Clive Bibby: Are we worthy custodians of our proud heritage?

When watching the D-Day landing footages on TV recently, I couldn’t help comparing that generation who were prepared to die, as so many others did, in order to keep us free, with the current generation and wondering whether today’s young men and women would have responded to the call as their grandparents had done so magnificently. 

As one commentator said: “there can be no doubt that their effort on that day will go down amongst the greatest examples of self sacrifice in the history of mankind.”
The fact that it changed the course and ultimately the outcome of the war seems almost incidental compared to the heroism displayed by so many on this and other battlefields during the entirety of World War 2.

Dr Oliver Hartich: D-Day's legacy for New Zealand

Yesterday, 6 June, was the 80th anniversary of D-Day, the Allied landings in Normandy. This day marked the beginning of the liberation of Western Europe from Nazism. It was also the birth of the modern West as a community of nations upholding the principles of liberty.

Many New Zealanders may not know that our nation played a crucial role on this day. An estimated 10,000 New Zealanders supported the landings as pilots, crew members, and sailors in the Royal Air Force and Royal Navy. They flew bombers, fired from warships, and steered landing craft onto the beaches of Normandy – all under heavy enemy fire.

Ele Ludemann: 80th anniversary of Operation Overlord – what have we learned?

It is 80 years since D-Day when Operation Overlord. the largest amphibious invasion in the history of warfare took place.

It was pivotal in ending Germany’s occupation in Europe and came at the cost of thousands of lives.

Some of the horrors the men landing faced are explained at the Normandy American War Cemetery.

Barry Soper: D-Day - 'The wartime generation is resilient'

It was clearly an impressive and moving spectacle, remembering the 75th anniversary of the biggest ever amphibious landing, mounted from the city of Portsmouth on the southern coast of England.

More than 130,000 men arrived on the beaches of Normandy, an area known today as the Parisian Riviera. Planes and gliders carrying 23,000 arrived ahead of them.

In the coming months troops flooded into the German-held France with the invasionary force growing to two million. It was the start of the end of the Second World War.