World War II in Europe (9 Days) 

     Fly this afternoon from your departure city to Paris. Beverages, dinner and continental breakfast will be served in flight. There is also a movie for your in-flight enjoyment.

     Arrive Paris in the morning, local time. Upon arrival, you will be met and transferred to your hotel. The balance of the morning is at leisure.

This afternoon you'll enjoy a panorama tour of the major sights of Paris.

Those who already know Paris may wish to spend the afternoon at the Louvre or another of the city's world class museums. Or, you may prefer just to stroll along the Champs Elysees, or while away the afternoon at a sidewalk cafe.

     This morning we'll follow the Seine west to Normandy, a land of rich pastures and orchards; of castles, cathedrals and medieval towns.

Two of history's greatest epics occurred in Normandy. William the Conqueror invaded England from Normandy in 1066. In 1944, green and peaceful Normandy with its picturesque landscape and villages was the setting for the greatest military invasion from the sea in world history. On June 6, 1944 - called the Longest Day - General Eisenhower's allied forces landed on the beaches of Normandy.

This afternoon we'll visit the Memorial Museum of Caen to introduce us to the events of D-Day and the summer of 1944.

Next, we will pay homage to our British allies and visit Pegasus Bridge, where British glider troops landed and captured the span over the River Orne, preventing the Germans from using the bridge to reinforce their defenders at the landing beaches. Landing at 12:30 AM on June 6, these British airborne troops had the honor of beginning the Battle of Normandy.

     Today and tomorrow we will follow the paths of the American infantry, rangers, and paratroopers in Normandy. The first Americans to land on June 6 were our paratroopers of the 82nd and 101st airborne divisions. We will visit the Airborne Museum at Ste. Mère Eglise, the first village to be liberated. Today, this village still hangs a parachute on its church steeple as a reminder of its liberation.

Next, we will proceed to Utah Beach, where our troops landed about a mile from its intended point. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., senior officer present, and at age 57 the oldest person to land at D-Day, declared “We’ll begin our war right here.” We will visit the museum at Utah Beach.

Among the bravest of brave on D-Day were the Rangers, led by Lt. Col. James E. Rudder, who scaled the vertical cliffs at Pointe Du Hoc in face of opposing enemy fire. As General Omar Bradley wrote, “Never has any commander been given a more desperate mission than that assigned to James Earl Rudder.”

We will visit Pointe du Hoc to see the German fortifications and pock-marked landscape resulting from the massive pre-assault bombardment.

We will walk on the beach at “Bloody Omaha” and visit the cemetery overlooking the beach, where more than 9,000 Americans are buried.

The D-Day book of Cornelius Ryan was called The Longest Day, as was the film staring John Wayne, Robert Mitchum and Curt Jurgens. The phrase came from the analysis of Field Marshall Erwin Rommel, Commander of the German forces in France.

Rommel was correct. D-Day was decisive. Fortunately for us, the beaches were secured. Although terrible fighting lay ahead, Germany's fate was sealed on this fateful day. General Eisenhower's prayer was answered.

     During the ensuing weeks, fierce battles were fought throughout the Normandy hedgerows. The largest battle was around the town of St. Lô, which was almost totally destroyed. We will visit the surrounding hedgerow (bocage) country and see the monument to Major Tom Howie, the “Major of St. Lô,” who was killed on the Martinville Ridge.

Our historian will walk with us along a typical hedgerow near St. Lô, and show us why the Normandy hedgerows were so extremely difficult for the American troops to attack, and so advantageous for the Germans to defend.

The break-out from Normandy took 75 days.

We will visit the museum of the Battle of Normandy in Bayeux.

The invasion of 1944 was not the first invasion across the English Channel. Nearly 900 years earlier in 1066, William the Conqueror invaded England from Normandy.

Pictures of William’s 1066 expedition can be seen in Bayeux. Honest! The famous Tapestry of Bayeux, 230 feet long and 900 years old, shows in astonishing detail - via millions of stitches - the life and customs of the Middle Ages and William’s epic invasion of England.

This afternoon we will proceed east to the medieval city of Rouen for dinner at a typical provincial restaurant.

Continue to Paris for overnight.

     What were the causes of World War II? The war can be considered as an extension of the First World War, which destroyed the European civilization that existed in 1914.

Woodrow Wilson called World War I “The war to end all wars.” Although hindsight is always 20-20, this prediction was wildly wrong. In one of the ironies of history, our troops in eastern France in 1944-45 retraced some of the same battlefields where American “doughboys” fought in 1918.

We’ll visit Belleau Wood, where U.S. Army and Marine Corps troops helped to stop the German advance from reaching Paris. In the Meuse-Argonne Region, we’ll see the Pennsylvania State Monument and the American Memorial at Montfaucon. It was in the Argonne Forest that Sergeant Alvin York showed his extraordinary courage and marksmanship, and where the “Lost Battalion,” led by a Wall Street lawyer called up from the reserves, was surrounded by the Germans for five days, refusing to give up. A precursor of Bastogne!

World War I on the Western Front was largely trench warfare - a four year stalemate where millions of soldiers were killed or wounded. Although American troops were not involved, we will also visit Verdun. The Battle of Verdun, lasting from February to December 1916, was the longest and largest single battle in world history. We will visit the trench at Fort de Vaux above Verdun. In planning for the Second World War, senior generals on both sides were determined to avoid the futile slaughter of trench warfare.

Next, we enter Luxembourg and return to World War II. We’ll visit the American Military Cemetery, where General Patton is buried.

     The Battle of the Bulge, as the Ardennes Campaign is widely known, was the largest land battle of World War II. It was also the largest battle ever fought by the American Army.

The last offensive of the German Army, the battle cost 19,000 Americans killed in action. But our troops held the line and the offensive was a disaster for the Germans, who had put their soldiers in a noose to be cut off by reinforcing Americans under General Patton. The above comments during the siege, from an unnamed army medic and General McAuliffe, became the most widely quoted comments of the war in Europe. We’ll visit Bastogne, where our soldiers were surrounded for a week, and see the town’s monuments to this epic battle.

The noose was closed on January 16, 1945, when the 2nd Armored Division of our First Army linked up with the 11th Armored Division of our Third Army at Houfalize, north of Bastogne.

Near Malmedy we will visit the site where Nazi troops massacred 85 American prisoners.

We will visit the Battle of the Bulge Museum at Diekirch, where Colonel James E. Rudder and his troops fought to prevent Germans from expanding the southern shoulder of their penetration. By this time, Rudder was a regimental commander with the 28th Infantry Division.

Greatly assisting General Patton’s 4th Armored Division in its drive north to relieve Bastogne was the close air support provided by XIX Tactical Air Command under General Otto P. Weyland. The book Air Power and Ground Armies from the Air University at Maxwell AFB described the cooperation between Patton’s Third Army and Weyland’s XIX TAC as “the most spectacular Allied air-ground team of the Second World War.” Patton himself called the relationship “love at first sight.

     The battle of the Hürtgen Forest, lasting from September, 1944, to February, 1945, was one of the worst battles ever experienced by the American Army. Negligently planned by senior generals who had no knowledge of forest combat, we could not employ in the dense forest the advantages of air superiority, artillery, and armor, which had been decisive for us since D-Day. The crucial objective of the Roer River dams was ignored for weeks.

The battle of the Hürtgen Forest has been overshadowed in historical memory by the Battle of the Bulge. A text book example of high command negligence and its disastrous consequences, the Hürtgen Forest battles have been presented as case studies to classes at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

Accompanied by our historian, we will walk in the forest near Kommerscheidt, reflecting back on that horrible time in the autumn of 1944 when thousands of American soldiers became casualties among the firs of the black Hürtgen Forest.

By 1945, both the American and German armies assumed that all permanent bridges across the Rhine would soon be destroyed and any crossing by the Allies would be via boat or pontoon bridge. But the retreating Germans failed to bring down the Ludendorff Bridge over the Rhine at Remagen; our Ninth Armored Division captured the structure on March 7.

The capture of the bridge at Remagen enabled thousands of our troops to cross the Rhine “with dry feet.” General Eisenhower called the bridge “worth its weight in gold.”

The enormous benefit of the bridge to the Allied advance was recognized by Hitler, who ordered an all-out assault against the bridge by aircraft bombing, rockets (the V-2 had just become operational), frog men, and artillery.

At Remagen, we will visit the site of Ludendorff Bridge and see the imposing towers that still stand today. We will visit the small museum inside the towers on the West Bank.

This afternoon enjoy a delightful drive along the Rhine. See the vineyards of the famous Rhine wines, the many barges on the busy waterway and perhaps best of all, the fairy tale castles around almost every bend in the River. Of particular note are the famous Lorelei rocks, immortalized in the classic poem of Heinrich Heine. Set to music, the poem tells the story of the boatmen lured to their death by a beautiful maiden sitting on the rocks, combing her long blonde hair while singing her fateful song.

Dinner this evening, with German entertainment, will be at a popular Rhineland restaurant.

     This morning we will be transferred to Frankfurt airport to board our return flight to the U.S. Cocktails and meals will be served in flight, and a movie will also be available. Arrive back in the U.S. this afternoon.


OPTIONAL EXTENSION TO BERLIN:

If you choose to join the weekend extension and make your way to Berlin, continue your journey with a morning drive into eastern Germany to visit Weimar, home of the best and worst of German history.

The cultural history of Weimar is awesome. Goethe, Germany’s greatest writer, lived here; Schiller, who wrote the words to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony “Ode to Joy,” lived in Weimar. Johann Sebastian Bach stayed ten years in Weimar, composing his immortal music.

The former concentration camp of Buchenwald is near Weimar.

Cost for extension is $1795, plus $297 for single supplements.

     In 1945 General Eisenhower decided not to direct our troops against Berlin. Instead, he elected to leave the capture of Berlin to the Russian Army, advancing from the East. The American and Russian forces therefore linked up near Torgau, a city on the Elbe east of Leipzig, on April 25.

Enroute to Berlin, we’ll stop at Torgau and visit the meeting site and small museum commemorating the Russian - American link-up of armies.

     Berlin is Germany’s largest and most fascinating city. The wall is down, Checkpoint Charlie is now a museum; Berlin is free and undivided, and again the capital of Germany.

Sightseeing this morning includes Potsdam Square, the Brandenburg Gate, and a remnant of the infamous wall. See the Russian War Memorial, Alexander Square, and drive along Unter den Linden, the main avenue of pre-war Berlin. See the recently dedicated Holocaust Memorial near the Brandenburg Gate. Our tour ends at the top of the Kurfurstendam (Ku’damm), dominated by the bombed out shell of the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church and its new, starkly modern replacement. These buildings have become symbols of the Old and New Germany. They are among the most impressive sights in Europe.

This afternoon is at leisure.

Berlin has 85 museums. Among the most impressive is the Pergamon on Museum Island housing some of the world’s most precious artifacts and classical antiquity. The famous Pergamon Altar, dating from 160 B.C., is a masterpiece of Greek art. Nearby is the magnificent Berlin Cathedral, the largest Lutheran church in Germany.

The Jewish Museum traces the history of German Jewry from the Middle Ages to the present.

     Potsdam was the site of the momentous “Big Three” conference of Truman, Churchill and Stalin in 1945, where the partition of Germany was determined. The Conference also showed early signs of the Cold War to come, as the Soviet Union changed from ally to adversary.

We’ll also see Sans Souci, the beautiful palace of Frederick the Great of Prussia, the political and military leader who started Prussia on the road to dominance among the German states.

We will visit the House of the Wannsee Conference, where the decision was made to exterminate the Jews (the “Final Solution”). The house is now a museum of the Holocaust.

The balance of the day is at leisure in Berlin.

Stroll along Unter den Linden to the Brandenburg Gate. Visit the Reichstag, again the site of the German Parliament. Enjoy a drink at the Gendarmen Platz.

For a closer look at the Nazi period, visit the Topography of Terror exhibit, offering a riveting pictorial of Berlin from 1933 to 1945.

For the Cold War period, the Museum of the Allies includes the extraoridnary Berlin Airlift of 1947-48. From evil to redemption to renaissance, Berlin has seen it all.

     This morning we will be transferred to Berlin Airport to board our return flight to the U.S. Cocktails and meals will be served inflight, and a movie will also be available. Arrive back in the U.S. this afternoon.