Remember Pearl Harbor

In Saturday's USA Today:

SHREVEPORT, La. -- You could hardly escape reminders of it during World War II. And over the course of decades since, Dec. 7 has meant one thing to generations of Americans:

Pearl Harbor. Unprovoked attack. The need to be prepared.

But that message has become muted over the past few years by the thinning of the ranks of the men and women who survived the assault that Sunday morning on U.S. military facilities in Hawaii.

For the first time in years, a request to the community for news on remembrances or memorials, as well as calls to the largest American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars posts and the local War Veterans Home and veterans cemetery turned up nothing.

MORE: For survivor, Pearl Harbor seems 'like yesterday'

Former Louisiana state Sen. Jackson B. Davis, now 95, who was a Navy officer assigned to intelligence duties, says he has not been asked to talk to any groups this year. "That is unusual. I usually do."

"It's the same old story," Davis said, illustrating his point by taking it to an extreme. "We don't hear much about Gettysburg anymore, or Bunker Hill. Or when the Normans took over England — we don't hear much about that."

Sadly, as time moves forward, the "Greatest Generation" will be gone, no one left to tell us the first-hand stories, good and bad, about what it was like to fight in the last-ever just war. Every war since then was politically motivated, using some "moral equivalent" to put our troops into harms way. 

WWII, initially, was fought by the USA to gain retribution for the horrible events of that day, 72 years ago. But as we discovered marching through Nazi-occupied Europe, rumors of horror done to millions of people, due to the finding of concentration camps, with their crematoriums and mass graves, actually turned this war of retribution into the just war it became. 

But, the barbarism was not limited to Germany. Japan, through its alliance with the Nazis, learned very quickly how to dispose of its political enemies through means, in some cases, even more barbaric than Hitler, Himmler and all the rest could ever imagine. 

As we age, the news of that day, becomes memories, twisted by our view that we were unprepared and victims of an unprovoked attack. But, conspiracy theorists have argued that President Roosevelt knew days, and even weeks, ahead of time that a major attack was imminent on American assets somewhere in the Pacific. The fact that our aircraft carriers, the main targets of the attack, were out of the harbor on exercises fuels that argument to this day. 

And now? Those memories are fading into history because there are so few survivors left to tell the stories of first-hand events. The same is true for WWI, the Spanish-American War, and all the wars fought all the back to the Revolutionary War. All relegated to history. 

Soon, the same will be said for those who fought in Korea, as those veterans, many who are in their 80s, continue to die off until there will be none to tell those stories. 

But, for today, we need to remember that the attack on Pearl Harbor, which was the worst one-day military disaster in our history, was in the end, because of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a great strategic victory for the United States. 

So, today, as we prepare for another Christmas season, with the shopping, the wrapping, watching the holiday specials, etc, please take a few moments out of your day and remember Pearl Harbor and all things those two words imply. And if you know someone who was there or fought in WWII because of the events of that day, thank him or them, for the freedoms we enjoy because of their efforts. 

The world, and our country, could have been an entirely different place without their efforts and their sacrifices. Remember Pearl Harbor!