Posted by
Roxanna M. on Monday, May 25, 2009 11:02:08 AM
A man I once respected once said: "I mean, it was not soft power that freed Europe. It was hard power. And what followed immediately after the hard power? Did the United States ask for dominion over a single nation in Europe? No. Soft power came in the Marshall Plan. Soft power came with American GIs who put their weapons down once the war was over and helped all those nations rebuild. We did the same thing in Japan.
So, our record of living our values and letting our values be an inspiration to others I think is clear. And I don't think I have anything to be ashamed of or apologize for with respect to what American has done for the world.
We have gone forth from our shores repeatedly over the last hundred years. and we've done this as recently as the last year in Afghanistan and put wonderful young men and women at risk, many of whom have lost their lives, and we have asked for nothing except enough ground to bury them in . . ." (Emphasis mine)
2,289 Aisne-Marne, France
5,329 Ardenes, Belgium
4,410 Brittany, France
468 Brookwood, England
3,812 Cambridge, England
5,525 Epinal, France
368 Flanders Field, Belgium
4,402 Florence, Italy
7,992 Henri-Chappelle, Belgium
10,489 Lorraine, France
5,076 Luxembourg
14,246 Meuse-Argonne, France
8,301 Netherlands
9,387 Normandy, France
6,012 Oisne-Aisne, France
861 Rhone, France
7,681 Sicily, Italy
1,844 Somme, France
4,153 St. Mihiel, France
1,541 Suresnes, France
104,186
This is the number of Americans who reside in American cemeteries at the locations indicated. Americans who gave up their youth and their lives on foreign soil in the defense of others in wars started by others. Americans who never saw their homes again. Their headstones stand as mute testimony to what America has to "apologize" for.
The next time the Poseur-in-Chief, whom the author of this quote endorsed, feels the need to apologize for this great nation, he should visit the foreign dead in foreign cemeteries in this country, the final resting places of those who gave their lives in defense of this country in wars we started. Shouldn't take him long.
Take time this Memorial Day to thank the living and remember the dead who answered this country's call to service, the minority that stood in harm's way so that the majority did not have to.