Evening star., 1945-06-06
One Year After

This Is the first anniversary of a
brilliant military achievement-the
Allied landing on the beaches of
Normandy. But as one looks back
over the year it is difficult to recap
ture the mood of that tense summer
day. So much has happened, so
swift has been the pace of history,
that we tend to forget the full story,
the real story, of June 6, 1914.
For most of us, to remember D day
is to think of American and British
and Canadian troops as they fought
for foothold on the beaches, of
the air-borne infantrymen and the
paratroopers as they made their
perilous descents in the rear of the
German coastal defenses, of those
grim days and weeks when the sue
cess of the invasion seemed to hinge
upon race against time and
Weather-a race to build up supplies
and manpower before an expected
enemy counterattack could hurl the
Allied vanguard back into the Chan
mel. Nor have we forgotten the
break through of July %, the breath
taking pursuit of the fleeing Ger
mans across France and Belgium,
the approach to the Siegfried Line,
and the desperate effort by Won
Rundstedt to gain time and perhaps
convert defeat into a stalemate in
the battle of the bulge We remem-
Der also the steady, irresistible ad-
vance Of the Russians, the crossing
of the ViStula and the Oder, the
falling away of the satellites, and,
finally, the total collapse of Nazi-
ism under the remorSelesS pressure
of great armies driving in from the
east and west. Within eleven months
after the first Allied soldier had set
foot on Normandy the whole of the
monstrous, evil structure of which
Hitler and Goebbels and Himmler
were symbols had fallen apart it's
principal architects were dead, and
little more than desolation and
hunger and ugly memories of the
Third Reich remained.
But what We are apt to forget is
that D day and the triumphs which
followed were not simply pulled out
Of hat by the high command. They
were the products of prodigious
effort, of the slow and painful
process of building up our armies
and our supplies in our bases on the
British Isles from which the inva-
sion was to be launched. For seven
years we had sat back and watched
the rise of German militarism, and
we did nothing. Then, In the sum-
mer Of 1940-four years before D day
we began in earnest to prepare for
war. With France fallen and the
British driven from the Continent,
we began to sense our danger. Amer
lean factories were converted from
peace to war, the Selective Service
Act was passed, and the first of our
young men, equipped with sticks in
lieu of guns, began the slow process
of learning the deadly business of
war.
Happily, this time, we were given
four years of preparation and train
ing before our armies had to face
the critical test of invasion. And
even then. as the frantic call for
trained rif1emen during the critical
phases of the battle of the bulge re-
minds US, there was not too much
time for training, nor too many
trained men available for the task
to be performed.
Certainly, with the science of war
as advanced as it is. we cannot ex-
pect again to enjoy this period of
grace. We hope and we pray-all
of us-that the youth of America
will not again be called to battle.
But If fate or the imperfections of
men should decree otherwise, we
can rest assured that another enemy
will not grant us the time for train
ing and preparation. If there is
another war, the young Americans
who will be called upon to fight it
will either be trained and ready, or
they will be slaughtered and the war
may we'll be lost 1t is this fact
which the real story of D-day
teaches us, and 1t should serve as
guide and example for Congress and
the country as we take up the matter
Of peacetime military training
program. A hundred arguments may
be raised against it by well-meaning
people, but they all fall in the face
of the indisputable fact that, should
there be another war, we will either
ha Nv u,a will bo Loot