A Little Boy’s Silent Vigil

UPDATE:  Welcome readers of Larwyn’s Linx.  We are grateful to Doug Ross for linking to this post.

Carnage In Color: Remembering D-Day, The Sixth Of June

Extraordinary photographs of the D-Day landings have been colorized to mark the 73rd anniversary of the largest seaborne invasion in history.

Brazilian artist Marina Amaral has transformed the images in remembrance of one of the turning points of World War II where experts believe 4,400 allied troops lost their lives.

Each image has been created following hours of research into the subject pictured, in order to make the retouching as realistic as possible.

Marina told The Sun: “I have always been fascinated by history since I was a kid, but the colorization itself came into my life in a random and unexpected way.  I was bored surfing the internet when I found a few colorized photos from the World War II in a forum.  I was using Photoshop as a hobby for many years, so I already had a sense of how the software works and what tools I should use. I tried to reproduce the atmosphere of the places and get as close as possible to what these soldiers actually saw with their own eyes.”

“The generation of World War II is almost all gone, so I think it is extremely important to rescue these photos through a process that interests the new generation. So maybe people will be able to better understand what happened.”

I am reposting a video that deeply touches my heart—a little boy who wanted to thank all the Americans who died in the fight against fascism and pure evil.  Wait for the 5-minute mark to see who joined his silent vigil.

Millions Cried Out For Liberation And The World Prayed For Its Rescue

World War II veteran Paul Jackson, who landed on the beach during D-Day, signs a photograph from D-Day during an event to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Victory in Europe (VE) Day at the National World War II Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, DC. (Photo credit: SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

This day, June 6th, marks the 72nd anniversary of D-Day.  Operation Overlord was the largest invasion by sea in history on the Normandy shores of France and was the turning point in World War II by Allied Forces to liberate the continent of Europe from Nazi Germany.

There are so few surviving veterans.  The National World War II Museum estimates that by 2036, there will be no living veterans out of the roughly 16 million who served from the United States.

Prolific character actor, Charles Durning, who died on Christmas Eve 2012, was in the first wave of troops to land on Omaha Beach on D-Day and his unit’s lone survivor of a machine gun ambush.

For much of his life, he avoided discussing the harrowing combat experiences that never left him confessing, “There are many secrets in us, in the depths of our souls that we don’t want anyone to know about.  There’s terror and repulsion in us, the terrible spot that we don’t talk about.  That place that no one knows about—horrifying things we keep secret.”

In 2007, during the National Memorial Day Concert from the West Lawn of the US Capitol, Durning recounted the horror of the landing on Omaha Beach.  It was riveting and left the audience in tears.

Durning was awarded a Silver Star for valor and three Purple Hearts.  He spent months in hospitals and was treated for psychological trauma.  In 2008, France awarded him the National Order of the Legion of Honor.

This June 6, remember well the heroism of all those young men who fought to liberate America’s oldest ally from Nazi occupation. Without their service and sacrifice, our world might be a darker place. Gen. George S. Patton may have summed it up best when he said, "It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived."

They Shall Not Grow Old As We That Are Left Grow Old

Over 160,000 troops from America, Britain, Canada, free France, Poland and other nations landed along a 50-mile stretch of the Normandy coast of France. It was the largest amphibious invasion force in world history, supported by 5,000 ships with 195,700 navy personnel and 13,000 aircraft.

On that day, the sea along the heavily-fortified beaches of Omaha, Utah, Gold, Juno, Sword and Pointe du Hoc ran red with the blood of almost 9,000 killed or wounded. It was a major turning point in World War II. Eleven months after D-Day, the war in Europe ended with an Allied victory on May 8, 1945.

On that ominous day, President Franklin Roosevelt had asked the American people to join him in prayer.  He concluded: 

“Help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice...I ask that our people devote themselves in a continuance of prayer. As we rise to each new day, and again when each day is spent, let words of prayer be on our lips, invoking Thy help to our efforts. Give us strength…and, O Lord, give us Faith. Give us Faith in Thee…With Thy blessing, we shall prevail over the unholy forces of our enemy…And a peace that will let all of men live in freedom, reaping the just rewards of their honest toil. Thy will be done, Almighty God. Amen.”

They Stepped Forward To Say “Send Me, I Will Go,” And Never Came Home

Pausing today to remember the sacrifices of our fallen warriors, it has been difficult to watch the gains of ISIS in Iraq’s Anbar Province and the subsequent fall of Ramadi where America’s first Navy SEAL, Marc Lee, was killed in a ferocious firefight.

Gold Star mother Debbie Lee, Marc’s mom, traveled to Ramadi in 2007 and returned home with some of its powdery soil in a plastic bag where her son’s blood was shed.  She sat watching her TV as the black flag of ISIS flew above the city.  Her outrage and grief can never be fully imagined.

So deep was her anguish she wrote a letter to Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin E. Dempsey following his controversial comment about the fall of that city.  Dempsey said, “The city itself is not symbolic in any way.  It’s not been declared part of the caliphate on one hand or central to the future of Iraq.”

In her letter Lee wrote, “I’ve traveled to Ramadi and visited Camp Marc Lee in 2007. I brought back soil from that city where Marc breathed his last. I interviewed Iraqi General Anwer in 2010 when I returned. I asked him if you could say one thing to the American people what would you tell them. He paused and with deep emotion said, ‘We will tell our children and our grandchildren for generations to come what Americans have done. There is American blood poured out on our soil.’” Lee added, “It seems the Iraqis understand the importance more than you do sir.”

Dempsey sent a short letter of apology stating he did not mean to add to her grief writing, “Marc and so many others died fighting to provide a better future for Iraq.  He and those with whom he served did all that their nation asked.  They won their fight and nothing will ever diminish their accomplishments nor the honor in which we hold their service.”

Dempsey has gained a reputation for being more interested in his post-military career and future benefits than the well-being of our troops.  He has become, as Sen. John McCain stated, “the most disappointing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs that I have seen, and I have seen many of them…he has basically been the echo chamber for the president.”

On D-Day seventy years ago, Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower said in his address to the troops who would storm the beaches of Normandy, “You are about to embark upon the great crusade toward which we have striven these months.  The eyes of the world are upon you…I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty and skill in battle.  We will accept nothing less than full victory.”  These inspiring words are inscribed on a wall at the World War II Memorial.

There are other inscriptions at the memorial referring to America’s “righteous might” and the “destruction of the enemy.”  At the northern end there is a monument that bears the words of Gen. George Marshall:  “Our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other.”

There is no monument in Washington and there may never be one to the American soldiers who have fought and died in Iraq and Afghanistan thanks to the Commemorative Works Act of 1986.  The act prohibits new war memorials until at least ten years after the officially designated end of a conflict.  If military operations against the evil forces of terrorism mean a permanent state of war, there may never be any memorials in our nation’s capital.

The World’s Most Dangerous Community Organizer’s fixation on his legacy will prove most discomforting if his words were to be carved in stone.  After the Islamic State won major battles in Iraq and Syria last week he said, “I don’t think we’re losing.”

At Arlington National Cemetery, alabaster headstones are a sobering reminder that even in death our soldiers stand as sentinels of unquestionable courage and sacrifice and we must honor those virtues.

At sunrise this morning, I lowered the flag on the 20-foot flagpole in my yard to half-staff.  All morning it hung there motionless.  According to tradition, at noon I reverently hoisted it to full height.  As if on cue, it caught the wind and flapped proudly as if to signal hope beyond death.

How Can You Look Upon This And Not Be Changed Forever?

UPDATE 8/3/2014 11:34 AM:  I wish to thank Bayouwulf of iOwnTheWorld for linking to this beautiful story and I welcome the readers who chose to click over to learn about this young man and his love of country.

Normandy: The 6th Of June

Normandy's cliffs are still littered with gun emplacements and other heart-rending reminders of the invasion that freed a continent including the white headstones of thousands of fallen American troops who fought against tyranny.

Today amid the stillness, it is disquieting to imagine that above the cliffs of Omaha Beach, the Germans had at least 85 heavy weapons and machine guns trained on the beaches below that could rain down about 100,000 rounds per minute cutting our boys to ribbons.

Ernie Pyle, the Pulitzer Prize winning war correspondent for Scripps-Howard, was walking along the beach and noticed something in the sand.

“The strong swirling tides of the Normandy coast line shifted the contours of the sandy beach as they moved in and out. They carried soldier’s bodies out to sea, and later they returned them. They covered the corpses of heroes with sand, and then in their whims they uncovered them.”

“As I plowed out over the wet sand, I walked around what seemed to be a couple of pieces of driftwood sticking out of the sand. But they weren’t driftwood. They were a soldier’s two feet. He was completely covered except for his feet; the toes of his GI shoes pointed towards the land he had come so far to see, and which he saw so briefly.”

It has been 30 years since President Ronald Reagan commemorated the 60th anniversary of D-Day.  Following his speech at Point du Hoc, he spoke at the Omaha Beach Memorial to honor those who died there saying, “…We can only honor them by rededicating ourselves to the cause for which they gave a last full measure of devotion.”

“Today we do rededicate ourselves to that cause. And at this place of honor, we're humbled by the realization of how much so many gave to the cause of freedom and to their fellow man.”

President Stompy Feet will commemorate the 70th anniversary of D-Day amid his squabble with Putin.  In light of his disdain for America’s military albeit the VA scandal and the 5-for-1 trade of high-ranking Taliban commanders for a “warrior of Islam” deserter, I am glad that the brave heroes who are resting peacefully beneath those white headstones cannot see the dishonor this president has brought upon America or know the cowardice of the man who currently occupies the Oval Office.

D-Day at the VA

Cross posted at Proof Positive