D Day Commemorated

Sixty-six years ago, the beaches at Normandy were the site of one of the largest invasions in history, as the Allied Forces began the slow recovery of Europe from Germany and the Axis.  Interviews with veterans from last year's celebrations, such as the one in the Telegraph with SGT Ken Scott (UK: 50th Div, Durham Light Infantry), say it all:

'"There's no hatred left, none at all," he says. "We have to move on and forget, but I felt it was my duty to come back and be reverent. There are no stains on the beach now, no bodies being washed up. The tide has cleaned this beach but it is the same beach we came up on. ... What was it like? If you were not there you will never know. Go to a cemetery and look at every cross and think of each one as a son or a husband or a father of children and count them, and then you might know a little."'

By Fox News with Jewish Veteran, Arthur Seltzer (4th Sig BN):

'Not that Arthur was alone in his endeavors. He was one of tens of thousands of young Americans who on June 6, 1944, took part in the D-Day landings, an unprecedented invasion that took so many lives, but ultimately saved the world from being crushed under the Nazi jackboot. ... Arthur did stay alive, and later on that fateful day he saw the sergeant whose idea it had been to sign the dollar bill, a dollar bill Arthur has kept to this day. "He says, 'You and I are the only two survived from that landing craft,' and I said to him. 'You mean you lost your whole squad?' and he says, "Yes I lost my whole squad." ... Arthur Seltzer's war did not end on D-Day. He went on to fight in the Battle of the Bulge, forever known as the greatest battle of the war, and on April 29, 1945, Arthur, who is Jewish, was with the American troops who discovered the Dachau concentration camp. Arthur describes the scene as, "Dead bodies all around, naked skeletons, people dressed in these uniforms with black stripes, they were half starved, the odor was so bad you could hardly take it. The odor of death."'

May we never forget.

UPDATE 1: You Took Your Time - We're Taking Ours

Update 1: Good news from Secretary Clinton: NATO appears to be pledging up to 7,000 troops from twenty-five member nations. NPR is reporting that WH staffers state that these commitments were made prior to the president's speech. Germany and France are standing pat on waiting for the January conference before committing to any troop increase. It will be interesting to see 3,000 more troops can be whistled up between now and the end of January. If so, Gen. McChrystal's plan would be almost fully staffed. President Obama now seems to accept that the surge plan from Iraq is transportable to Afghanistan.

Previously Posted:
While the Pentagon and President Obama have requested 10,000 additional Afghan-bound troops from NATO members, primarily for training purposes, NATO is likely to provide, at most, 5,000 troops. If the war has lost support here in the United States (to 50% or just under), support in the European public is far lower, and NATO governments have lost patience with President Obama's long decision-making process. Germany and France seem unwilling to answer the president's call until at least January:

'German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm welcomed Obama's timeline for withdrawal saying it was "correct and sensible." But on the question of whether Germany would send more troops, he preferred to point to the Afghanistan conference set to take place at the end of January in London. After the conference, Germany will decide "whether and if so what kind of additional efforts we might undertake." ... German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle also pointed to the January conference. "Obama also took his time to work out the speech and his strategy and we will take our own time to assess what he said and discuss this with our allies," he said. Indeed, the only countries which immediately offered to up their troop contingent were Britain, Poland and Italy. Prime Minister Gordon Brown said that the UK would send an additional 500 troops with Poland likely to up its contribution to 2,600 from 2,000. Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said his country would send more as well, but avoided a concrete pledge, saying only that Rome would "do a lot."'

Reaction to the President's speech at West Point was mixed, and the latest major polls were taken prior to the speech, making it difficult to gauge it's effect on the American public. Spiegel Online has openly reflected Europe's disenchantment with Obama Administration leadership. One can only hope that they'll pony-up in the long run, or the new Afghan strategy will prove just as flawed as the old.

UPDATED: Remembering Poland

Updated links to: the ongoing war of words with Russia over Stalin's role, today's commemorative ceremonies in Poland and elsewhere, and ongoing efforts to rehabilitate Stalin.

Seventy years ago, 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland at 0445 on three fronts and by naval bombardment. Two days later, France and Great Britain declared war on Germany, and the battle for Europe was joined. Culturally rich Poland however, was sacrificed on the altar of delay and prevarication, and less than one year later, Norway and Denmark followed. Preceding the start of combat, Germany threatened all Jews, her neighbors, and took over a relatively complacent Austria. She took these actions one step further by hobbling Russian and Italy through a non-aggression pact and peace treaty respectively.

In 1943, Poland's agony culminated with the Warsaw ghetto uprising and deportation and slaughter of her remaining Jews. The end of the war brought no peace to Poland, which was promptly folded into the USSR after the Soviet Union invaded western Poland (eastern Poland was invaded following the non-aggression pact). Poland did not become her own nation again until 1989 when Lech Walesa, supported spiritually and politically by the Pope and

President Reagan, led the Polish arm of the Velvet Revolution.

Remember Poland.