There was once a time when a Sword was more than a sword. Gold wasn't just a precious metal, and Utah, Juno, and Omaha where more than places our high school kids couldn't find on a map.
They were places where a lot of fine young men found the courage to charge into the jaws of death, to defeat what they saw as a great evil. Just because the ones going ashore in on the Juno sector beaches didn't have the same opposition as the ones who died on Omaha Beach doesn't make them less heroic. They didn't know what they would find when the doors opened on the landing craft.
I can only assume the opening of Saving Private Ryan is an accurate portrayal of the Hell these guys went through. War has changed, which is good. I can't imagine many scenarios where we would have to mount an amphibious assault like that again, but then again, as brave and honorable as many of our sailors and soldiers are, I can't imagine us finding 100,000+ of them willing to charge into the jaws of death like that without at least asking if it might not just might not be easier to drop a few smart bombs to take care of the problem.
God Bless the few who are left, and say a prayer for the ones who have moved on.
If you recall, America did not want to enter WWII. FDR all but forced the issue, putting civilians and allies in serious risk to do so. At least one luxury liner was sunk due to probable misinformation he saw got into the hands of the Germans. It wasn't until he cut off Japans oil supplies that Pearl Harbor was used as the cry for war. Further, most of those men were drafted. They didn't have a choice.
ReplyDeleteJust... be careful when discussing some things. While I agree, we probably had to be to war, I don't agree with how it was run, how it was managed, and many other things. FDR, the one who gave Stalin the monicker "Uncle Joe", is... not a favored of mine... and loved, absolutely loved, to throw American lives away. He and "Uncle Joe" had way too much in common.