Meaning of the 'D' in D-Day

Mat · 20 Mar 2006 at 15:19

Wryel said:
etc

Back for beat with back with beat for... Go! Go! Go! Go! etc

I wonder if E-bay was conceived on E-Day...

The_blue · 20 Mar 2006 at 15:25

A day didn't work
B day the same
c as above

Now D did the trick!!

honest gov..

Stringy · 20 Mar 2006 at 15:30

Wikipedia disagrees
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-Day

No matter what day they used it was going to be called D-Day (it was meant to be the 5th, alas, bad weather). Different operations were going to have different letters e.g. The proposed invasion of Japan would've been X-day for invading Kyushu, and Y-day for invading Honshu.

Defcon5 · 20 Mar 2006 at 15:47

Its a term used to describe the timing of an event

something will occur at H-Hour on D-Day, the specifics of when this will actually be do not have to be known

The actual invasion was planned for june 5th, however bad weather led to a 24hr delay (Montgomery infact wanted to postpone it a week) and as such there cannot have been an A-Day etc

Using terms such as Y-Day wouldnt be much use, as the seperate invasions would have had their own codenames (eg operation overlord/torch) so the actual time of the attack would still be at H-Hour on D-Day

#Chri5# · 20 Mar 2006 at 15:56

Stringy said:
Wikipedia disagrees
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-Day

No matter what day they used it was going to be called D-Day (it was meant to be the 5th, alas, bad weather). Different operations were going to have different letters e.g. The proposed invasion of Japan would've been X-day for invading Kyushu, and Y-day for invading Honshu.

It's worth having a read about Operation Olympic (Kyushu) and Coronet (Honshu). The figures and statistics are quite amazing. Couple of links to get going - FAS and Ibiblio

Irish_Tom · 20 Mar 2006 at 16:01

How does the term 'Day of Days' fit into this then?

Is it of any significance?

Panzer

Whappers · 20 Mar 2006 at 16:14

I'm pretty sure I was told by a war veteran that it stood for dooms day.

RandomTom · 20 Mar 2006 at 16:17

nastyhead said:
It's pretty clear

D = Day

Day Day

Yep, none of my friends believed me when I told them that, even though I read it in the National D-Day Museum in Portsmouth

OT: my b-day is on d-day which falls on 6/6/6 :cool:

William · 20 Mar 2006 at 16:19

It means deliverance day, I don't care what wikipedia says. I have a historical reference here in the form of Berlin: The Downfall - Antony Beevor.

Stringy · 20 Mar 2006 at 16:29

It was probably just penned as D-Day for an undramatic reason, and then people that were there or were related, or just were bored, theorised it stood for all sorts of fantastical things to liven it up.

Killerkebab · 20 Mar 2006 at 16:58

I always assumed the it simply meant "day".

The day "D" - D minus etc
The hour "H" - H minus etc
The time "T" - T minus etc

And the letter is simply the day.