The concept of a new world, for which the greatest generation gave their lives in the blood-soaked waves of Normandy beaches, is becoming a thing of the past as aged soldiers also pass away.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden celebrated the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings in France. It is highly probable that this will be the last big decennial commemoration that a large number of veterans attend. Someone who swung adrift at the age of nineteen in the largest amphibious operation ever would turn one hundred years old very soon.
As Biden embraced and saluted the last surviving members of the invasion force above the beaches where thousands of Americans died, he said, “We’re not far off from the time when the last living voices of those who fought and bled on D-Day will no longer be with us, so we have a special obligation.”
“What transpired here must not be forgotten in the hushed memories of future generations.”
This year’s memorial event is about a lot more than just saying goodbye to the remaining members of the 150,000 allied soldiers who helped liberate Europe from the Nazis.
A contradictory occasion brought together presidents, prime ministers, and monarchs from NATO members. Despite their uncommon unity, they are becoming increasingly afraid. Now when a tyrant is hell-bent on expanding his territory, the alliance has a new mission: to oppose a war in Ukraine. However, the unwavering leadership of the United States in the West and its support for internationalist principles have never been in such doubt since June 6, 1944. Populism on the far right is on the rise on both sides of the Atlantic, posing the greatest threat to democracies in recent memory. The world order that has been governed by Western principles since WWII is under jeopardy due to the resurgence of geopolitical empires such as China and Russia.
In his speech, Biden compared the evil that compelled American troops to fight in the 1940s to the present-day Russian effort to eradicate Ukraine and its democracy, which is commanded by President Vladimir Putin.
“That must not be allowed to occur. It is absolutely inconceivable to give in to tyrants or bullies. If we did that, we would be erasing all memory of what transpired on these sacred beaches. “We will not grovel; we will not forget,” he declared emphatically.
An important lesson that the Normandy veterans learned was that “our democracy is only as strong as we make it all together,” according to Biden. They were absolutely certain that some causes are worth risking one’s life for. Investing in freedom, democracy, America, and the world is worth it – in the here and now, and forever more.
Amid mounting concerns in Europe that the United States, the rock of democracy since WWII, is going to abandon the West, his remarks took on further resonance.
US allies were already unsettled by the relentless assaults on NATO that US presidential candidate Donald Trump launched during his first term. His recent statement that he would allow Russia “whatever the hell they want” with allies that he believed were not paying their fair share of defense spending only added insult to injury. The statement cast doubt on NATO’s central tenet of mutual self-defense, the very essence of the alliance. If Trump is re-elected in November, some of his former aides have expressed concern that he may want to withdraw from the alliance. The United States’ readiness to uphold the security guarantees, even to countries like Japan and Germany, which purchased eight decades of peace, seems to be dwindling, even if Biden is elected president.
The Republican Party, which formerly took great pleasure in its victory in the Cold War, has been deeply influenced by Trump’s “America First” ideology. Four years ago, the former president attempted to undermine American democracy in order to remain in office. The former president and other GOP elites now seem to care more about Putin than the free democracies in Europe that America restored after WWII. There is growing skepticism that Washington would consistently defend democracy in Europe and oppose authoritarian aggressiveness due to the months-long delay in funding Biden’s latest aid package for Ukraine.
On Thursday, Biden brought up the insurmountable debt that the United States, Britain, Canada, and other countries’ military engaged in Operation Overlord face. Beneath the shady pine and oak trees that overlooked Omaha Beach, he passed row after row of white crosses and Stars of David. Here, thousands of miles away from the homeland they abandoned to save strangers, more than nine thousand Americans from every state and DC lay in state of death.
As the last wave of WWII veterans fades into oblivion, the world will lose firsthand accounts of the horrors endured by millions as they fought against an oppressive regime. That will mark the beginning of a perilous era in which corrupt political figures will have an easier time manipulating history to strengthen their own position. An increase in antisemitism in Western nations has already begun to undermine the lessons learned from the Nazi Holocaust, whose survivors are becoming fewer and fewer.
Is the United States truly “back”?
As soon as he became president in 2020 and made the statement “America is back,” Biden wasted no time jetting across the globe. True to his commitment, he led the Western alliance more effectively than any president since George H.W. Bush at the Cold War’s end. However, some world leaders are concerned that Biden’s presidency is more of a transitional period of stability than a restoration of the unwavering US leadership. During his first time in office, Trump transformed the United States from a stable haven into a chaotic mess due to his erratic behavior, transactional distrust of alliances, and admiration of autocrats. Many in the European chancelleries are expecting Trump’s return after a lengthy period of denial.
Trump’s populist and isolationist policies did not arise overnight. It grew out of the widespread fear that the globalized world was stealing the peace and prosperity that had been built up in the United States after World War II by returning servicemen and women from the Pacific and European theaters of conflict, as well as from years of American military failures overseas in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq. A renewed focus on Europe’s security has reignited long-overdue discussions in some European capitals, prompted by a perception that the United States is growing weary of its global role.
A senior scholar at the Council on Foreign Relations named Charles Kupchan thinks that the West faces an internal threat that is just as serious as the exterior one from US enemies. “And it’s not just Trump,” he stated. The center-right in Germany and France is experiencing the same thing, as are the advances the far right is poised to make in the next European Union elections. Europeans and Americans alike are beginning to doubt the United States’ dependability even if Biden were to emerge victorious.
