Thank You Veterans Remembering Veterans and Those Saved and Lost

Today in honor of Memorial Day I remember those who serve and have served in military conflicts across the globe. Today I remember the Holocaust. Today I am moved to tears in compassion for all that has been endured by so many.

It is simply astounding to me that most so many people in a country could be influenced to hate, steal from and murder 6 million people. There were 9 million Jews living in Europe and SIX MILLION were murdered. 2 out 3 Jewish people were murdered. 25% of the murdered people were children.

The Holocaust survivors were starved, enslaved and tortured. The survivors lost everyone that they loved and everything that they owned. Many of the survivors were twin children that were experimented on by chemical injections and surgical expirements such as inserting pieces of wood in their bodies, procedures to cut out eyes and transplant new eyes into the socket and injections of ink into eyes to change the eye color to blue.

How different would this earth be the Holocaust had never happened? I think of the children who were left orphans with not a single family member alive on this planet. The children of those children grew up with no grand parents and almost all with no aunts and no uncles. They had no one to lean on or to comfort them. Many of the survivors were assigned jobs in concentration camps. Concentration camp jobs included pulling the teeth out of the dead to recover the gold, going through the belongs of the dead to recover the valuable good to give to the Nazis and picking up the dead by hand, loading them onto carts or into mass graves and burning the dead.

To make it more real for people in my community, imagine if all of the Cuban people in Key West FL were packed up in cattle train cars and 2 out of every 3 people were murdered. Imagine if the robbery and murder was celebrated by the community. How is it possible that the entire country of Germany could be turned against an entire race of people? It is simply incredible and almost unbelievable. Could this happen on a smaller scale today? Could many in this country be turned against innoscent people? Could we be inflenced by creative propaganda (advertising) to care nothing for the life and welfar of others? Could advertising today cause you to abandon your morality, your ethics and your humanity?

Is it possible that our pro war / anti war inter American conflict about Iraq and Afganistan could be influenced by the media the same way that Germans were influenced to hate a race of people? We all know people who hate muslims, Iraqis, Afgans or other races of people. The haters see race descrimination as equal to support of our military and support of our country. Does the news and information (propoganda?) we see, hear and read make people hate a group when there are really few people guity of what has been said abou them. Our hatred is justification for torture or murder. Maybe the citizens of Germany were not so different from me or you.

It seemed to me that the owners of a large company in my past life saw non management as less than human. The owners feelings were trasferred to management and managment was obiligated to enforce the order. Some managers were stressed out by what they had to do, but most seemed to not care what they did to others as long as they had a job. As a whole, does human nature have more power to encourage us to evil or goodwill toward our fellow man? Maybe we are not so different from the Germans.

I've watched movies about the German propaganda films that were used to inspire German hatred for Jews. I've watched movies with old film footage showing German men and women laughing, flirting and having picniks where they could see the smoke and smell the burning bodies.

How do people develope indifference to human suffering and murder? Easily. One step at a time. History books are filled with descriptions of pirates, slavery, attrocities to the native American Indians, witch burning, hangings, the fighting of people in the Collesseum (and the cheering of the crowd when 1 person killed another) and war. Do some people enjoy torturing others? Does justification make murder and torture OK in ones mind?

World War I left Germany weak and broken in wealth and spirit. The poor state of mind and the economy in Germany created an opportunity for Hitler to inspire and encourage the people in his country. Germans were sad and depressed and Hilter was able to redirect the anger that the Germans were feeling. World War II started in 1939 just 6 years after Hiltler became Chancellor. In the US Americans had lost everything and were starving and struggling in 1933. It seems like the world did not notice Hiltler or maybe hoped things were not as bad as they seemed.

World War I and World War II blended together like a movie with a part II that comes out a few years later. The US was on the road to recovery from the Great Depression. Every family in the US came together to fight the war. I've watched movies about women mathematicians who worked on the first computers and aided the war effort, women who worked in factories building war suppies and the families and homes that soldiers had when they came home. I've watched movies about many different car manufactures that changed their factories to create war vehicles.

The US was in the Great Depression that started in 1929 when Hitler became Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933. A few months after Hiltler bacame Chancellor in 1933 the SS began painting stars and painting "Jew" or "Jude" on the store front windows of businesses owned by Jews. The SS chanted in the streets, "Germans, liberate yourselves from the rule of the Jews! Germans, resist the Jews! Don't buy from Jewish shops!" The SS blocked Germans from entering stores owned by Jews. When the Jews were weakened financially they would be easier to target and punish without consequence.

1 week after the boycott the Nazis instituted the Arian Clause. The Arian Clause were new laws that prohibited people of Jewesh ancestry from holding positions in civil service.

In South Germany, where where National Socialism started, most people were Roman Catholic. In the summer of 1933 Vatican members met with Nazi leaders and they signed the Konkordat. The Konkordat was a promise by the Vatican not to organize against the Nazi regime and the Nazis promised to leave the Catholic Church alone.

Not everyone in Germany was an anti Semite. A pastor led a protest against the Arian Clause. The protest became the Pastors Emergency League. 7,000 pastors joined. 20,000 pastors did not join. The Gestapo, Secret State Police, harassed and jailed members of the Pastors Emergency League. One of the pastors went to London and then to India to study non violent resistance under Ghandi. In 1934 a very brave group of 100 church men risked their lif and issued a statement of civil disobedience. Soon the pastors asked all of the Christian Churches in the world for help.

In 1939 the US turned on a dime and converted domestic industry so that we could fight injustice and the extermination of a race. The veterans in this country have protected those who could not protect themselves all over the globe. I'm grateful. And proud. Thank you to all of the veterans who have saved suffering people from injustice, persecution and every manner of inhumanity on this earth. Veterans have made the world a better place. Thank you Veterans and Veteran familis for your bravery and for all that you have given and all that you have lost and sacrified.