Craig Vasey, president of the Sister City Association and a member of the FXBG Advance Board, was Master of Ceremonies for Thursday’s D-Day commemoration. His father was in the D-Day invasion. His remarks are reprinted here.
Thank you all for coming, and welcome. We begin this afternoon with the presentation and posting of the colors by our City Honor Guard.
Good afternoon. My name is Craig Vasey, and I am the President of the Fredericksburg Sister City Association –for our sister city, Fréjus, in the south of France. Thank you for coming to our ceremony.
Today we gather here to remember the sacrifices endured and the courage required by our fathers, uncles, cousins, and grandfathers who were at Normandy on June 6, 1944. Few of them are still among us. My own father, who was a radio man on a landing craft at Omaha Beach, was 19 at the time, and passed away at 96, a few years ago. We are delighted and honored, however, to have Mr. Robert Potts in our company today. Mr. Potts is 102 years old, and served in the 29th Infantry Division, driving a truck; he was 22 on D-Day, landing on the beach on June 7.
That invasion by the Allied Forces 80 years ago today was the beginning of the liberation of France and of Europe from the totalitarian regime of the Nazis. The French have not forgotten it. In 1976, I was studying in Paris. On my first trip to the university library, one of the workers –a man of some 50 years– noted my accent and asked if I was American. When I replied that I was, he stood straight up and saluted me. I was astonished.
But it is important that we remember that 100 years ago, the reasons for the necessity of the invasion were already at work. A man –a cult leader, one might say–had been lying to and whipping up the German people, and manipulating the press, encouraging the formation of a private army, had cheated the democratic institutions of the time, and had installed himself in power, with a vision for his nation’s greatness that was based in resentment, violence, and retribution. He called for the elimination of the “enemies of the people;” he spoke about the “poisoning of his country’s blood” and the need to save the nation and return it to its purity. He dismantled the rule of law and replaced it with loyalty to himself. The German people went along with him, and one of the most oppressive and undemocratic regimes ever to exist was the result. It became a threat to all of humanity.
“Thank God,” some would say– or “thank human decency” –that so many people and countries eventually stood up to this monster and ultimately defeated it. We are truly indebted to those men and women who fought at Normandy and throughout Europe for what they did for the world, and for us. I hope we will never forget that we cannot afford to allow people who espouse and promote a worldview of divisiveness, resentment, and retribution to take power away from those who believe in democratic institutions, and to trample on respect for the rule of law.
WWII and Operation Overlord must be a lesson that we do not allow ourselves to forget. I am therefore thankful for this ceremony, and to all of you who have come to witness it and pay tribute to the meaning of D-Day. However, I must mention that last night on the PBS Newshour, we learned that 50% of children in England do not know what D-Day is. I can only imagine it is worse here in the US. To be allowing such ignorance is to be allowing a threat to freedom to grow.
I should also say, of course, that things did not “magically” change on June 6 1944; that was just the beginning of fierce fighting. And for those living in the south of France, where our Sister City Fréjus is, it was not until August 15, 1944 that the disembarkation of Allied Forces occurred.
Our program will be brief. The French section of the Fredericksburg Sister City Association approached the Office of the Mayor a few months ago to see if we could assure that an observation of the 80th anniversary of D Day would take place in the City, and we are most thankful for the help we’ve had in planning this through the leadership of Brenda Martin.
In a moment we will hear the national anthems of the United States and of France, then we will turn to remarks from four speakers –Mayor Kerry Devine, Delegate Joshua Cole, State Senator Tara Durant, and Martin Davis of the Fredericksburg Advance. These remarks will be followed by the presentation of a commemorative wreath by Delegate Cole and Senator Durant. We will end with the playing of Taps by a rising junior from Stafford High School.
Please stand (and gentlemen, please remove your hats) for the Star Spangled Banner and La Marseillaise sung by Ashley Rizzo.
by Craig Vasey
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