The call to duty and sense of service to one’s country is a feeling that has defined Americans through generations since the days of the American Revolution. No different are the Veterans of today’s conflict than are the Veterans of past wars. Just as many young, brave men and women today, take an oath to protect and defend these United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic, as today’s older generations, who also took that oath.
December 7th, 1941 marked a day in American History that would forever ‘live in infamy’, drawing the United States into the largest military conflict to date, thousands of young men and women answered the call, sending many to the European front, however enlisting the support of all left stateside. The war lasted four more years following U.S. involvement in the war, each day as fateful and costly as the last. Two years from Pearl Harbour, in May of 1943, General Dwight D. Eisenhower began formulating the blueprints of a military operation that would come to fruition in June of 1944.
June 6th, 1944, known as D-Day, marked its place in history, as it became a pivotal point for allied forces in the Second World War, and the largest invasion ever launched. More than 150, 000 allied forces crossed the English Channel to the beaches at Normandy of Nazi-Occupied France. The invasion was costly for both sides, as the invasion was met with heavy artillery fire and interlocking machine gun fire; many men never made it to the beach, and fewer ever made it past the beach.
The Americans that made it through the Great Depression, then served on either the domestic or European front during World War II and came home to change America, became known as the greatest generations of Americans. An estimated average of 555 WWII veterans, members of America’s Greatest Generation, pass away each day, soon to leave only the text books to pass on their great legacy and share the history that they made. Still today 70-years later, we, as Americans, commemorate and thank those men and women for their defining service to the United States and lasting impression on America.