European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - June 13, 1994, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Monday june 13, 1994 a commentary the stars and stripes Page 13trying to make sense of warfare s awful truth William f. Buckley in a searching review of Stephen Ambrose so Day june 6, 1944, new York times reviewer Christopher Lehmann Haupt writes a again and again they . Survivors a a describe How they gathered their wits took command of themselves and the survivors around them and pressed ahead toward some objective whether it was simply shooting Back or crossing a stretch of Sand or scaling an escarpment and knocking out a machine gun nest. They did what they did because they were scared out of their minds too dumb to know better drunk on alcohol or simply beyond caring about survival. They knew what to do because they had been trained to a Point where they did no to have to think about their actions. As or. Ambrose stresses they were thus Able to exercise initiative. In his View Hitler gambled on the conviction that a totalitarian fanaticism and discipline would always conquer democratic liberalism and  and Hitler  the observations of historian Ambrose seep into the mind at the end of a week airborne in the memory of Aylor and purpose and nostalgia. All of America had personal experiences with june 4-6, mostly via the Home television set but it transmitted unforgettably the sights and the sounds of Omaha Beach and Caen and Pegasus Bridge 50 years after. My own experience included crossing the Atlantic Ocean on a liner in which More than 200 Normandy veterans travelled to the celebrations. And there were others bound for Normandy one Man spoke with a slight accent. He lives in Tulsa okla., and was Normandy bound to celebrate his own liberation a from Dachau. He was then 20 and had lived five years in the Camps. He showed pictures of him and other inhabitants of one of the cells into which they were crowded a picture of men starving almost to death. The blur of 1944, the great crusade reached into 1945 when nazism was finally Over the forlorn survivors of Dachau brought Back to life. What creeps into the distillery of the mind is the vexing question of motive. No one doubts that the crusade for Europe had the Noble objective of removing from Power the monster who dominated Western Europe but we tried to make out of this a syllogism that does no to quite work and Ambrose swords Tell us something Here not entirely harmonious to the rhetoric of self congratulations. It is that when soldiers become soldiers they fight and tend to do so expressing instincts that have been cultivated in their training. Ambrose tells us that Hitler assumed the Superior prowess of nazi trained soldiers because democratic liberalism would Breed softness whereas the reverse was True. But the proposition is shaky. It runs up into hard truths that we need to stare in the face. They include 1. In order to have any Chance of succeeding the invasion of France did require the enormously impressive logistical operation that was operation overlord. But the invasions Success was not an aspect of the Liberal democratic background of our military. If Rommel had been on the scene and had had the authority to counterattack at 2 of clock in the morning of june 6 rather than 12 hours later the invasion would have been repelled. 2. The forces against which we contended included to be sure hard trained nazis veterans. But they were also substantially made up of German kids and conscripts from various parts of Europe. Notwithstanding these German divisions held Back our mighty juggernaut for six weeks. And six months later they came very close to turning the tide of Battle against us at the Battle of the bulge. Quot a hitlers rockets matured at just about a Day and if they had been trained on the beaches rather than at London suburbs Hitler might have won the Day. 3. If a dozen historians set out to record the valorous performances of individual German soldiers Young and old and of soviet soldiers Young and old As thick a Book of heroic deeds would result As those Over which we gloried during the Garcal Celebration it teaches us the awful lesson that soldiers on the March Are not palpably animated by the nobility of their cause. The 20-year-old German Soldier directed by hitlers lieutenants flip 20-year-ou1 russian Soldier directed by Stalin a lieutenants the 20-Ycar-od japanese Soldier directed by Tojo a lieutenants is going to Cross stretches of Sand scale escarpments and Knock out machine guns even As 20-year-old americans did. It is history and our Confidence in enduring truths that tells us that the soldiers in Normandy who attacked were serving great ends while the soldiers who defended were serving ignoble ends. Hut the evidence is not there that the machinery of injustice at the margin yields to the machinery of Justice. It is essential to the understanding of warfare to face the awful truth which is that warriors tend to lose sight of the cause for which they make War. We Are indeed the children of sacrifice. But the sacrifice we made in Normandy had also other children who under Stalin and his successors lost every Day for 45 years As Many lives As we lost on june 6,1944. Cd Universal Pross Syndicate now stamp out a Days the moving ceremonies to commemorated Day should do More than celebrate the courage and sacrifice of 50 years ago. They should remind us of what made that sacrifice necessary the earlier failure to stand up to evil. Hitler made no secret of his hatred his violent nationalism or his megalomania. But european leaders did not act to confront the menace when it appeared. They treated Hitler As a joke then believed his promises and swallowed his aggression a until their own countries were threatened. The mistake for which so Many paid so dearly in Normandy carried an unmistakable lesson demagogic preachers of nationalist hate must be taken seriously and stopped before their words turn to blood. But in the first test of that principle after the cold War we failed again. A militant nationalism is on the Rise a president Clinton said in his important speech to the French National Assembly last week a transforming the healthy Pride of nations tribes religious and ethnic groups into cancerous prejudice eating away at Stales and leaving their people addicted to the pain killers of violence and  exactly. And As we know How weakness in the 1930s let the nazi menace grow so Vic know How and when weakness opened the Way for the new militant nationalism. The year was 1991. Serbia a communist. Leader Slobodan Milosevic turned from communism to extreme nationalism As a device to hold on to Power. He used the yugoslav National army to attack first the northernmost yugoslav Republic Slovenia. When that attack failed the serbs turned their guns on Croatia. Serbian forces shelled the medieval port. Of Dubrovnik and levelled the City of Vukovan. That was the moment when Strong leaders by resisting the evil of a tin pot tyrant could have stopped the new menace of violent nationalism. But we had weaklings George Bush John major. Instead of resisting they began a course of diplomacy and Quot peacekeeping that continues its gyrations to his Day. Three years later serbs occupy 72 percent of Bosnia Herzegovina and a big Anthony Lewis slice of Croatia. More than 200,000 bosnian Are dead  million Are left gees victims of the serbian genocide euphemistically called ethnic cleansing. Diplomats and . Peacekeepers did nothing for those victims. And diplomacy has no effective leverage now to make the serbs disgorge their conquests. Indeed the United states is reportedly ready to join others in pressing bosnian to accept a settlement that gives half their country to the serbian aggressors. The lesson is obvious again. The Way to Deal with demagogic nationalists is by strength Force and the threat of Force. The misuse of peacekeeping when there was no peace to keep has Only Given peacekeeping a bad name. Weakness in the face of evil serbian leaders has encouraged nationalist demagoguery elsewhere. The threat was not hard to understand. The aggression was unconcealed and exceptionally cruel. And it was accompanied by characteristic hate propaganda Brg no War a Book just published in London by article Xix the International Centre against censorship is a fascinating study of the manipulation of the Media in the former Yugoslavia during these last years. It shows How both the serbian and the croatian governments used the press to stir up hatred. A thus the serbian press and television spoke of bosnian muslims As a a Mujahedin and said they were committing a spiritual genocide of serbs. They charged that the bosnian government had staged massacres of bosnian. And soon. Commentators and diplomats Are divided about what we should do in Bosnia and Herzegovina. But surely no reasonable person can doubt that the West should have stopped serbian aggression at the beginning before the bosnian tragedy. As Margaret Thatcher urged we should have told the serbs Slop shelling Dubrovnik or we will bomb your military installations. But Lawrence Eagleburger then Deputy Secretary of state and a former ambassador to Yugoslavia said we should not take Milosevic too seriously. Jim Baker the Secretary went to Belgrade at the crucial moment in 199 and spoke soothing words to Milosevic and president Bush averted his gaze. As in 1944, Many will Lay dearly for the Tail Urc to draw a line against evil. F.  i i a