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Amen, you did your country proud.

Forever Rest in Peace.

K.

Always remembered never forgotten

Keep smiling
Tug

We who live today in freedom owe a great debt to those who have made it possible by giving their lives so that we may continue to live free.
And every hour of every day there are those whose job it is to watch over us and to protect us.

Long ago in high school, in the time when we would start the school day by standing and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, in the School Year of 1964-1965,
in the full auditorium homeroom, there were those, just a few in number, less than a half dozen, who would not or could not, for various reasons, do the recitation.
They would sit there mute.

One day, the homeroom teacher, Mr McAlloon, usually the very quiet type, got up to the podium and angrily said words that I have not forgotten all these years:

"Every person in this room is under the protection of our American Flag. If you don't want to say the Pledge, you don't have to say the Pledge, but you will stand
in respect while the rest of us do."

From that day on the few sitters stood, albeit in silence, but respectfully. Mr M. had gotten his point across, and without incidence or backlash.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

We really should celebrate VE Day (May 8, 1945) or VJ Day (August 15, 1945).

On 11 November 1918 Ferdinand Foch accepted the German request for an armistice. Foch advocated peace terms that would make Germany unable to pose a threat to France ever again. After the Treaty of Versailles—signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand—Foch declared, due to France not being allowed to annex the Rhineland or occupy the area for a period of thirty years, "This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years". His words proved prophetic: the Second World War started twenty years and 64 days later.

Here are some photos from a book I have called "Eleventh Month, Eleventh Day, Eleventh Hour" by Joseph E. Persico




This piece of dirt should have been tried for gross negligence and incompetence and thrown out of the service.
Notice the soldier at his left doesn't look like he saluted the general since both his hands are in his pockets. I wouldn't have saluted the SOB either.

Webb wrote:We really should celebrate VE Day (May 8, 1945) or VJ Day (August 15, 1945).

On 11 November 1918 Ferdinand Foch accepted the German request for an armistice. Foch advocated peace terms that would make Germany unable to pose a threat to France ever again. After the Treaty of Versailles—signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand—Foch declared, due to France not being allowed to annex the Rhineland or occupy the area for a period of thirty years, "This is not a peace. It is an armistice for twenty years". His words proved prophetic: the Second World War started twenty years and 64 days later.

The irony here, besides the twenty year time frame, is that the Austrians really didn't care for the Archduke. His wife, Sophie (the Countess Chotek von Chotkova und Wognin), was shunned by the nobility. She was not allowed to appear with him at any official state functions. This trip was her first official outing and it was their wedding anniversary. The Archduke was shot in the jugular and Sophie was shot in the abdomen. She died at roughly 10:45 am: Franz Ferdinand, at around 11:00 am. The Emperor, Franz Joseph, though horrified by the crime itself, was not unhappy that Franz Ferdinand was out of the way. He had not wanted to have the Archduke succeed him on the throne. "For me, it is a great worry less," he told his daughter in speaking of the Archduke's death.
(Pg 139 of Europe's Last Summer by David Fromkin)

When the Battle of France ended on June 21, 1940 Hitler ordered that the surrender documents be signed in the same railway car as the 1917 armistice.

He then had the car destroyed.

Webb wrote:When the Battle of France ended on June 21, 1940 Hitler ordered that the surrender documents be signed in the same railway car as the 1917 armistice.

He then had the car destroyed.

I didn't know he had the car destroyed, interesting!