D-Day Anniversary
(click on link below for a special Veterans Affairs video- image and video courtesy Veteran's Affairs Canada)
http://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/remembrance/history/second-world-war/d-day/video
Veteran Armand Denicola of Prince George was one of those who landed on Juno beach, at the recent grand opening of the new Legion in Prince George he spoke of that day “"I was there the first day, but, you know, they say D-Day was the 'thing', but the whole northwest Europe was important. Normandy and Juno Beach, of course, was important – that was our jumping off space – but you've got to think of the whole picture."
The "whole picture", was that D-Day was the day the Allies would start their push into Europe and eventually defeat the Germans.
It was a costly day for Canada, as 340 Canadians lost their lives, another 574 were wounded and 47 had been taken as Prisoners of War.
While there are special events taking place in France to mark the anniversary, there will be a special dinner tonight right here in Prince George at the Legion. Tickets are $10 dollars for Veterans, $15 for Cadets, and $25 for guests.
A national ceremony will take place at the Canadian Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa. Governor General David Johnston and Minister of Justice and Attorney General for Canada will be joined by Veterans, their families, youth, current serving Canadian Armed Forces members and representatives from the Government of Canada to pay tribute to all Canadians who were part of the D-Day operation and the taking of Juno Beach.
Comments
Fascinating stare down live on CNN today between Putin and Obama at a brunch with the Queen next to Obama, and the President of France giving a speech between them. Putin didn’t take his eyes off Obama, and Obama blinked first turning away not wishing to make a scene.
With hundreds dieing in recent days in the Ukrainian civil war, and foreign mercenaries fighting on both sides doing most of the killing… the two have a lot to stare each other down over.
Even if France goes ahead and sells Russia the two naval assault ships set they are catching flack for… any war with Russia would never have an amphibious landing like D-Day, because it would go nuclear long before it ever reached the D-Day stage of proportions. France is trying to be a fence sitter, not willing to cut military sales to Russia as part of a sanctions package. So its awkward for them all around.
So, in all likelihood D-Day truly will remain an original and epic event in modern world history. Faced with what they had to face that morning 70-years ago today sailing into a firestorm beach landing is not something any Canadian today will ever have to face. We should be thankful they won way back when on the beaches of Juno, and hopefully their sacrifice inspires ordinary Canadians to a higher civic duty to the kind of country our Canadian soldiers marched off those boats believing in.
People use to say, ‘we didn’t defeat hitler so that…’ and yet nowadays people shrug at the loss of our civil liberties, and the decline of honor in our politicians…. Days like today should server to remind us all why prior generations had the dignity to say, ‘we didn’t defeat hitler so that….’
I wonder if today, we would have the commitment our soldiers had on that day? It was a terrible and terrifying day, one that had to come and proved to be successful but at a horrible cost. My hat is off to all who participated.
Just wonder how many kids know what this means, and what the importance of this day was in the whole second world war
“Just wonder how many kids know what this means, and what the importance of this day was in the whole second world war”
Just plop them down in front of “Saving Private Ryan”.
Yep it’s too bad about Ukraine. When will the US quit meddling in the affairs of other country’s governments?
“Saving Private Ryan” is a great movie for the first 15 minutes alone, but there are other good films about the invasion itself.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/06/d-day-landings-on-film-hollywoods-wwii-tributes
The best one is Band Of Brothers to follow
Heard something interesting on CBC today, a little known fact; on this day in 1944, in addition to D-day, Canadian soldiers were also involved in another important action that helped change the course of the second world war;
the taking of Rome, from German hands.
It was no small feat, apparently.
Even back then, that action received little press coverage, as D-day overshadowed all other news at the time.
I was glad to learn of this, it helps one to remember that there was a hell of a lot going on in Europe besides the big beach invasion.
metalman.
Interesting point Metalman. Good thing to remember as well is that the Canadians basically did all the fighting to liberate Rome and they resented that the Americans got to take the glory of liberating the city with fresh troops off the boat.
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