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Advance Happy Birthday Ms. Luecht, Otanjoubi Omedetou gozaimasu (Happy Birthday in Japanese)!" HAPPY BIRTHDAY! With best wishes, Kazu:-)

 Kazu, many thanks, I have never had anyone wish me Happy Birthday in Japanese so truly you have given me a unique gift for my 55th.

‎"Doui tashi mashite (You're welcome in Japanese):-)"

USS Shaw Exploding - Wikipedia Image

It has been a long time since the attack on Pearl Harbor. I found myself watching Clint Eastwood’s Letters from Iwo Jima the other night at dinner with my husband. We are the children of World War II veterans. My father in law was in the Navy at Saipan. Recently we discovered some pictures that he had taken on the island after a battle. My mother’s role in the Navy at the time was not in a battle zone, she was a WAVE.

We have all probably heard of Pearl Harbor and though it happened some 69 years ago, there is resonance for us today in mentioning it. The American people were shocked at the news of Pearl Harbor. It became for many in this country, the rallying point to get into the fight against the Axis powers. We declared war as a result of it. Many have suggested that we needed Pearl Harbor as the impetus to get us into the war, that it was not the surprise to some in our country as it was to the general population. That may be true. Misinformation, speculation, and certainly conspiracy theories are nothing new, even today.

So why mention this anniversary here? Well, one of the most successful slogans in the world, and there have been many, is “Remember Pearl Harbor”. Well I do remember it. I remember it because so many lives were lost. So many people were taken from us that day; so many lives were changed as a result of that event. I am not a person who thinks we did not belong in the war. I am actually one of the people who with great recollection of the pain and suffering of those who were oppressed and dying wished we had entered the fight, officially, sooner. Great negotiations took place to try and give something to help, but not be open about it. It was a different America then. Recently watching the 1939 movie, Confessions of a Nazi Spy, I became more than peripherally aware of some of the sentiment in this country prior to Pearl Harbor about any participation the US might have in the war over seas.

So Remember Pearl Harbor, like Remember the Alamo, like Remember 9/11, stoke the fires of aggression and reprisal. We are enveloped, each of us in the responsibility to defend what we believe in.

The other day Alfred W. McCoy, a history professor at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, released a long essay about Four Scenarios for the Coming Collapse of the American Empire. It is a disturbing work which explains a process which some believe is already in motion. Many great empires have collapsed over time and some with a relatively short demise. I am questioning our direction in this country and wonder at times, if cries like that of Remember Pearl Harbor, must be sounded as part of our wake up for a turn around within. Can we see the enemy here? It all remains to be revealed or perhaps sufficiently acknowledged, to make change.

While I write this I mean no disrespect for the events of history which bring us to our knees, perhaps in prayer, for a willingness to fight for what we believe. It is not so much about retaliation for Pearl Harbor as it seemed to be finally standing up to the bullies in the world at the time. I am comforted how so many years later we can be at peace with those very nations, how a friend can wish me Happy Birthday in his native tongue and I would be graciously pleased.

I write a great deal about Germany, and do so with great affection and appreciation for the land of my husband’s ancestors. I have helped infuse a love of German heritage to my own children. This has not been done ignorantly and without benefit of history. I have stood in the gas chambers of concentration camps and been too close to the ovens. I have the knowledge deep within in me of what happened there. In watching Letter from Iwo Jima, I felt again the other point of view from a Japanese soldier, the confusion, mixed messages and emotional abandonment in war that allows for great cruelty and horror.

We all must make the choices every day to be in control of ourselves, our emotions. We must know when it is the right time to fight back, to say enough is enough. When I remember Pearl Harbor, I do think of the ships sinking, the destruction, the damage, the hopelessness of that moment. I also remember the courage, the response, the direction which the nation took as a result of it. This gives me confidence in the future of this country. I think that we can become united about the America we want for our children, for ourselves and our role in the world.

I do not know how many people trying to save burning sailors, or those being strafed in the water that day were greedy. I do not know what lines were drawn with respect to class, finances or intelligence. I think that in the midst of those trying to save themselves; there were more than many who saved others.

So I think I am more than grateful to still be an American, to face what the future might hold, because I will Remember Pearl Harbor and in my mind it will signify a time to be selfless, to fight something bigger than our individual needs, to take risks, to suffer, for a greater good, and with good intention, goodness will be wrought. I will also Remember Pearl Harbor as the significant peace effort that it unleashed, because when we went to war to fight what was so terribly wrong and inhuman, we went at the peace with the very same zeal.

Otherwise I would not be hearing birthday greetings in Japanese.

http://www.alternet.org/world/149080/4_scenarios_for_the_coming_collapse_of_the_american_empire/

 **This actually says Happy Birthday, Katie, Happy Birthday Katie. I could not use the direct typing with the real Japanese Characters to me as OS did not translate the type font correctly. So I include this just so you can see something of what I was looking at in my birthday message I was describing.

Copyright 2010 SheilaTGTG55