Eightieth Anniversary of the Allied Invasion of Normandy, France During the Second World War

Today, we commemorate the eightieth anniversary of the Allied Invasion of Normandy, France that began on “D-Day” June 6, 1944 to liberate France from the Nazi Germans during the Second World War. The landing by the many Allied Powers, known as the “United Nations,” was the largest military landing in history, was led by the United States, against Germany, which led the Axis Powers, which were totalitarian States that were committing aggression around the globe. The Allied invasion, which was the beginning of the end of the war, opened a new front against the Axis. Thousands of Allied soldiers were killed on the first day and many more would sacrifice their lives on the Allied advance through France to Germany to win the war within a year and save the world from nationalist totalitarianism. The United States and many of its allies would afterward keep the peace through a strong defense against aggression, including through the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a defense pact, particularly against the increased threat of International Communism that arose from the Soviet Union and the satellite States it established in Eastern Europe after defeating the Axis there. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the Atlantic Alliance next helped to defend the world against Islamist terrorism. But now the Soviet successor state of Russia is again imperialist and led by a tyrannical ex-Soviet intelligence officer intent on reforming the Soviet Union, and who is currently committing aggression against a former Soviet Republic, Ukraine, in an obvious parallel to the threat posed to the world by the Axis Powers. NATO, which has grown in the face of the resurgent Russian threat, is as strong and united and needed as ever. The most successful defensive pact in history is inspired today by the example of the sacrifice of the troops on D-Day who helped save the world against the vital threat to its flank of an advancing superpower led by an imperialist tyrant. The United States, NATO and all its allies are obligated to keep the peace and freedom that was hard-won on the beaches of Normandy and on every battlefield of the Second World War by meeting the challenge of the current danger so that the sacrifice of eighty years ago will not have been in vain and Americans and citizens of its allies in Europe and around the world may continue to enjoy peace and freedom.