I am fortunate enough to have been to France half a dozen times, although all my visits have always been to Paris and points south.
With the exception of a train ride from London to Paris in 2003, I have never been in the northern part of the country. I was the fourth man in my family to visit France, although my dad and my two grandfathers were both there for reasons other than tourism.
My grandfathers were in World War I and died in 1948 and 1985, while my dad was a teenage soldier in World War II and died in 2008. My birth father was in the Navy at the end of WWII but never saw action.
I never served.
My own second trip to France — my first with a French wife — was in 1994, a little later in the summer than the 50th anniversary commemoration of the D-Day landings of June 6, 1944.
June 6, 2024
My father-in-law’s neighbor, on hearing I was American, brought over a bottle of wine and thanked me for what my country had done to free his country from Adolf Hitler. I told him thanks and that I would pass his words along to people who played bigger roles than I had.
With the exception of Donald Trump, American presidents since the end of World War II have honored U.S. and Allied troops who gave their lives to beat Hitler. Trump? He said Hitler wasn’t all bad, that he did some good things.
He’s the one — Trump, not Hitler — who asked his chief of staff, a Marine Corps general, what would motivate young men to join the military. and that especially the ones who died wedre little better than sucker and/or losers.
I’m not sure there were ever braver, more-selfless Americans than the first wave of infantry that hit the beach at Normandy 80 years ago yesterday. Most of them died before taking more than a few steps out of their landing crafts, and it’s not like that was a great shock.
If they knew one thing in 1944, it was that some things are worth dying for. And while I think Tom Brokaw’s designation of the “Greatest Generation” is overstated at times, it’s certainly appropriate in this case. And I can say what I want about Trump, but let’s be realistic. The last president actually to see combat in a war fought in World War II and left office in 1993.
When Steven Spielberg made “Saving Private Ryan” in 1998, the opening scene was the Normandy landing. I saw a special screening for press and industry people, and I have never seen as horrified a reactions from a sophisticated audiences as I did for that scene.
If you’re unfamiliar with it, here it is. But be prepared to be shocked.
You’ll see fiction, but it’s honest enough and realistic enough to see what an amazing accomplishment it was.
Suckers and losers?
No way.
The D-Day landings were amazing, as good as it gets for Americans.