Eris was originally called "Xena", after the main character of the television series "". However, there is a rule stating that all objects orbiting outside Neptune’s orbit have to be named after a creation of mythology. Therefore, it was officially named Eris on September 13, 2006. Eris is named after the goddess of strife, discord, contention and rivalry in Greek mythology.
Eris has one moon called Dysnomia. It was discovered on September 10, 2005. Dysnomia was originally nicknamed "Gabrielle", after a character from the television series "Xena: Warrior Princess", like Eris. However, like Eris, it could not be called this. Dysnomia was named after the daughter of Eris, in Greek mythology. Dysnomia is the goddess (or spirit) of lawlessness and poor civil constitution.
Media reports have argued that Eris is the tenth planet, along with astronomers and NASA scientists. However, the definition of a planet was changed in August 2006. Under the new specifications, Eris, along with Pluto, was lowered in status to a dwarf planet.
Scientists are continuing to find out more about Eris and its moon, and to look for any more moons and possible rings. Because Eris is so far away, it would take 24.5 years to visit Eris with a space probe.
Operation Overlord
Operation Overlord was the 1944 campaign for the invasion of continental Europe in World War II. It was fought by the Allied forces against German forces. The most critical part was the Normandy landings, which were to get the Allied armies onto the continent of Europe. This might have failed. Heavy casualties were expected, even if it succeeded. It was successful. The Battle of Normandy raged until German forces retreated across the Seine on 30 August 1944. This marked the close of Operation Overlord.
The main Allied forces came from the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada. Nine other nations also sent units, the rest being Australia, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Greece, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and Poland.
Preparations were large and complex. Operation Overlord was the largest and deadliest amphibious assault in the history of warfare. Almost three million troops crossing the English Channel from England to Normandy in then German-occupied France.
Allied troops made many practice landings to understand how to do it.
Maps of Normandy beaches were created. The planners knew heavy tanks and transport could not travel on the beaches, which had soft peat underneath them. Detailed maps of the area were required. Where peat had to be travelled on, the plan was to lay down matting.
On 7 April and 15 May, Bernard Montgomery presented his plan for the invasion. He planned a ninety-day battle, ending when all the forces reached the Seine.
The goal for the first 40 days was to capture Caen and Cherbourg (especially Cherbourg, for its deep-water port). Then Brittany and its Atlantic ports would be captured. Railways and roads in northern France would be bombed to block reinforcements for the defenders. Next, the Allies would go 125 miles (190 km) to the southwest of Paris. The Allies would then control the land between the rivers Loire in the south and Seine in the northeast.
Meanwhile, the Allies made great efforts to make the Germans think the invasion would happen elsewhere.
The Allies developed new technology for Overlord. The "mulberry", a mobile concrete harbor, allowed the Allies to supply their soldiers on the beach without capturing one of the heavily defended Channel ports. Major-General Percy Hobart, a military engineer, designed modified Sherman and Churchill tanks.
In the months leading up to the invasion, the Allies worked at military deception. German coastal defences were stretched thin in 1944. Once Normandy had been chosen as the site of the invasion, it was decided to attempt to trick the Germans into thinking it was a fake invasion and that the true invasion was to be elsewhere. This was called Operation Bodyguard. In the weeks leading up to the invasion, the Allies tried to make the Germans think that the main invasion would take place at the Pas de Calais and in Norway. The deception was an industry in itself. It included dummy messages, dummy tanks in places near Dover and the south coast of England, using double agents to spread false information, dummy radio messages, and so on.
The deception was highly successful. It led Hitler to delay sending reinforcements from the Pas de Calais region for nearly seven weeks (the original plan had specified 14 days). In his memoirs, General Omar Bradley called "Bodyguard" the "single biggest hoax of the war".
Allied forces rehearsed their roles for D-Day months before the invasion. On 28 April 1944, in south Devon on the British coast, 946 American soldiers and sailors were killed when German torpedo boats attacked one of these landing exercises, Exercise Tiger.
The security of D-Day was supported by stopping unplanned news from getting out of Britain. Travel to and from the Republic of Ireland was banned and movements near the coasts was not allowed. The German embassies and consulates in neutral countries were given false information.
All the same, there were several leaks before or on D-Day. An embassy spy in Istanbul gave the Germans documents containing references to Overlord, but these documents lacked detail. Another leak was General Charles de Gaulle's radio message after D-Day. He stated that this invasion was the real invasion. This had the potential to ruin the Allied tricks. Eisenhower referred to the landings as the initial invasion. The Germans did not believe de Gaulle and waited too long to move in extra troops against the Allies.
The British did an airborne assault on the River Orne. The British goal was to capture the Orne River bridges to prevent German armor from using them and to prevent retreating Germans from blowing them up. This way, they could be used by Allied armor and vehicles.
The British sea attack units would attack through Sword and Gold Beaches. The United States had an airborne division and land units, which were to take Omaha Beach, the Pointe du Hoc and Utah Beach. The Canadians would work with British units to attack Sword Beach. The British and Canadians had separate beaches, Gold Beach and Juno Beach, respectively.
The Invasion Fleet was made upfrom eight navies made up of warships and submarines, split into the Western Naval Task Force (Rear-Admiral Alan G Kirk) and the Eastern Naval Task Force (Rear-Admiral Sir Philip Vian). The fleet was led by Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay.
The Allies assigned codenames to the various operations involved in the invasion. "Overlord" was the name for the landing on the Continent. Getting a secure hold on the area was codenamed "Neptune". It began on D-Day (6 June 1944) and ended on 30 June 1944. By this time, the Allies had control in Normandy. Operation "Overlord" also began on D-Day, and continued until Allied forces crossed the river Seine on 19 August 1944.
Through most of 1942 and 1943, the Germans thought successful Allied invasion in the west would not happen. Preparations were limited to building fortifications at the major ports. The number of military forces in Nazi Germany reached its peak during 1944 with 59 divisions in France, Belgium and the Netherlands.
Field Marshal Erwin Rommel was in charge of the wall. He improved the defences of the entire coastline. Steel obstacles were put on beaches, concrete bunkers and pillboxes constructed, and low-lying areas were flooded. Pointed stakes were set up on likely landing grounds to make it hard for the Allies to do airborne landings. The Germans fortified the foreshore area as part of their Atlantic Wall defences (including tank turrets and barbed wire).
These projects were not finished, especially in the Normandy sector. Allied bombing of the French railway system made it hard to move materials, and the Germans were convinced by the Allied tricks that the landings would take place in the Pas de Calais.