ON THIS DAY – AT 8:56 A.M. ET:   The Second World War came to an end on this day in 1945.  CBS's Robert Trout told America that "the United Nations, on land, on sea, and in the air, are united and are victorious."

Well, we weren't so united, as we soon found out by Soviet actions, but we were certainly victorious.  Victory was our goal, and it was achieved.  Today we have a mentality wherein the word "victory" is considered obsolete, or the preserve of old nationalists.  We are paying a price for that mentality.

World War II, which we fought with about 135 million Americans, was a war in which almost every family was involved.  Everyone knew soldiers, sailors, Marines, airmen, Coast Guardsmen.  We had 15 million men and women under arms.  Today, in a nation of about 310 million, we have 1.4 million under arms, and we're told with a straight face by the trendies that we're overstretched.   And how many Americans actually know someone in the armed services? 

Churchill called that huge conflict "the unnecessary war."  It was unnecessary because, had we confronted evil earlier, the war could have been prevented.  But, beset by economic stress and intellectual fashion, the people of the free nations, and many of their leaders, chose to avert their eyes.  Indeed, some of our most prominent citizens had only good things to say about the changes Hitler was bringing to his country.

In this connection, I highly commend to readers the book, "In the Garden of Beasts," by Erik Larson.  It is the story of America's first ambassador to Nazi Germany, William Dodd, who had been chairman of the history department at the University of Chicago.  It depicts how Dodd came to understand what actually was happening, and its implications for the United States.  But when he tried to be heard, he was eased out, replaced by a certified appeaser of the old State Department school. 

History doesn't repeat itself.  It's the psychology of history that repeats itself.  Today, plagued again by economic distress, misled again by the self-appointed intellectual elites, we once more are averting our eyes.  Our president, the first true leftist to serve in his office, and vastly to the left of FDR or even Bill Clinton, has plans for us, but they don't include a true assessment of the complex foreign threats we face, and what we must do about them.

We know who paid the price in World War II.  They're in military cemeteries all over the world.  Who will pay next time?

August 14, 2012