Have you ever wondered why we’re lucky enough to have privileges like democracy, and rights to freedom? Not everyone in the past has enjoyed these blessings, and today there are still people in the world who seem to have priorities which could jeopardise people’s rights and freedoms. In this article, Advisory Group Member Iona Taylor explains what happened on D-Day, reminding us that the heroes who were involved in this historic event gave up their tomorrow so that we could have our today. She also warns that freedom should never be taken for granted and needs to be protected.
Heavy surveillance. Random arrests. Imperialist-style enforcement of a foreign culture. Curfews.
A few months ago, I described life under Russian-occupation in Eastern Ukraine.
82 years ago, the majority of Europe was occupied by Nazi Germany, and the picture was similar.
D-Day, or Deliverance Day, commemorated on 6 June each year, marked the beginning of the end of that tyranny, when the Allied “Operation Overlord” was launched. 1,000s of American, Canadian and British planes, troops and ships crossed the English Channel and landed on the shores of France to liberate the locals.
Eventually they went on to set Europe free from Nazi terror, and their efforts have consequences that are still visible in today’s world. They defended our freedom, our democracy and our right to choose.
A bit of background
The D-Day landings could have happened sooner. In fact, America and Russia, the two main Allied powers working with the UK, had already been pushing (somewhat aggressively) for an invasion of occupied Western Europe for months. However, Prime Minister Winston Churchill knew that if the landings were to happen, they mustn’t fail; he didn’t want lives to be lost in an unsuccessful campaign.
The timing chosen wasn’t the best in terms of weather – cloud cover and fog caused some soldiers to turn up in the wrong places. But by the evening of 6 June 1944, the Allies had secured the Normandy beaches and were ready to advance into Europe.
All the people involved risked their lives, in a campaign which has enabled their children and future generations to live without needing to fear the Nazi regime that had set out to destroy life.
What if the operation had failed?
If the US hadn’t helped the UK and Europe in their hour of need, by helping organise the D-Day landings, life would have been very different.
More civilians in the UK would have been killed by German rockets launched from French coasts, and our friends in Europe would have continued suffering under occupation for even longer. The Holocaust would have continued, resulting in even more deaths.
What’s more, D-Day paved the way for Western Europe to be freed by US and UK forces, rather than Soviet Russia. This allowed Western democracy to be a dominating influence following the war, a privilege which was denied to Eastern Europe by the Russian “liberators”.
The message for us
There’s a lot to be said for remembering that the life we enjoy hasn’t just come from nowhere. We can make the choices we do because of the sacrifices of our heroic predecessors.
Keeping these things in mind is still very relevant in the modern world. As the King said in a speech in the USA in early May: “Freedom is again under attack.” That could be due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine like the King said, or because of religious-political terrorists who sacrifice their lives for a cause which would remove people’s freedoms, or maybe it’s down to those closer to home whose priorities seem to focus on regulation not education (forcing people to do things a “better way” rather than trying to persuade them to choose a “better way”). It could be due to racism, or any other issue that deprives people of their rights.
Whatever the mixture of causes, there are millions of people who believe that we have a duty to ourselves, to our great-grandparents, and to those who will succeed us, to make sure the freedoms we have are never taken away – suddenly or by gradual erosion. As US President Reagan said “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.” In other words, if we don’t preserve it, there’s no guarantee we’ll enjoy it forever.
Preserving freedom is the main focus of D-Day and that’s why this event must never be forgotten.
Iona
