Today, we remember and honor the millions of brave soldiers and private citizens whose bravery, courage and determination ended a war that began with unimaginable atrocities against human life. Few believed such atrocities were going on even upon photographic proof its existence. Many turned the other way. Peace came at a huge price with lost of millions of innocent lives and lives of those who sacrificed so others could live. It is incomprehensible that a government could carry out a program of systematic termination of lives for so many years without being called out.
It is still incomprehensible to me that the current world leaders would cuddle states that continue to call for the destruction of human lives - be it the destruction of the western civilization or the destruction of Israel. Have we not learn anything from the Second World War? Were those sacrifices made in vain? How do we honor those sacrifices?
Could we have won the war if we had the same team of world leaders and commander-in-chief we have today? Could we have won the war if we had the same press corp we have today? Could we have won if images of the ugliness of war and mistakes of war were splashed instantaneously across our TV screens and published over the internet? Could we have won if media and politics were allowed to control the way the war was fought? Could we have won if the media and politicians insisted on indisputable evidence that atrocities were committed? Fortunately, it was much more difficult to remove the traces of over 6 million lives and human remains than it was to remove the traces of weapons of mass destructions!!! 
4 comments:
I quite agree about the D-Day celebrations and whether our current leaders would have acted in the same way as the leaders did in the forties. I know many veterrans of the war and even a few men who stormed the beaches on D-day itself in that June of long ago. What made most of us in England furious was that the French leader failed to invite our head of state (The Queen of England) to the ceremonies. He was too busy toadying up to President Obama, conveniently ignoring the fact the the British and Canadian forces landed on three beaches with a larger number of men than the Americans. In fact he invirted nobody from the UK - not even our Prime Minister (although Brown could have pushed for an invite.) The Queen,in fact, is the only current head of state who actually served in the forces dyuring the war years. None of the others did. I remeber talking to Jack Lord (of Hawaii 5.0 fame ) one evening who related his experiences of the landings - I think he went across on day three. All were very brave men and should never be forgotten.
Bill, I can't agree with you more about the French government not inviting the Queen - such a simple traditional protocol of an event that is remembered every year - there is simply no excuse! I was very surprised when I learned about it.
But then, the present batch of world leaders seemed to care little about observing protocols and traditions, much less be mindful of the lessons of history of why and how time and again we end up fighting wars that we did not start!
I fear with their war averse attitude, they are allowing the seeds of unimaginable chaos and tragedy to be planted during their administrations and by the time disaster strike the world, they will not acknowledge that their inaction was the cause of the problems. The future administrations will be tasked with the unpleasant job of cleaning up their mess.
NK is giving them the finger each time it launches its missiles, currently prepping for its third launch. Guess what will soon be available in the market for extremist groups and rogue countries? Yes, the dreaded N weapons in the wrong hands.
We are in for a rather rough ride. I hope I am wrong.
WWII seems like a very long time ago to me but I recognise how different the world would have been today if all those brave people hadn't made the ultimate sacrifice.
Pootle, WWII has little meaning for your generation and that is kind of sad because there is a lot to learn from both WWI and WWII. Even my generation is somewhat removed from WWII and I would have been less passionate had it not been for sitting next to my H, watching the documentaries and getting insight into the challenges and sacrifices of a truly brave generation - a period when honor and love of country was the badge of all people. That is my humble opinion of the generation that fought WWII.
Sadly, in another generation the sacrifices of the brave in WWII and the horrors of the holocaust would all be a faint and distant memory as those who lived and survived the horrors of that war would no longer be among us.
It was a compelling reminder of the horrors of WWII when I saw the numbers etched on the arm of an elderly gentleman during my trip to the Gold Coast of Australia years ago. He stretched his hand to reach for a glass - that's when I saw the numbers and my heart missed a couple of beats. I have also been to Dachau and it was difficult just being there and knowing what had happened to so many innocent lives - their only crime was being born a Jew!
Such is life - we move on and hope that the future generations will always be mindful of the lessons of historic events.
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