D-Day
Today, June 6, 2019, is the 75th anniversary of D-Day. Seventy-five years ago our troops hit the beaches—five beach areas to be exact Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword. Operation Overlord was planned to liberate German-held France from Nazi control and to ultimately liberate Western Europe. Like all battles in any war, the operation was costly in lives—about 209,000 Allied lives. My father was not at Normandy but followed in the fighting in December 1944 in the Hurtgen Forest—trying to defeat the Siegfried Line. Losses there were close to 140,000.
I do not post today to romanticize war, but to honor men and women who brought about the Allied victory. I am by nature a storyteller, and my mind thinks often of the stories that were or might have been--the life stories of the men who fought and lived--and some who died.
Many of us know the individual stories of family members (many now deceased) who returned to continue to build our country and sire a new generation. We hold them in our hearts and honor them. I do—I honor all of the lives, as they all went to fight for me in a sense.
I also think of the stories that were cut short on those beaches. Perhaps there was someone who could have lived to cure a dread disease, invent something to revolutionize the world, win the Nobel Prize, become the President or just tell some loved one a bedtime story, and raise that person to see their line live on. What were they thinking when they hit the Normandy shore? What photo was tucked away in their wallet? What dreams had they formulated for the future?
I know it is in the past, 75 years ago is a long time. But I fervently believe that quote from Edmund Burke: “Those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it." And repeat it we have on other battle fields, in other foreign countries.
But today, for today at least, we should think of those from June, 1944 who sacrificed all, and those who fought and returned. These were men who probably did not want to be in a war in a strange place, some who were afraid, some even knew the sacrifice they might have to make.
Simply take a minute or two to think of that father, grandfather, and the women who went to war for our country. They did not shirk, they went. And I for one shall be eternally grateful and remember as long as that part of me that holds my memories survives.
(Footnote: We have heard of the radio address and prayer by FDR on that June day. If you would like to read the text of it, go to the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum at this site below: