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Jewish World Review May 9, 2005 / 30 Nisan, 5765 Say thanks to the Greatest Generation By Peter A. Brown
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Go out of your way to find someone 75 or older, whether you know him or not, and thank him for making this country, and this world, a better, safer place.
Sunday was the 60th anniversary of World War II's end in Europe. Those who fought the war, whether abroad or at home, deserve not just our thanks, but our understanding of their sacrifices that made the period since the American (half) Century.
It is almost impossible to overstate the enormity of our parents' and grandparents' achievement in stopping Adolf Hitler from forever changing our planet.
Baby boomers who lived through the Cold War and members of the younger generations who now see Islamic terrorism as the primary threat to their existence may wrongly look back at the pre-atomic-bomb era as a safer time.
Yet the relative security and outright prosperity the post-World War II generations enjoyed as their birthright occurred because the United States, Britain and, yes, the Soviet Union — with some help from Canada and Australia — freed Europe from Hitler's grasp.
In the early 1940s, the Continent was firmly in his control. Who knows what might have happened had he been able to remain in power?
Time and technology have eliminated the protection our two great oceans had provided the United States from attack. Had World War II turned out differently, that protection would have been erased sooner.
Who can imagine what Nazi Germany, perhaps in time with its own atomic bomb, would have done?
Despite the insecurity of the Cold War years, the Soviet Union's communist economics and political suppression were obviously unable to dominate the world. That's why it eventually collapsed of its own weight.
Even with today's fear of more 9-11-type incidents, no one should worry about our nation's ability to remain free and prosperous. Hitler's Germany — economically efficient and militarily mighty and menacing — could have been another story.
For those who are not history buffs, it is probably hard to imagine how unprepared we were for World War II. Had Hitler not declared war on the United States right after Pearl Harbor, there would have been significant opposition at home to Franklin D. Roosevelt doing so against Germany.
In the first two years of the war, Allied victory was far from certain, both in Europe and Japan. And had the D-Day invasion on June 6, 1944, not succeeded, a stalemate might well have developed.
The Nazis all along believed they could force a negotiated peace that left them in power in Germany and at least partly in control of Europe.
Had sheer luck not handed the United States a huge military victory at Midway Island in the Pacific six months after Pearl Harbor, the Japanese might have been able to threaten our West Coast, and perhaps force Roosevelt to renounce his commitment to eliminate Hitler first.
FDR deserves credit for leading us through those dark days.
But it was millions of soldiers abroad and many millions more people at home churning out airplanes and tanks — all of whom had just weathered the Great Depression — who made the difference.
Even the usual cynics recognize the enormity of the challenge faced by G.I. Joe and Rosie the Riveter.
Hollywood is instinctively pacifist to its core, yet Saving Private Ryan, Band of Brothers, Winds of War and War and Remembrance helped dub World War II the "Good War."
And it was certainly that.
We can debate the merits of Vietnam and Korea or the wisdom of Iraq.
But no one with a brain can argue the necessity of the United States taking a stand in World War II and making sure the job was done right.
The alternative was tolerating evil, and living under its constant threat.
The Germans believed they were the master race and saw a multiethnic and multiracial society like ours as the embodiment of all that was wrong on the planet.
Thankfully, Americans responded en masse in a way that may seem terribly naive these days.
My father, who volunteered to serve even though he was in his mid-30s and well past draft age, was emblematic of his generation.
Too many of us today take for granted what they did.
Most, like my father, are long gone.
So this week, thank those among us who are left from what was truly our Greatest Generation.
It is the least we can do.
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Peter A. Brown is an editorial page columnist for the Orlando Sentinel. Comment by clicking here. © 2005, Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services |
Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||
