doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Greatest Generation

We buried my Father-in-Law, yesterday. He was A WW2 veteran and Purple Heart holder. The weekend before, my brother's Father-in-law was also buried, a WW2 veteran too. These men (and women) really were the greatest generation, they raised us and our children in a country that is the best in the world- they made it so. This is two more WW2 members of my American Legion Post now gone. There are only a few left, we should pray for them, support them, and, most of all; we must keep the faith with them and not allow what they built for us to be thrown away.
Mike

Amen.

Not in any way meant to disparage the WWII veterans or their generation, but what makes them better than the Generation who founded this great country, wrote us a constitution which we would be a lot better for"IF" we still followed it.
I believe that Tom Brokaw coined the phrase Greatest Generation. If he got that right it's the only thing he was ever correct on.

The WWII people grew up in hard times and knew no others. They did what they had to do and accepted sacrifice for more than themselves. Not all to be sure but 75-80% where in today's generation you'd be hard pressed to find 10-15% willing do what they did. That war was fought up close and personal. We think in terms of drones, smart weapons, air strikes they thought in terms of small arms, arty, flame throwers and knew it could come down to a brutal slegfest.

My father recounted how he watched men drop around him left and right as he went to and across the beach. Friends lost in a second. Worse he said later in the war they landed on another island and suffered zero losses on landing. Not even a shot. He said the wait was worse than being shot at. Then it started. Slugfest for every inch. These men were determined to get the job done without fail. I fear we are not up to that measure. I hope we never have to find out again.

A day doesn't go by when I don't think of Dad who would be 93 on June 21st. If I take the long way to Mom's I can see his Arlington-style grave marker across the street at the cemetery in front of the old family home. Capt. John K. Stacy, Jr. US Army, Inf., PH OLC. He was a heavy weapons platoon leader attached to the 3rd Infantry and received his second gunshot wound December 11, 1944, just 5 days before the Bulge. He was just inside German territory when hit. After he died, I talked on the phone to one of his enlisted runners, Pete, who went on to a successful business career after the war. The last time he saw Dad was when Pete was hit by 88mm shrapnel from a Panzer. Dad scooped him up, and ran like a deer to safety while being under small arms fire. The next day, Dad was shot and spent 16 months in a body cast. Dad never talked much about the war, but we heard snippets of his experience over the years. Mom said he took survivor's guilt to the grave. If we are half the men our fathers' were, that's not so bad...Gil

It may because they are the Greatest Generation in living memory ?

Look at the numbers: 16,000,000 men served the U.S. in WWII.
405,000 dead from all causes.
1776--population of the U.S.-2.5 million. 25,000 dead from all causes during the Revolution.

Approx 600,000 died in the War Between the States if the number of deaths is what determines the Greatest. Incidentally Most of these were volunteers. In WWII there were also many volunteers, but many were there because they were drafted. As I said I am not trying to dishonor anyone who has served their country, am just not ready to pick "ONE" generation & say it is "Greater" than all the rest.
I had two great Grandfathers who fought for the confederacy, I hold them in just as high Honor as I do my family members who fought in WWII, they all fought for what they believed in.

we are lucky and privileged to live in "the land of the free and the home of the brave"...

every generation has made that possible and perpetual...

they are all the greatest for that reason...

A recent article that was sent to me around Memorial Day listed 20 European Cemeteries with a little over 104,000 U.S. soldiers buried in them. I don't know the number of soldiers sent home for burial.