It was June 6, 1944, the Allied forces had just launched the biggest amphibious attack in history. A strong 3 million soldiers lined up to retake Western Europe and take down the Nazi war machine. The Nazi army had received word of the attack prior to allied troop deployment, setting up and fortifying their defenses on the five French beaches. Atop the cliff, hundreds of Germans stood behind their concrete bunkers and loaded MG-42s, aimed at the shoreline. These modified weapons holding enough ammunition to wipe out a small country, firing faster than the Allies could make it to the beach. Gunners stood like statues with their eyes aimed down the iron sights, spotters next to them peering through binoculars, waiting for the oncoming enemies.

The boats were coming. Beasts of metal skillfully gliding through the waves, making their way to the shore. Fifteen armed men flanking each ship on either side, shivering in fear of the upcoming battle. They just kept coming, tens upon tens of new ships breaching the horizon every minute that went by. Closer and closer they came, eventually the first ship started to stop, the men aboard getting themselves ready for the battle ahead. As soon as the exit ramp dropped, I moved my finger onto the trigger, the cold metal slowly but surely numbing it through my thin gloves. Iron sights aimed directly at the middle of the ramp, ready to do what it took to survive. The first man’s shoulder peeked the corner, and I shot, and just kept shooting. They just kept coming, tripping over the bodies of their dead comrades before eating the bullets of my MG-42.

Although few men made it off the boats the few that did were the unlucky ones, once you started towards the bunkers the horrors became more obvious, rotting corpses, piles of intestines, and people screaming for help. As more stepped off those ships more dropped into the watery sand. I didn't stop to think about what those men were going through, I just kept firing. The rest of us in the concrete bunkers kept cutting down American soldiers. I watched as men tried to turn back but were then shot by other gunners. As the ramps went down it was a large new target that we needed to start firing at. Before long the ships stopped coming and the soldiers stopped running up the beaches. So many lay dead on the shores.
My spotter yelled all clear, not one man stood alive on that beach. I slowly stood up to stretch my legs; we had won.

There was a knock at my bunker door. I made my way over, turning the frigid brass handle, revealing the outside. All of the other gunners and spotters lined up with their backs to their doors. As soon as the general walked out, the cheering started. You would've thought someone had scored a goal in a sports game. After minutes of patting each other on the back and congratulating, reality struck, we had just killed over 15,000 people.