World War II quotes

JFK stole this one from Churchhill- "Never in a field of human conflict, has so much, been owed by so many, to so few."

love,

Sopranette

 

"The raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years."

James Forrestal, Secretary of the Navy; 23 February 1945

 

Well you could not have this thread without including FDR

And I am partial to Halsey

But how about this one

Lieutenant Kermit Tyler (Duty Officer of Shafter Information Center, Hawaii), upon being informed that Private Joseph Lockard had picked up a radar signal of what appeared to be at least 50 planes soaring toward Oahu at almost 180 miles per hour December 7, 1941

 

I've always been a big history buff, especially WWII.

In our family, we listen to a lot of radio shows from that era.

For instance, I just heard an Amos an Andy program where they slipped messages about rationing into the show, Amos said "My wife made one a dem new 'milkless, eggless, flourless cakes. Pretty soon, we's gonna have cakeless cakes. But that's alright. They's a certain man substitutin' tyranny for freedom so I guess until we's done stopped him, I can substitute fo' eggs."

And there's also an episode of "Command Performance" hosted by Ronald Reagan and William Bendix.

They were interviewing a young Marine and William Bendix said, "Hey, I got an idea. I'm going to put a bounty on the head of every Jap."

Reagan: "Well, I guess I'll throw in a nickle a head."

Marine: "That would never work, fellas."

Reagan: "Why Not?"

Marine: "Because there's too many guys willing to do it for nothing."

Of course, you could never say that today.

And one of the nicest shows I've ever heard is the one where Red Skelton, in character as "the Mean Widdle Kid" prays for our soldiers and Marines.

I've learned more about the war just from listening to them recounting and making fun of the events of the day than I ever did from books.

 

"Go ____ yourself!" - Capt. Robert Frasier, after being ordered to surrender by the Germans at the Battle of the Bulge.

His company was bloody and battered and had taken heavy casualties, but they managed to hold two key bridges, stalling the Germans long enough to allow Allied tanks to move in and capture their objective.

 

Yea Mike there are several good ones from the Battle of the Bulge.

How about "Nuts" by Anthony McAuliffe when demanded by the Germans to surrender the 101st.

And this was always one of my favorites (edited for Baptist Board):

I actually used that one in a sermon one time, in a fully family friendly edited version of course. Sometimes we just have to say enough is enough and we are not going to give any more.

 

This one is by Capt. Henry P. Jim Crowe on 13th Jan. 1943 at Guadalcanal:

"*** You'll never get the Purple Heart hiding in a foxhole! Follow me!"

 

"Although personally I am quite content with existing explosives, I feel we must not stand in the path of improvement." - Winston Churchill


"What'd I do??" - What a relative of mine said when a Japanese sniper shot at him.

 

“Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders.

That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.” Hermann Goering

Strange, this is the very same thing the "republicans" have been telling us since 9/11. Apparently it works the same now as it did then.

 

I thought about that one. It reminds me of Chesty Puller's great quote, "We're surrounded? Fine! We've got the b*****ds right where we want them. They'll never get away now."

And then there's my favorite: "Retreat? Retreat, Hell! We just got here!"

 

That quote gets used here about once a week, as far as I can tell.

Between 1935-1945 an estimated 18.2 million German troops served in the Wehrmacht. It went on to conquer and occupy- Poland, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, Belgium, Holland, France, Yugoslavia, Greece, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Egypt, Belarus, Italy, parts of North Africa, and attempted to conquer Russia and Great Britain. The war caused an estimated 50-70 million deaths worldwide. Goering needed some falsehood to convince the German people that they were under attack. Quite a job.

Not really comparable to George Bush’s America, if that's your implication. Sometimes enemies really do attack us.