Memorial Day 2020
As of this writing nearly 100,000 Americans have died of Covid-19. The vast majority of these deaths were entirey preventable. That is undisputable. What is also undisputable is the horror of dying from this disease, of dying alone. Though every one of these deaths is a tragedy unto itself - what sickens me even more is the fact that we, the supposed greatest nation on Earth, have allowed so many of our bravest to die needlessly before their time, after they had already sacrificed so much for our collective freedom.
I was going to do one of my usual Memorial Day blog posts on say, tank battalions at D-Day, or a statistical look at historical U.S. Military Deaths, but then I happened to catch the recent New York Times article detailing the sheer neglect with which we have thrown away the lives of our Second World War veterans:
HOLYOKE, Mass. — In 1945, James Leach Miller returned from the war and said nothing.
He said nothing about it to his wife, not for 64 years of marriage. He folded up his Army uniform, with the medals still pinned to it, and put it in the basement, where his older boy would sometimes take it out to play soldiers.
He joined the fire department. He went to church on Sundays. He never complained.
“That generation, they didn’t air their problems,” said his younger son, Michael. “He would say, ‘It was not a good time. I’ve had better times.’ He would not embellish.”
Mr. Miller was already in his 70s when he began to tell Michael, an Air Force flight engineer, little bits about landing on Omaha Beach on D-Day. “Fragments would come out,” his son said. The deafening roar as they waited for the beach to clear, crowded into a landing ship with other 21-year-olds. A blur that lasted 24 hours. The buzz-drone of Messerschmitts. Dust clouds. Mud.
Michael once offered to take him back to Normandy — World War II veterans were making the journey — but his father shook his head and said, “I’ve been there once.”
This story comes up for a reason. Mr. Miller, 96, who survived what was for Americans the bloodiest battle of World War II, died of complications from the coronavirus on March 30 inside the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home. The virus has spread in more than 40 veterans’ homes in more than 20 states, leading to the deaths of at least 300 people.
The conditions inside the 247-bed, state-run home, where Mr. Miller had lived for five years, were so chaotic that his children cannot recount them without breaking down.
When Mr. Miller lay weak and gasping that weekend, his two daughters, in a car in the parking lot, pleaded with a nurse on duty over an iPhone to give him morphine or atropine to relieve his suffering. “She said, ‘we can’t do it,’ and she started to cry,” said his daughter Linda McKee. “There was no one there giving orders.”
Michael Miller, at his father’s bedside, did the only thing he could do — moistened his lips with a sponge on a wooden stick.
“At that point, he was choking,” Ms. McKee said. “He died with no care whatsoever.”
That's just the start of the article. This damning narrative goes on from there in equally appalling detail. I am not a big fan of the New York Times, but every once in a while the top notch reporting that has traditionally defined our American newspaper of record re-emerges. This is one of those times. I highly recommend that this Memorial Day you take a moment, and read it.
I also what you to think about what this article means the next time you hear someone thanking one of these veterans for their service. The veterans of the Second World War have not asked for much. They especially don't need your thanks. What they need is for this nation to honor their sacrifice by taking care of them in their greatest hour of need. Is that too much to ask?
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