It is the Soldier, not the minister
Who has given us freedom of religion.
It is the Soldier, not the reporter
Who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the Soldier, not the poet
Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the Soldier, not the campus organizer
Who has given us freedom to protest.
It is the Soldier, not the lawyer
Who has given us the right to a fair trial.
It is the Soldier, not the politician
Who has given us the right to vote.
It is the Soldier who salutes the flag,
Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag,
Who gives the protester the right he abuses to burn the flag.
― Father Dennis O'Brien, USMC
Today is Veteran's Day in the United States, a day where we recognize what veterans have done for this nation, and for the world. In other countries it's a day of sadness, reflecting on the loss of those young men and women who served in Flander's Fields and other places. Here, we we reflect on this on Memorial Day in May - originally called Decoration Day after the War Between The States, and chosen in May because there were flowers in bloom everywhere, suitable for decorating the graves of the loved and lost.
But today we recognize the accomplishments of veterans, living and dead. This video popped up in my video feed, and while at times sounding a bit propogandistic, it seems to me to be (as the Mythbusters used to say), plausible.
How Americans introduced WWII German POWs to Thanksgiving dinner.
I say plausible because while I haven't verified any of the claims in the video, I've posted before about LTC Gail Halvorsen:
He was a kid who liked to fly, joining the Civil Air Patrol in 1942 and then the brand new US Air Force when he was old enough to sign up. He missed World War II because of his age but found himself in the left hand seat of a C-54 in Germany, 1948. That's when Stalin cut Berlin off from the Free World and the Berlin Airlift started.
[Then] Lt. Halvorsen was at Tempelhof Airport one day when he saw some kids standing on the other side of a chain link fence. They told him not to worry if the weather was bad and he couldn't bring in food. You see, they said, they could live on very little food but if they lost their freedom they thought they would never get it back. Smart kids.
Halvorsen wanted to do something for them and told them that he'd drop some gum from his plane. They'd know it was him because he'd wiggle his wings. He and his co-pilot pooled their candy rations for the next day's flight. Because it was heavy, they made little parachutes out of handkerchiefs.
...
They called him the "Candy Bomber" and when the word got to the Press it became a sensation back in the States. School children and candy manufacturers donated candy for the children of Berlin. In just a few months Lt. Halvorsen couldn't keep up with all the candy and handkerchief parachutes that were arriving in the mail. Pretty much everyone in his unit was now a Rosienbomber (as the German kids called them - "Raisin Bomber". Halvorsen himself was known as "Uncle Wiggly Wings" because of his signal that he was about to drop sweets.
Operation "Little Vittles" dropped 23 tons of candy in a quarter million handkerchief parachute loads. Halvorsen was awarded the Großes Bundesverdienstkreuz, Germany's highest award.
Like I said, plausible. American veterans came from the pool of American citizians, and pretty much returned to that pool of Americaness. One of the seldom considered accomplishments of the Greatest Generation was not just that they won the war, but that they won the peace afterwords. At least with Western Europe, although post-1992 it seems like Eastern Europe as well.
They did it because they were Americans. Yes, they could afford to be generous to the defeated, but they did it more or less unconsciously because that was who they were. In my mind, this was the greatest hour of American veterans, and the Americans who stood behind them.
And so while this is a day of sadness overseas, let me be the first to wish you a happy Veteran's Day. Thanks to all who served, including Grandpa, Dad, Uncle Dick, nephew Daniel, The Queen Of The World's son, our Son-In-Law (just retiring from the Navy), and last but by no means least our very own ASM826. The citizens - of whom you were once part and to which you returned - are proud indeed that of the members of its own Armed Forces.
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