Sixty-Four Years Ago
Today is the anniversary of the second-most deadly attack on US soil. Sunday, December 7th, 1941 began quietly; by the end of the day 2,409 Americans had died and 1,178 were wounded. Three years and a little over eight months later the Japanese surrendered unconditionally on the decks of the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay. The United States had over 16 million men and women under arms in World War II; 291,557 of those service members were killed in action and another 369,267 were wounded.
My father was a corporal in the US Army Air Corps, stationed at Buckley Field, Colorado, on December 7, 1941. When the end of the war came he was a First Lieutenant on occupation duty somewhere in Germany. He died in 1989.
More and more WW II veterans slip away every day; soon the "Greatest Generation" will be gone. If you know a WW II vet, today would be a perfect day to thank him or her for their sacrifices...you won't have many more chances.
Today is also a good day to thank our current service members, if you know any...we are at war, after all. I'll start: Thanks, Buck. Thanks, Sam.
Update: Michelle Malkin has an interesting post about our collective fading memory. Lots of good links to Pearl Harbor related posts.
My uncle worked at Pearl Harbor in charge of a maintenance crew. He went from being in charge of 6 people on 12/6 to 100 people on 12/8. Thank you, Uncle Reynold.
ReplyDeleteThanks for stopping by, Anon. I'd like to thank your Uncle Reynold, too.
ReplyDeleteIt was like that for a lot of folks in WWII. My Dad went from Corporal to MSgt in about 18 months and then got his commission.