[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 48 (Thursday, April 28, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: April 28, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                         FIFTY YEARS AGO TODAY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Lancaster). Under a previous order of 
the House, the gentleman from California [Mr. Dornan] is recognized for 
5 minutes.
  Mr. DORNAN. Mr. Speaker, I am very glad tonight that I have got a 
tall Washington marine here by my side, the gentleman from New York 
[Mr. Solomon]: once a marine, always a marine. I have in front of me a 
book that I understand is a series put out by the Marine Corps. I hope 
all the services are doing this. I found this in the El Toro ready room 
during our trip for former President Nixon's funeral. It's on Tarawa.
  We just passed the 50th anniversary of that amazing fight. The 
highest casualties we had taken since Pearl Harbor happened on that 
day, and I find out there is a whole series of books, I say to the 
gentleman from New York, ``Marines in World War II Commemorative 
Series.'' Take a look at that and call for the whole set, and I will 
let the gentleman know how to do it.
  First, Mr. Speaker, before I start, last week I did a special order 
on crime, and I put in quotes that the people want revenge, not in the 
meanest sense of the word but, instead, in the context that they want 
to feel safe on the streets, and I put in a series of excellent 
articles by Ben Wattenberg and Paul Johnson, the great English writer, 
parliamentarian, and philosopher who wrote ``Modern Times,'' which I 
understand from the gentleman from California [Mr. Cox] has just been 
updated, and, because I put in so many solid articles, I came up with a 
small figure here, given what the special orders cost, of $1,087. I am 
going to enter this in the Record with my special order from last week.
  Mr. Speaker, I labored under the delusion, when we passed the 50th 
anniversary of Pearl Harbor back in December of 1991, two Congresses 
ago, that we would be having a series of special orders during this 50-
year commemorative period at least for all the highlights, for all the 
major battles, for Normandy's 50th anniversary coming up this June, for 
the Battle of the Bulge at the end of this year, for Tarawa last year, 
for all the horrible, slug-it-out battles that we are commemorating 
this week, last week, and the week before as we landed on the Admiralty 
Islands above New Guinea, all that incredible jungle combat with our 
Australian allies all across the northern coast of New Guinea, which 
seems to get so little coverage here in America, and it just has not 
happened. Except for one or two of us, Mr. Speaker, nobody remembers 
these 50th anniversaries as they pass.

  Well, today is one that was kept secret, a great tragedy involving 
much friendly fire, which is one of the amendments that I hope to get 
passed on our defense authorization bill this year. But today, April 
28, is the 50th anniversary of an incident so horrible that it was kept 
secret for the entire war.
  I bring us this tiny little blurb from the newspaper, Mr. Speaker, 
and I hope that the million and a half people listening will remember 
again and debt we owe to the George Bushes of the world and to all 
those people that wore the uniform, especially those who suffered in 
combat in the dark years of 1942 and 1943; what we owe our 14,000,000 
veterans who conquered Hitler, Tojo, and Mussolini in unbelievable 
record time.
  Fifty years ago today nine German torpedo boats; it doesn't say, but 
they were called E-boats, and they were the equivalent of John F. 
Kennedy's PT 109--they stumbled, dumb enemy luck, on an allied force 
practicing off the southern English coast for the Normandy invasion 
which was to come 6 weeks later. Three of our huge landing ships were 
torpedoed by these German E-boats, and hundreds of men in our 
amphibious force were killed, dozens of them by friendly fire. We lost 
749 American soldiers and 197 sailors, and it was the worst single day 
of U.S. losses since Pearl Harbor. As I said, Tarawa was the worst 
battle loss, but this is a single incident, and it was kept secret 
until the war was over for purposes of morale.
  I guess the parents of each one of these people that died never knew 
that 946 other people had perished the day their son died, so they 
thought it was just a simple training accident. They did not realize it 
was in combat, out in the channel, getting ready for the fantastic and 
successful D-Day invasion.
  Mr. Speaker, little incidents like these pass at 50 years, and it 
reminds me of Ronald Reagan's goodbye speech to his fellow Americans 9 
days before George Bush was sworn in as the 41st President. President 
Reagan, on January 11, 1989, told all of us that we were losing our 
history. We were forgetting the sacrifices that men and women made 
through two centuries to give us this, the world's freest, most open 
country and open society ever. And then, President Reagan--and I wish I 
had his words in front of me--spoke out to the young people of America 
and gave them permission to go and chew out their parents at the dinner 
table or the kitchen table, to say to their parents, ``If you are not 
teaching me the history of our Nation, you should be ashamed.''
  Mr. Speaker, this is a kind of fascination of mine, about the size of 
our Nation, and I think about it at funerals, like President Nixon's--
and let me just finish this one sentence, Mr. Speaker: When President 
Nixon was born, we barely had 100 million people. When I was born, Mr. 
Speaker, it was 125 million. When World War II started, it was 130 
million plus. Now, we are twice our size on the date of Pearl Harbor--
260 million people--and we seem to be confounded by the smallest of 
problems.
  We are Americans. We ought to be able to do anything we set out to 
do, like balance the budget.

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