This day cannot pass without some comment.
It is V-E Day, the day the Nazis surrendered to the good guys who were closing in on them to end World War II. Victory in Europe Day marks one of the great military victories of all time.
Of course, the term “good guys” carries a bit of a mixed message in today’s context. The Soviet Union’s Red Army got to Berlin ahead of the American- and British-led Allies who were advancing from the west. The Soviet Union is now gone and Russia has re-emerged as a thorn in the U.S. side. But that’s another story for another day.
The aim today is to salute the brave warriors who advanced on Berlin and ended the Third Reich’s reign of terror. The Reich was supposed to last 1,000 years — or longer. It fell far short, only existing for a dozen years.
V-E Day was celebrated in cities around the world. The Greatest Generation saw to it that tyranny wouldn’t be allowed to stand in Europe.
The Nazis had marched across most of Europe, starting in 1938 when they seized control of the Sudetenland and then Czechoslovakia. Then all hell broke loose on Sept. 1, 1939 when Germany invaded Poland; Britain and France declared war on Adolf Hitler’s regime.
Europe would go up in flames.
In June 1941, Hitler decided to turn on the Soviet Union, with which he had signed a “non-aggression pact.” Germany and the Soviets had split control of Poland, but then Hitler decided he wanted the USSR, too.
He advanced far into Russia, only to be stopped by a combination of ferocious winter weather and a determined Soviet military machine.
The world emerged a different place after V-E Day. The United States was the greatest power on Earth. It led the effort to rebuild a continent destroyed by war. The Greatest Generation, which has been heralded ever since that great conflict, built a nation — America — into the world’s pre-eminent industrial power.
That generation is now receding into history. Of the 16 million or so Americans who answered the call during World War II, only about 2 million are left. They’re old and largely feeble now. We occasionally forget they were young, strong and brave.
We owe them everything.