A row has erupted in France over plans for a new D-day attraction near the beaches where Allied forces landed during World War II, with critics likening the proposal to a Disney-style theme park.
The 90 million euro (US$89.57 million) project to retell the story of le debarquement of June 6, 1944, and the subsequent Battle of Normandy in a high-tech 45 minute “immersive show” has sparked a furious war of words, with opponents describing it as disrespectful to those who died and their families.
On one side are promoters of the Hommage aux Heros (Tribute to the Heroes) project, who insist it will be a historically accurate and appropriate tribute. On the other, angry locals and veterans’ families have nicknamed the project “D-day Land,” accusing the businesspeople behind it of reducing one of the bloodiest events in European history to a money-spinning tourist attraction.
Illustration: Constance Chou
“They talk creating the ‘wow factor’ of a ‘sensational show’ that will take place near the beaches and cemeteries of Normandy, which seems fundamentally immoral and indecent,” Bertrand Legendre, a former Sorbonne professor and novelist who is leading resistance to the plans, told reporters. “The ethical principle of this commercialization of history is extremely shocking.”
Regis Lefebvre, one of the people behind the project, disagrees.
“We want transmit the story of what happened with great historical rigor using today’s technology to make it interesting to the largest number of people. It’s a simple as that,” Lefebvre said. “It’s not a theme park and we never called it D-day Land. That’s the name our opponents used. As for making money, who seriously sets up a business to lose money? In England you understand that.”
A public planning consultation is running until Oct. 7. If the attraction is approved, it will be built on a 30.4 hectare site at Carentan-les-Marais, inland from the US landing beaches Utah and Omaha. The British offensive centerd on Sword and Gold beaches, and the Canadians came ashore at Juno beach. Its backers hope it will open in 2025 and attract 600,000 visitors a year, paying up to 28 euros for tickets.
Legendre has a petition with 700 names of people opposed to the plan, including historians and relatives of Normandy veterans.
“We the children, grandchildren and loved ones of the American, British and Canadian soldiers who faced the enemy fire wish to register our firm opposition to the envisaged Hommage aux Heros theme park,” it reads. “We are appalled that their memory should be treated as a tourist attraction ... the eagerness of the promoters for a ‘wow factor’ is absolutely objectionable.”
“Make no mistake. The passing on of memories is see[n] here as no more than a business opportunity ... to give this project the go-ahead would demean and devalue pain and sacrifice, and present our fallen loved ones as mere curiosities in a money-grubbing entertainment venture,” it says.
Lefebvre has the backing of the former French minister of defense Herve Morin, the president of the Normandy regional council, and says the education inspectorate, the local mayor and the official French memorial association also support the project, which is funded by private investment.
Morin said he fully supported the project as a means of “marrying memory and touristic development done with dignity.”
“Honestly, as former minister of defense, do you think I’d be supporting this if I didn’t believe that?” he asked. “We have 5 million visitors to Normandy every year. Are people suggesting we should shut down all the businesses linked to the Battle of Normandy? Did anyone demand the banning of the film Saving Private Ryan?”
Charles Norman Shay, 98, an American veteran living in Normandy who took part in the first wave of landings at Omaha beach, has also given the project his blessing as an “appropriate” tribute to the fallen.
Another veteran, Leon Gautier, 97, the last of the 177 French troops who took part in the landings, is reported to oppose it.
On June 6, 1944, 156,000 British and Allied troops stormed the beaches of Normandy in Operation Overlord, a surprise invasion that would signal the beginning of the end of the Nazi occupation of France. The Nazi regime surrendered less than a year later under attack from east and west.
More than 425,000 Allied and German troops were killed, wounded or went missing in the Battle of Normandy. Since then, veterans and their families have made an annual pilgrimage to the landing areas to pay tribute to fallen comrades.
In the past few years their numbers have dwindled as the old soldiers have died. In their absence, Hommage aux Heros aims to appeal to a younger audience, drawing visitors with a show in an amphitheater seating 1,000 spectators, telling the D-day story through actors and archive footage.
The British Normandy Memorial said it was keeping out of the fray and maintaining a “neutral position” while accepting that a number of veterans and their relatives had “significant reservations” about it.
“There are a lot of commemoration sites in Normandy, which is right and proper,” said Richard Dannatt, chairman of the British memorial. “Those where people go to pay their respects, like the British memorial, are free of charge and we note that this proposed site will charge a fee, which makes it very different. We will wait with interest to see what the French planning authorities decide.”
Mark Worthington, the curator of a museum at Pegasus Bridge, where the first Allied gliders led by British major John Howard landed in the early hours of June 6, 1944, said local museums were concerned that the new attraction would “cannibalize” visitors from them.
“A lot of people who have spoken to me about it are not very enthusiastic and some are dead against it,” Worthington said. “I suppose we have to see how it is done and hope it is not distasteful.”
Penny Howard Bates, Howard’s daughter, said she thought the Hommage aux Heros idea was in poor taste.
“To seek to exploit this momentous event in history along with all the tragedy and suffering — not least by the French themselves — would be considered an outrage by those who seek to honor relatives who died to liberate France and then Europe from the Nazis,” she said.
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