Some anniversaries remain popular because the people make it so. That is the case with June 6, the anniversary of D-Day in 1944.
The news media sometimes notes historical anniversaries on round numbers, like 10, 20 or 25.
But for June 6 and Dec. 7, Americans keep those dates alive.
So we asked members of our Email Interactive Group, many with military backgrounds, for their comments.
WHAT MAKES US GREAT
Today’s society spends so much of its decreasing time focusing on the demise of our society that it’s crucial we remember what makes us great.
It’s been said that the ultimate act of love is laying down one’s life for a friend, and that’s what this nation did on D-Day many times over.
The invasion at Normandy was world changing in a number of ways, and the lives we sacrificed should always be remembered and respected with patriotism and pride.
The youth of today need to realize that freedom is indeed not free but was earned by the sacrifices of ancestors now mostly gone. It’s up to those of us today to ensure that these brave people never be forgotten for the legacy they left us to enjoy. Put simply, we owe it to them.
Bill Hehn, Jacksonville
WHAT IF HITLER HAD WON?
Without being taught the history of Adolf Hitler’s attempted domination of Europe with the total defeat of the Nazi war machine, the leaders of tomorrow could be destined to repeat the diplomatic and military strategy failures of that era.
Joseph Gayhart, Atlantic Beach
Some of those who survived World War II and D-Day are still with us.
We owe them a debt of honor along with a visible display that we are proud of their courage.
The goal is to make sure today’s children realize, as they play with their iPods, the valor of those they will never know who came before them.
Albert Rabassa, Jacksonville
COURAGE DESERVES REMEMBERING
It was the day when men of massive courage charged into the maw of death to establish a breach into Adolf Hitler’s so-called Fortress Europe.
The U.S. and our allies landed in France in a place Hitler though was a diversion.
To our relief, he did not release the German tank corps in time to close the breach.
It opened a second front against Hitler that was necessary to obtain victory against one of the most murderous dictators in history.
If a person was disabled physically or mentally, Hitler ordered them put to death.
If a person was Jewish, Hilter ordered them put to death.
If a person opposed Hitler or his government, he ordered them put to death.
Many allies and American sons died fighting bravely to help bring this massacre to an end.
Edward Ogle, Orange Park
FOR FREEDOM, NOT GAIN
D-Day is still celebrated today because the allied landings on the beaches of Normandy in France marked the beginning of the end of the domination of Europe by the dictator Adolf Hitler.
This is significant.
American soldiers, sailors and airmen didn’t fight this war for territory or commercial gain for America.
They fought for the restoration of liberty of the Europeans who were subjugated by Hitler’s Third Reich.
Robert S. “Bo” Smith, Capt USN (Ret.)
NATION WAS UNITED
Every man, woman and child was part of the war effort.
If you had lived in the early 1940s, you would have seen everyone in your community becoming totally involved in the effort to defeat the Axis and Japanese war machines.
That community effort included rationing coupons, collecting aluminum pots and pans and growing and canning our own food so all the troops and fleets of ships could fight the war on the front lines.
D-Day to me means that everyone in America joined together with a firm and gritty determination to defeat evil.
And to bring peace to the world.
Tom Diekmann, Jacksonville
HISTORY TEACHER’S VIEW
Sometimes it is better to forget; sometimes it is essential to remember!
As a history teacher and as a Vietnam veteran, my students at Vanguard High School in Ocala framed D-Day as a strategic action for the liberation of Europe and as an emotional high tide for a nation brutalized by Nazi occupation.
My students examined the photographs of burdened soldiers wading ashore into the wrath of a German arsenal fighting a last gasp to survive; they recognized valor, determination and sacrifice in the faces of our troops; they embraced them as the heroes they were and remain.
June 6 is immortalized as a date the world began to take back France and opened the door to the re-established freedom of Western Europe.
I have been to France. The French remember and respect the men who came ashore and those who remain there forever in hallowed ground.
We should, too.
My students do.
Bill Boe, Gainesville
THE SOVIET FACTOR
The importance of D-Day is not what everyone supposes and celebrates; that is, that we invaded Europe to defeat Nazism.
The importance of D-Day, though we did not understand it at the time, was that by invading Europe we prevented the Soviet Union from taking control of and imposing Communism upon the entire European continent.
The Soviets took control of half of Europe anyway.
Benton L. Bradberry, Jacksonville