then we will focus in on the Potsdam Conference, the bluff to the Japanese Government, and the decision to drop an atomic bomb on Japan, that will finally bring this horrifically, bloody war, to its end.

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Operation Market Garden was an enormous effort led by General Montgomery that included 41,268 troops from Allied countries. It was designed to capture several bridges so that the Army could cross over into Germany and , with any luck, end the war by Christmas of 1944. The overall effort failed because the German forces fought hard to defend the bridges and they had help from the weather.

This operation was where Bob Hirsch was extremely active throughout and his stories will hold you spellbound as you hear about his return with a plane with 85 bullet holes, or death of a jumpmaster killed by bullets that hit him as soon as the jump door opened, or the need to slowdown to allow two paratroopers with parachute problems to jump, to late for their targets, but still over enemy territory.

This is a fascinating look at Operation Market Garden that was the inspiration for the movie " A Bridge to Far". Then we will follow our troops as they head into the Battle of the Bulge and on to the final days of the War.

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Operation Overlord, known to the world as D-Day, was the beginning of the end for the Nazi Regime of Adolf Hitler. It was the start of the Allied march across the European Continent. Bob Hirsch had not yet arrived in England in time to take part in the invasion. However, a decade ago he sat down with Rod Gragg of Coastal Carolina University and participated in several interviews about his experiences as a pilot that carried paratroopers over enemy lines. Those interviews were a part of two videos we are using in this series : "Military Memoirs" and "A Salute to American Veterans : Death Drop and the 82nd Airborne in the D-Day Battle of Normandy"

The latter video, "Death Drop" , is an extraordinary look at the air campaign that was such a major part of the success of D-Day. In this episode we have attempted to take our former Mayor's extraordinary insights of the air and paratrooper campaign and combine it with a fascinating look at D-Day Veterans and their account of those events from a documentary titled "D-Day, Omaha Beach, June 6, 1944 Volume One" by Voices of History and documentarian Larry Cappetto.
{ Documentary Filmmaker Larry Cappetto
Voices of History YouTube Channel
Voices of History Radio Station, (KVOH)}

These veterans were on the ground or in the boats who came ashore on the beach's of France. We also found several radio broadcasts recorded live in the middle of the night on June 6, as the folks on the Homefront were trying to find out for sure if the invasion had actually begun.

I hope to give you a feel for how everyone felt, and what they dealt with as this historic day unfolded, be it from the air, ground, or back home, worrying about the boys so far from home.

This episode also sets the stage for the situations to come for our former Mayor, Bob Hirsch, as he arrived on the seen to take part in the final crusade to liberate the enslaved people of Europe.