D-Day Assault, 6 June 1944. Eisenhower placed the issue in the hands of the few thousand brave men at Gold, Sword, Juno, Omaha, and Utah beaches.

west of the Rhine was also an important objective that he could accomplish only by maintaining a steady advance with all of his forces. In the process, the Allies would close on the Rhine River, a defensible terrain feature that would allow great economy of force in case of a German counterattack. Furthermore, a broad-front attack used all of the Allies' military power against the Germans, rather than just a portion. Finally, a broad attack offered more chances of finding, and exploiting, enemy weaknesses. Eisenhower, concentrating on the objective of destroying the German armed forces rather than on the occupation of terrain, firmly resisted both military and political arguments against the broadfront attack.

He was as resolute in adversity as in success. When the Germans launched their counterattack through the forest of the Ardennes in December 1944, Eisenhower recognized it as a major attack well before intelligence reached the same conclusion. He moved quickly and calmly to cope with the situation, adjusting command arrangements to suit the geographical conditions under which his armies had to fight. Most significantly, he treated the developing Battle of the Bulge as an opportunity to destroy