D-Day Rememberance

Take a moment today to remember that 63 years ago, 155,000 American, Canadian, British, Free French, and Polish volunteers landed on the beaches of Normandy, on the North coast of France, to begin the great push to free western Europe from the Nazi war machine. The crosses, tombstones, and other markers that now show their passing are reminders of a time when battles were fought with the expectation of a minimum 10% casualty count, and when friendly troop deaths for single battles were measured, not in tens, but in hundreds or thousands.

Let's also be grateful that the modern media and opposition did not have the power then that they have now, or the invasion plans would have been leaked and published in the New York Times two months before the invasion began, and political commentators would be calling for a pullout and impeachment of President Roosevelt after the casualty reports of the first day.

Finally, remember that there are still young men and women serving now, in Iraq, Afganistan, Germany, Okinawa, South Korea, aboard ships, all over the United States, and scattered in countless other deployments that we may never know about, who still serve to protect the freedoms we enjoy today.