Air Operations, Bonin and Volcano Islands

• Despite very bad weather, carrier aircraft from Task Group 58.1 and Task Group 58.4 are able to mount unopposed afternoon attacks against airfields, fuel supplies, and barracks on Chichi Jima, Haha Jima, and Iwo Jima.
• 2 F6Fs and their pilots are lost, one to antiaircraft fire and one in an operational accident.
• 2 VF-32 F6Fs down an H8K 'Emily' flying boat at sea at 1350 hours.
• Task Group 58.1 and Task Group 58.4 retire to the Marianas, with Task Group 58.1 refueling along the way.
• In two days of attacks, an estimated 86 airplanes are destroyed or severely damaged on the ground at Iwo Jima, and 21 seaplanes and floatplanes are destroyed at Chichi Jima.

Air Operations, Carolines

39 XIII Bomber Command B-24s attack the Truk and Yap atolls.

Air Operations, CBI

• 28 10th Air Force fighter-bombers attack Myitkyina and targets in northern Burma.

Air Operations, Europe

Since midday on the 15th 244 V-1s have been launched against London.

• 2 Mosquitos of No. 100 Group carry out uneventful Intruder patrols Leeuwarden airfield.

• 405 aircraft of Nos. 1, 4, 5, 6 and 8 Groups begin a new campaign against flying bomb sites. Included in this total are 236 Lancasters, 149 Halifaxes and 20 Mosquitos. This raid is to 4 sites in the Pas de Calais area. All targets are accurately marked by Oboe Mosquitos and are successfully bombed. There are no losses.
• 321 aircraft including 162 Halifaxes, 147 Lancasters and 12 Mosquitos of Nos. 1, 4, 6 and 8 Groups, attack the synthetic oil plant Sterkrade/Holten despite a poor weather forecast. The target is covered by thick cloud and the Pathfinder markers quickly disappear. The Main Force crews can to little but bomb on the diminishing glow of the markers in the clouds. Photo reconnaissance and reports from the ground say that most of the bombing is scattered, although some bombs do fall in the plant area but do not affect production. Unfortunately, the route of the bomber stream passes near a German night-fighter beacon at Bocholt, only 30 miles from Sterkrade. The German controller has chosen this beacon as the holding point for his night fighters.
• Approximately 21 bombers are shot down by fighters and a further 10 by flak. 22 of the lost aircraft are Halifaxes. No 77 Squadron, from Full Sutton near York, loses 7 of its 23 Halifaxes taking part in the raid.

• 25 Mosquitos and 1 Lancaster of No. 8 Group are sent to Berlin, 8 Stirlings and 4 Halifaxes lay mines in the Frisians and off the Biscay coast, there are 53 Serrate, Intruder and flying-bomb patrols and there are 12 RCM sorties using the airborne Mandrel jamming screen for the first time this night.
• 1 RCM Stirling is lost.

Air Operations, Marianas

During the day, in response to the discovery by US submarines that a large component of the Japanese Navy’s First Mobile Fleet is sailing from the southern Philippines toward the Marianas, the US Fifth Fleet commander Adm Raymond A. Spruance, and his chief subordinates decide to reinforce the carrier antiaircraft screens with cruisers and destroyers drawn from fire-support and shore-bombardment groups as well as to shift the entire burden of responding to ground-support missions and on-call air support to aircraft based aboard Fifth Fleet escort carriers. In the meantime, carrier aircraft from Task Group 58.2 and Task Group 58.3 concentrate on neutralizing all the airfields on Guam and Tinian. This effort will ultimately fail, because pleas by experienced carrier airmen to add the power of large naval guns go unheeded.

A VF-60 F6F downs a G4M 'Betty' bomber at sea at 1440 hours.

Air Operations, New Guinea

• Escorted by 8th and 475th Fighter group P-38s that refuel at Wakde airfield, 41 38th and 345th Medium Bomb group B-25s based at Hollandia attack the airfields at Jefman and Samate at very low levels at 1255 hours. This is the longest B-25 mission yet undertaken by V Bomber Command B-25s.
• 1 P-38 is lost in aerial combat.
• 5th Air Force bombers and fighters attack the Babo airfield, Sorong, and barges and bivouacs between Hansa Bay and Wewak.
• A 348th Fighter Group P-47 downs a Ki-46 'Dinah' reconnaissance plane near Biak Island at 1050 hours.
• 8th and 475th Fighter group P-38s down 2 Ki-51s 'Sonia' bombers, 2 D3A 'Val' dive bombers, and
• 21 Japanese fighters over or near Jefman airfield between 1245 and 1300 hours.

Burma

Units of the Chinese 50th Div capture Kamaing in the Mogaung valley. Beyond Kamaing the Chinese 38th Div links up with the Chindits of the Indian 3rd Div at Gurkhaywa.

On the Salween front the Japanese counterattack, driving the Chinese 87th Div back 3 miles. Farther north, the Chinese 2nd and 36th Divs capture Chiaotou.

China

The Japanese open their offensive against Changsha, and the garrison there, units of the Chinese 4th Army, withdraws to Paoching.

Eastern Front

Mannerheim orders the Finnish forces in the Isthmus to retreat to the 'VKT Line' (Viipuri-Kuparsaari-Taipale).
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Italy

Troops from the British X Corps take Spoleto and push on to enter Spoligno as well while the Germans are still completing the withdrawal of their 10th and 14th Armies behind the 'Gothic' Line. The 8th Army also threatens Perugia. On the west side American units take Grosseto.

Marianas

At Saipan, on the north flank of the beachhead, the US 2nd Marine Div consolidates its own positions, capturing Point Afetna and the village of Charan Kanoa and joining up with the 4th Marine Div south of Point Afetna. The 4th Marine Div advances inland against strong resistance. In the previous night's fighting the Japanese lost more that 1,000 men. American guns try to silence the Japanese batteries which are firing very effectively on the beachheads from the interior of the island.

Rear-Adm Walden L. Ainsworth's battleship squadron shells enemy installations on Guam. Meanwhile Vice-Adm Raymond A. Spruance puts back the date for the invasion of Guam, in the knowledge that a big fleet under the command of Vice-Adm Jisaburo Ozawa is about to arrive there.

Mediterranean

The British submarine Sickle is lost, probably on a mine in the Kythera Channel, around this date. The entire crew of 48 are lost.

New Guinea

Fighting continues in the area of the western caves on Biak Island.

Pacific

• Intelligence from US submarines indicates 2 large Japanese naval forces (1st Mobile Fleet and a Southern Force) making a refueling rendezvous east of the Philippines, before setting sail in the direction of the Mariana Islands. The combined force totals 7 battleships, 9 aircraft carriers (4 of them light carriers), 13 cruisers and 28 destroyers. Its objective is to crush naval support of the Marianas landings. The full force of Mitscher's Task Force 58 begins redirecting itself to meet this threat.
• The Japanese submarine RO-44 is sunk by the US destroyer escort Burden R. Hastings (DE-19) in the Marshall Islands area.
• The US destroyers Melvin (DD-680) and Wadleigh (DD-689) sink the Japanese submarine RO-114 in the Marianas Islands area.

Western Front

The American VII Corps reaches the Douve River and succeeds in establishing a bridgehead across it. After formidable German opposition and bitter street fighting units of the 82nd Airborne Div enter St Sauveur-le-Vicomte, on the west bank of the Douve. The Germans withdraw in disarray. In the American XIX Corps sector, while some units man the canal linking the Taute and Vire Rivers, the 29th Div, with the V Corps' 2nd Div, advances in the directon of St Lô. In other sectors all the Allied forces continue to press forward. King George VI visits the forces.

Images from June 16, 1944

Landing French 9th Colonial Infantry Division Troops during the Invasion of Elba, 17 June 1944

Military vehicles move ashore from Mulberry Artificial Harbor A, across a pontoon bridge, to Omaha Beach, Normandy, 16 June 1944

Using the Artificial Harbor

US Army vehicles roll ashore on one of the floating causeways of the 'Mulberry' artificial harbor off Omaha Beach, 16 June 1944. The causeway had been erected by US Navy SeaBees. Note the M3 half-track in the lead, towing a howitzer, and the Jeep behind it with a semi-circle marking painted on its grill.

Using the Artificial Harbor

King George VI, accompanied by Admiral Sir Bertram Ramsay and the First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, touring the beaches at Normandy in a DUKW amphibious vehicle, 16 June 1944

Touring the Beaches at Normandy

B-29 Superfortress bombers photographed shortly before they participated in the 15/16 June 1944 raid on Yawata

B-29 Superfortress Bombers

A dazed 1Lt Jacob C. Blazicek, 367FS/358FG is lifted from the cockpit of his P-47D (42-76436, coded CP-D) at Cardonville airstrip, 6 June 1944.

A Dazed Pilot

Moroccan Troops Waiting to Invade Elba in the Corsica Canal, Italy, 16 June 1944

The Mulberry Harbor off Omaha Beach, 16 June 1944

Me-109 Crash Beny-sur-Mer, France, 16 June 1944

Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte, 16 June 1944: Lt-Col Benjamin Hayes Vandervoot copes with a broken ankle after he jumped in France. Refusing to be evacuated, Vandervoot used his jump boot as a temporary cast and fought on until his unit was relieved in july 1944. Vandervoot was a battalion commander with the Army's 82nd Airborne Division.

Lt-Col Vandervoot with Broken Ankle

A B-24 of the 460th Bomb Group falls victim to an Me 109's attack near Vienna during the Fifteenth Air Force's strike against synthetic oil plants in the area on 16 June 1944. The crew were able to bale out before the aircraft went out of control and broke in two. The B-24 in the foreground, 41-28804, is an all-over grey-painted pathfinder with ground-scanning H2X radar.

B-24 Bomber Victim to Me-109

Soldiers of the US 82nd Airborne, accompanied by a jeep, walk down what is now Rue du Vieux Château. Saint Sauveur-le-Vicomte is in ruins, 16 June 1944

Airborne Soldiers in Saint Sauveur-le-Vicomte