1 day Ago By Ellie Bufkin
The triumph of the 1944 allied invasion of Europe — secured 80 years ago this week — was no sure thing. World War II was ultimately won by the courage and conviction of young soldiers, sailors and Marines who gave their all in fights far from home because they knew isolation was no way to defeat authoritarianism’s spread. United in that common quest, the Allied nations accepted the unconditional surrender of Germany on V-E Day, May 8, 1945 .
Last June, inspired by the stories of so many heroes — including my great-uncle, who landed on Utah Beach with the US Army’s Fourth Infantry Division — I visited Normandy to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day. I walked among the graves in the Allied cemeteries, struck by their beauty and serenity, and recalled that those who fought that day did so not just for their own homelands, but for the ideals of liberty and freedom from oppression, for the hope of a better future. That legacy still calls to us: For the past 80 years, the United States and its allies have helped foster an era of unparalleled peace and prosperity.
America’s leadership and global partnerships have been vital in maintaining a rules-based global order safeguarding freedom and lifting billions out of poverty. As we mark the 80th anniversary of Germany’s surrender, we must remember the world still needs American leadership — and this nation must continue to answer that call. The Second World War taught us a critical lesson: Isolationism is not security.
President Ronald Reagan made that clear in 1984, when he visited Normandy on the 40th anniversary of D-Day and delivered an immortal speech surrounded by some of the Army Rangers who scaled the cliffs of Pointe du Hoc. “It is better to be here ready to protect the peace, than to take blind shelter across the sea, rushing to respond only after freedom is lost,” Reagan declared. “We’ve learned that isolationism never was and never will be an acceptable response to tyrannical governments with an expansionist intent.
” That truth is one post-war America took seriously. It was the United States that led the way to establish a framework for collective international security — one that has guaranteed a foundation of peace for much of the world in the decades since. Today, weary of foreign conflicts, some demand we turn America’s attention inward.
It’s tempting to believe our nation’s mandate to safeguard liberty abroad is now expired. But history shows us the penalty for retreat. As Winston Churchill famously warned in 1940, when World War II was just beginning: “If we fail, then the whole world, including the United States, including all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new dark age.
” The victory that followed those days of fear and uncertainty inspired a generation to face darkness with similar courage. The threats to freedom across today’s world look quite different than they did before the defeat of the Nazis. But they are no less serious.
Authoritarian regimes seek to extinguish the sovereignty of neighboring nations while stamping a boot on their own people’s necks, stripping them of dignity and free will. America’s leadership is now more essential than ever — not as an open hand of charity, but as the free world’s crucial vessel of strength and self-preservation. Beyond the headstones and memorials in rural Normandy, I noticed during my visit how the people who live there cherish the legacy of the Allies who liberated them — preserving a veritable time capsule of the immediate post-war era.
French teens wore 101st Airborne jumpsuits. American flags proudly waved over French homes. Businesses displayed signs in their windows thanking the troops, echoing sentiments from so many years ago.
The courage of the D-Day soldiers was contagious, and in Normandy, it lives on. American strength must once again serve as a catalyst for shared courage. Our nation is at its best when it rallies free partners as a leader, not as a spectator.
And our democratic allies across the world must also shoulder their share of this great responsibility to stand with us as champions of liberty: investing in defense , standing tall against authoritarianism and promoting human dignity everywhere. This nation, not yet 250 years old, remains the global bastion of personal freedom. That ideal is why the American soldiers who left their families and homes to liberate Europe fought so hard — not for conquest, but for the simple and resolute belief that freedom is worth dying for.
Now it’s the responsibility of the living to honor their sacrifice beyond this anniversary day. Let’s do so with an enduring resolve to share the commitment to freedom that led the Allies to victory 80 years ago. Ellie Bufkin is deputy director of communications at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
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