[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 8]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 10094]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




   THEY SAVED CIVILIZATION--A TRIBUTE TO THE VETERANS OF WORLD WAR II

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. VITO FOSSELLA

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, May 18, 2004

  Mr. FOSSELLA. Mr. Speaker, today we pay tribute to the men who made 
up the greatest fighting force ever assembled. Their cause was just, 
and they carried the banner of freedom against the most fearsome and 
vicious enemy the world has ever seen. All the while, the courage of 
these American heroes never failed.
  They were soldiers, sailors, marines--others served with great 
distinction in the Air Force, the Coast Guard and the Merchant Marine. 
We owe them all a great debt. Over 400,000 Americans died during the 
conflict. Today, roughly 4,300,000 veterans are still with us.
  To understand the importance of what these men did, one must realize 
the magnitude of what they were up against. In the space of a few 
years, a great evil had swept across much of the world. It was the hand 
of several governments--all dictatorships--who had formed a 
bloodthirsty pact to swallow their neighbors whole.
  The aggressors struck quickly and with ferocity impossible to resist. 
Many strong nations fell under their control.
  The occupation was focused, deadly and vicious, and executed millions 
of the conquered peoples. One of the aggressor states in particular had 
developed an ideology so disturbed it led them to murder millions more 
of their own citizens, including many loyal ones. So perverse were the 
nature and scope of the deeds committed by Germany that, decades later, 
the mere name of its ruling political party is a curse word for the 
most vile--the Nazi party.
  Meanwhile, Japan captured the Chinese city of Nanking in December, 
1937, and the four months that followed have become known as the Rape 
of Nanking. It is estimated that the occupiers executed between 250,000 
and 300,000 of the city's inhabitants, merely the most outrageous of a 
series of atrocities committed in the Pacific Theater.
  Who could stand against these savage marauders? Who could stop them, 
as they savaged their way across the continents?
  The answer came on December 7th, 1941. Japan attacked the U.S. naval 
base at Pearl Harbor, killing 2,409 Americans. The devastating attack, 
which nearly crippled the battlefleet and destroyed equipment and 
facilities, shocked the nation.
  Americans, still groggy from the Great Depression, were jolted awake 
by the empires expanding across the oceans both to our east and west, 
and by the grim realization that it was going to take America to do 
something about it.
  We were fortunate to have strong leaders: President Franklin 
Roosevelt knew that a full-scale mobilization was needed, and that it 
was going to take the entire country pitching in to properly prepare 
our military for war. Army Chief of Staff George Marshall revamped the 
military and crafted overall strategy.
  One who was watching the American reaction and knew what it meant was 
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill: ``To have the United States 
at our side was to me the greatest joy. Now at this very moment I knew 
the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death. 
So we had won after all! . . . Hitler's fate was sealed. Mussolini's 
fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to powder.''
  Thousands upon thousands of Americans answered the call to arms, 
flooding into enlistment centers. They knew the danger; news reports 
out of Europe and Asia made the mounting death tolls clear. Japan's 
assault on Pearl Harbor was of a piece with its strategy to dominate 
the Pacific, capturing nearly every outpost of significance. As they 
became entrenched, dislodging them would only be more difficult and 
cost even more lives.
  American courage and commitment would prove superior to the great 
evil it confronted. Our sailors, marines and soldiers battled every 
step of the way, first at the Battle of Midway on June 6th, 1942, and 
then through the long slog of the Guadalcanal campaign (August 1942-
February 1943).
  Meanwhile, the American fighting men joined the European front, and 
our allies from Britain, Poland and many other nations. First in North 
Africa the German armies were confronted under Operation Torch in 
November 1942, which culminated in the defeat of Germany's greatest 
general, Erwin Rommel, by early 1943.
  The war then moved to Sicily, then Italy--at each step our men giving 
better than they got. The Battle of Monte Cassino during the first half 
of 1944 led to the liberation of Rome.
  The greatest single act of courage came on D-Day, the largest one-day 
offensive in history, on June 6th, 1944. Over 10,000 allies were killed 
that day in breaching Fortress Europe, and another 200,000 would die 
over the next two months during the Battle of Normandy. American 
fighting men, in concert with men from Britain and many other nations, 
stormed the beaches of northern France. They charged through a hail of 
machine-gun fire to gain the foothold they would use to liberate all of 
Europe.
  The last major German offensive was the Battle of the Bulge, December 
1944-January 1945, trying one last time to keep the war outside of 
Germany. American supply lines had been stretched since D-Day, and the 
101st Airborne Division found themselves surrounded at Bastogne. A 
hundred miles from their nearest fellow units, the situation was grim, 
and the German commander demanded they surrender. The American 
attitude, here and throughout the war, was summed up by the response: 
``Nuts.''
  While many persevered in the belief that liberty would prevail, 
educated opinion was cynical. Many believed that the captured lands 
could never be freed, even assuming that the aggressors could be forced 
into a stalemate. What force could possibly stop them?
  It was up to the American GIs to dispel the doubts and charge into 
the fire. Every step of the way they knew that many of them would never 
be coming home again. But they knew the importance of their task--as 
Dwight Eisenhower said: ``History does not long entrust the care of 
freedom to the weak or the timid.'' Our fighting men were neither.
  Today, at long last, we unveil the monument to those who saved 
civilization in World War II. We thank them for their sacrifice and 
pray that no struggle so titantic ever again need take place.

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