British paratroopers dropping on Normandy on June 6, 2024, to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings faced an unexpected reception from French customs officials. Video footage shows the troops, carrying heavy rucksacks, having to display their passports and documents to French bureaucrats on landing.
Over 300 paratroopers from the United Kingdom, Belgium, and the United States participated in the event, replicating the historic D-Day drops on June 6, 1944. The 250 British paratroopers from the British Army’s 16 Air Assault Brigade departed from RAF Brize Norton, Oxfordshire, with their descent in France marked by the Royal British Legion Band of Wales, who played Vera Lynn’s We’ll Meet Again.
Anti-Brexit activists and journalists celebrated the spiteful gesture by the French, doubly insulting given their refusal to stop boat migrants from sailing for England from French beaches in their tens of thousands each year, as just revenge for Britain leaving the European Union.
🌎 British paratroopers get their passports checked after landing in France pic.twitter.com/qnNFgxJahm
— Telegraph Politics (@TelePolitics) June 6, 2024
Brigadier Mark Berry, commander of 16 Air Assault Brigade, was first to exit the Airbus A400M transport plane. Brigadier Berry paid homage to the 23,000 airborne troops from Britain, America, Canada, and other Commonwealth nations who participated in Operation Tonga, a critical component of the D-Day invasion.
The commemorations represent possibly the last significant gathering of D-Day veterans, as the few remaining survivors are now very advanced in years. One American veteran, 102-year-old Robert ‘Al’ Persichitti, missed the anniversary after he passed away on a ship en route to Normandy on May 31.
Reform Party leader Nigel Farage, a history enthusiast and great supporter of veterans, attended the memorial.
Honoured to be in Normandy for the 80th Anniversary of D-Day. 🇫🇷 🇬🇧 pic.twitter.com/sRU2a8jKnX
— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) June 6, 2024