Trump is one sick dude. To link some from 2918 here on his blaming weather for not visiting the cemetery. On seeing military killed and disabled as losers. As he saw John McCain for being captured in Vietnam.
A White House statement said the Belleau visit was “canceled due to scheduling and logistical difficulties caused by the weather”, and said a delegation “led by Chief of Staff Gen John Kelly and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen Joe Dunford” would attend on behalf of the Trumps.
Nonetheless, Burns, the former ambassador, committed his thoughts to Twitter.
“Did the President really not visit the American military cemetery today in France?” he asked. “It is his duty to honor our soldiers who fought in 1917-18.”
Among veterans groups, one progressive organisation responded angrily.
“Donald Trump complained about having to stand in the rain, to speak about the massacre in Pittsburgh, because it messed his hair up (more),” said VoteVets in a tweet, referring to Trump’s remarks after a mass shooting two weeks ago in which 11 people were killed. “Today, he will skip honoring fallen American heroes of WWI, and stay in his hotel room, because of some rain.”
Trump obviously loved his bone spurs. I can really feel, even more now after reading yours, how he must have really seen those who have served and been killed or disabled as suckers.
A continuation of Trump's HATRED for the Military and the Veterans...
Pentagon orders shutdown of Stars and Stripes newspaper
AP NEWS 30 minutes ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Pentagon has ordered the military’s independent newspaper, Stars and Stripes, to cease publication at the end of the month, despite congressional efforts to continue funding the century-old publication.
The order to halt publication by Sept. 30, and dissolve the organization by the end of January, follows the Pentagon’s move earlier this year to cut the $15.5 million in funding for the paper from the Defense Department budget. And it is a reflection of the Trump administration’s broader animosity for the media and members of the press.
Members of Congress have objected to the defunding move for months. And senators sent a letter to Defense Secretary Mark Esper this week urging him to reinstate the money. The letter, signed by 15 senators — including Republicans and Democrats — also warns Esper that the department is legally prohibited from canceling a budget program while a temporary continuing resolution to fund the federal government is in effect.
“Stars and Stripes is an essential part of our nation’s freedom of the press that serves the very population charged with defending that freedom,” the senators said in the letter.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., in a separate letter to Esper in late August, also voiced opposition to the move, calling Stripes “a valued ‘hometown newspaper’ for the members of the Armed Forces, their families, and civilian employees across the globe.” He added that “as a veteran who has served overseas, I know the value that the Stars and Stripes brings to its readers.”
In the memo, the department says Esper made the decision as a result of his department-wide budget review. Signed by Army Col. Paul Haverstick, acting director of the Pentagon’s Defense Media Activity, the memo says plans to close the paper are due on Sept. 15 and the last newspaper is to be published on Sept. 30.
The memo adds that if the paper continues to be funded by either a continuing resolution “or other unforeseen circumstances” then Stripes must submit a plan by Sept. 15 to shut down at the end of the next budget year, Sept. 30, 2021. Haverstick’s memo says that in that case, the last date for publication of the newspaper will be determined based on budget or other circumstances.
The Stripes ombudsman, Ernie Gates, told The Associated Press on Friday that shutting the paper down “would be fatal interference and permanent censorship of a unique First Amendment organization that has served U.S. troops reliably for generations.”
The first newspaper called Stars and Stripes was very briefly produced in 1861 during the Civil War, but the paper began consistent publication during World War I. When the war was over, publication ended, only to restart in 1942 during World War II, providing wartime news written by troops specifically for troops in battle. Although the paper gets funding from the Defense Department, it is editorially independent and is delivered in print and digitally to troops all over the world.
The Pentagon proposed cutting the paper’s funding when making its budget request earlier this year, triggering angry reactions from members of Congress.
The House-passed version of the Pentagon budget contains funding for the paper’s publication, but the Senate has not yet finalized a defense funding bill.
Welcome to The Newspaper Archives of Stars And Stripes
The North Africa and Mediterranean editions (1942-1945) from World War II are now available!
This database contains over 1 million historical newspaper pages from Stars and Stripes, the independent daily newspaper of the U.S. military.
At present this archive includes newspapers published from 1948 through 1999 and editions published in the UK and the Mediterranean (including North Africa) during World War II. For current news and information, please visit stripes.com.
The full-page newspaper pages are rendered in both PDF and JPG format and are searchable by keyword and date, making it easy to explore this unique content. Because the publication history of Stars and Stripes spans several wars, its printing locations and the geographic regions covered changed with the movement of American troops. It was also published in multiple editions—as many as 35 during World War II. To gain a better understanding of this complexity, please see the Publication History section.
Stars and Stripes is likely the only independent news media in the world to operate from within a nation’s defense department. Although the organization is authorized by the U.S. Department of Defense, Stars and Stripes content and coverage is completely independent of outside control or interference. Its singular coverage of the U.S. military offers first-hand accounts of life in peace and during times of war from the service members’ point of view.
Use the archive to gain a new perspective on military conflicts and news, to research the military service of a friend or family member, or simply to read about a person or event that interests you.
Trump, under fire for alleged comments about veterans, has a long history of disparaging military service
By Michael Kranish September 6, 2020 at 7:55 p.m. CDT
(Most pictures and embedded links omitted)
As Donald Trump laid the groundwork in 1999 to run for president as the Reform Party candidate, he made a little-remembered attack on the person he saw as a rival in a possible general election campaign: Republican John McCain.
A few years earlier, Trump had bragged on a morning radio show about avoiding the Vietnam draft, remarking that one of the show’s hosts who had gotten out of service by declaring he had a bad knee had done a “good job.”
Long before Trump’s views of the military would emerge as a flash point in his 2020 reelection campaign — before he would shock the political world withthe more widely seen 2015 attack on McCain, in which he said the senator was “not a war hero” and declared, “I like people who weren’t captured” — Trump had a long track record of incendiary and disparaging remarks about veterans and military service.
Trump, who avoided military service by citing a bone spur in his foot, has disparaged veterans who were wounded or captured or went missing in action and even compared his fear of sexually transmitted diseases to the experience of a soldier, saying in 1993, “if you’re young, and in this era, and if you have any guilt about not having gone to Vietnam, we have our own Vietnam. It’s called the dating game.”
It is a history filled with contradictions, of a man who denigrates his handpicked generals while saying no one supports the military more than he does, and of a commander in chief who questions the bravery of some soldiers even as he reversed disciplinary action against a Navy SEAL over the objections of Pentagon officials. He was raised in a family that criticized the value of military service, according to niece Mary L. Trump, but nonetheless he was sent to a military academy for most of his teenage years.
And now, Trump and his aides are fiercely denying a report in the Atlantic in which the president is quoted denigrating U.S. soldiers, including calling those killed in combat “losers.”
Trump has on rare occasions admitted that he struggles with how to address military issues because of his efforts to get out of service.
He told The Washington Post in 2015 that he “always felt somewhat guilty” about not serving in the military. “I had a lot of deferments,” Trump said. “I had a foot deferment for a short time. And then I got a lucky number. I got 356 [out of 365]. You don’t get a luckier number than that.”
In what he called an effort to make up for his guilt, Trump said he “spent a fortune” to build a Vietnam memorial in New York City and sponsor a Memorial Day parade. The Post has reported that Trump gave $1 million in 1985 to help build the memorial and at least $200,000 for the 1995 parade.
At the time of the memorial dedication in 1985, Trump struck a tone more in line with the traditions of honoring the service of those who fought for their country.
“I was a very strong opponent of the Vietnam War,” Trump said when the memorial was dedicated, “but I also recognized that the people who went to fight were great Americans.” Trump also highlighted the plight of those missing in action, reading a telegram from then-President Ronald Reagan that said the federal government wanted “the fullest possible accounting of your missing comrades in arms.”
Military historians said there is no precedent for a commander in chief to have made such attacks on the military he oversees.
“He may imagine, however bizarre, that this is a way to energize his so-called base” that agreed with his disdain for “endless wars,” said Andrew Bacevich, a Vietnam veteran and author of “The Age of Illusions: How America Squandered Its Cold War Victory.”
“I believe that is one explanation for why he won in 2016 — it came from his willingness to basically denounce post-9/11 military policy as foolhardy, and very few members of the political mainstream were willing to say that,” said Bacevich, who said he will not vote for Trump and may support a third-party candidate. “Since his presidency, he hasn’t ended endless wars, but I just wonder if in some way, if we are looking for a reason, this is some other expression of his opposition to foolish wars.”
The White House issued the following statement in response to questions for this story: “President Trump has nothing but the utmost, solemn respect for our nation’s military. He lauds their heroism and has consistently been the strongest advocate for our veterans and active servicemen and women.”
Fred Trump Jr., the older brother of Donald Trump, is pictured with his wife, Linda in 1961 when he was a second lieutenant in the U.S. Air National Guard. Fred Trump Jr.’s daughter Mary says the president criticized her father for serving in the military. (Mary L. Trump
The roots of Trump’s view of the military were formed at an early age, according to friends and family. Growing up in a mansion in Jamaica Estates in Queens, Trump heard the family criticize those who joined the military instead of going into business. Trump and his father, Fred Trump Sr., were especially harsh in criticizing the decision by Donald’s older brother, Fred Jr., to join the U.S. Air National Guard, according to Fred Jr.’s daughter, Mary L. Trump.
“My father was frequently ridiculed for his career choices and disparaged for serving our country by both his father and by his brother Donald,” said Mary L. Trump, author of a critical book about the president. She said that given the family history regarding the military, it is “beyond comprehension” that her uncle is commander in chief.
Notwithstanding the family criticism of the military, Donald was such an unruly boy that his father decided he needed to impose discipline on the 13-year-old by sending him to the New York Military Academy for five years.
Bolog noted a previously reported episode in which Trump headed the A Company but was quickly transferred to a different position because of a dispute over his leadership capabilities. It was one of several experiences that may have weighed heavily on Trump and shaped his view of the military, Bolog said.
“You have to know that those formative years are what formed his opinion of the military,” Bolog said. “You come from your beautiful home in Jamaica Estates and suddenly you get dropped off at this military school, it was darkness, it was horrible. So spending five years there and then having a cold, rich man as your father, I can’t imagine it. It’s got to harden your bark.”
Other classmates have said the experience was a positive one, and Trump told The Post in 2016 that he left his position at A Company because of a promotion. “I had total control over the cadets,” he said. “I did very well under the military system,” Trump said, while declining to release his transcripts.
Trump wrote in his 1987 book, “The Art of the Deal,” that if he stepped out of line at the academy, one of his instructors “smacked [him] hard.” He said initially he wasn’t happy about being sent to the school but that he “learned a lot about discipline, and about channeling my aggression into achievement.” He wrote that “I can’t say I ever worked very hard” at the school and “was never all that interested in schoolwork.”
By the time Trump graduated in 1964, some of his peers were volunteering for service in Vietnam, but Trump used a series of deferments to attend college. Upon graduation from the University of Pennsylvania in 1968, Trump faced the prospect of being subject to the draft lottery, which began in 1969. Trump then received a medical deferment for what his campaign called “bone spurs on both heels of his feet.” https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/26/us/politics/trump-vietnam-draft-exemption.html
The daughters of the podiatrist who determined that Trump had bone spurs told the New York Times that the diagnosis was made as a favor to Trump’s father, Fred Sr., who was the doctor’s landlord.
Shortly after that, Trump entered the draft lottery, in which he received a high number that ensured he wouldn’t be called to serve. "I got very lucky"
Years later, Trump repeatedly congratulated himself and others for avoiding military service. Appearing on the Howard Stern radio show in 1995, he said that “during the Vietnam War, I got very lucky. I had a very high lottery number.”
Stern responded that a member of his staff, whom he referred to as Jackie the Joke Man, “convinced the doctor that he had a bad knee. I love that.”
“Well, that was a good job, Jackie,” Trump said.
Trump’s aversion to service reportedly filtered into his own family. In her book, Mary L. Trump wrote that when Trump’s son, Don Jr., said he might join the military, Trump and his then-wife Ivana, “told him if he did, they’d disown him in a second.”
By the time Trump decided to seek the Reform Party presidential nomination in 1999, he veered far from the comments he had made 14 years earlier at the dedication of the Vietnam War memorial he helped finance.
At the time, thousands of people flocked to events at which McCain autographed copies of his memoir of the Vietnam War, a prelude to his first presidential bid. In McCain’s book, “Faith of My Fathers,” he cast his decision to serve as putting self-sacrifice for his country ahead of personal ambition.
Trump countered by appearing on the CBS show “60 Minutes II” to promote his campaign book, “The America We Deserve,” and tout his presidential ambitions. He was asked to comment on his potential rivals. It was then that, as interviewer Dan Rather said that McCain “flew combat missions with distinction,” Trump questioned whether the shoot-down of McCain’s plane and subsequent capture made him a hero.
Mark Salter, who co-wrote McCain’s memoir, said he had no recollection of Trump making the comment at the time and never heard McCain mention it.
“In 1999, McCain‘s message was sacrifice for a cause greater than one’s self,” said Salter, co-founder of a group of former McCain staffers supporting Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden. “For Donald Trump, there isn’t a cause greater than self interest .?.?. sometimes he doesn’t know he is hurting his self interest.”
Trump withdrew from the campaign in February 2000.
As Trump prepared for his 2016 bid, he told his then-attorney, Michael Cohen, to prepare for questions about his lack of military service, Cohen later told the House Oversight Committee. Cohen said he asked Trump to provide his medical records that would document the bone spur that enabled him to avoid being drafted. “He gave me none and said there was no surgery.” Cohen told lawmakers. Trump ended the conversation by saying, “You think I’m stupid, I wasn’t going to Vietnam,” Cohen said.
As Trump watched the 2016 Democratic National Convention, he became infuriated at a speech by Khizr Khan, whose son, Army Capt. Humayun Khan, was killed in a 2004 car bombing in Iraq. After Khizr Khan said Trump had “sacrificed nothing” for his country and had smeared Muslims, Trump seemed to compare the death of a soldier to his financial achievements.
“I’ve made a lot of sacrifices,” Trump said. “I work very, very hard. I’ve created thousands and thousands of jobs, tens of thousands of jobs, built great structures. I’ve had tremendous success.”
Trump was ridiculed across the political spectrum for picking a fight with the parents of a fallen soldier, but he won the election, touting his pledge to “rebuild the military.” He said he knew more about the Islamic State “than the generals do, believe me.”
As president, defense spending rose each of the first three years he was in office, with more than $2 trillion in overall spending and $738 billion approved for 2020. The Pentagon greeted the money warmly after facing cuts during the Obama administration that included a reduction in the overall size of the military, smaller pay raises of 1 percent and a shortage in spare parts.
Trump’s criticism of “endless wars” has resonated with voters, including a majority of veterans, who believe that the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan were not worth it, according to the nonpartisan Pew Research Center.
But Trump’s relationship with the military sometimes has fractured over his abrupt decisions.
For example, while Trump has reduced the number of U.S. troops under his watch in Afghanistan by about 4,000 as part of negotiations with the Taliban to end the war there, violence has remained high, and there is no clarity on whether a full peace deal will be reached. Trump’s withdrawal of U.S. troops from northern Syria last year triggered a period in which Russian forces took over American bases, and some veterans decried what they saw as an abandonment of Kurdish forces who have partnered with the United States against the Islamic State.
Trump has had a series of fights with the generals he put in power, some of whom left in anger and dismay. In a 2017 meeting at the Pentagon, he called his top generals “losers” and “a bunch of dopes and babies,” according to “A Very Stable Genius,” by Post reporters Philip Rucker and Carol D. Leonnig. Among those who have departed include his chief of staff, retired general John F. Kelly, and his defense secretary, Jim Mattis, a McCain favorite.
Mattis said earlier this year that “Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us.” In response, Trump, who had once lavished praise on Mattis, tweeted: “I didn’t like his ‘leadership’ style or much else about him. .?.?. Glad he is gone!”
Alice Crites, Dan Lamothe and Carol Leonnig contributed to this report.
More than 60 veterans of World War II took off Friday from Dallas to France, where they will take part in ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of D-Day. The group ranges from 96 to 107 years old, according to American Airlines which is flying them first to Paris. The flight is one of several that are taking veterans to France for the commemoration. The group traveling from Dallas includes six Medal of Honor recipients from wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam who wish to honor the World War II veterans. There are also two Rosie the Riveters, representing women who worked in factories and shipyards during the war. (AP video shot by Kendria LaFleur)
Updated 10:54 PM CDT, May 31, 2024
DALLAS (AP) — More than 60 veterans of World War II took off Friday from Dallas to France, where they will take part in ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of D-Day.
The group ranges from 96 to 107 years old, according to American Airlines, which is flying them first to Paris. The flight is one of several that are taking veterans to France for the commemoration.
The group will take part in a wreath-laying ceremony at Suresnes American Cemetery, visit the Eiffel Tower and join in a daily ceremony known as le Ravivage de la Flamme, which honors fallen French service members at the Arc de triomphe.
They then head to the Normandy region for events that include wreath-laying ceremonies on Omaha and Utah Beaches, two of the landing sites for the Allied forces. Almost 160,000 Allied troops, 73,000 from the United States, landed at Normandy on June 6, 1944, in a massive amphibious operation designed to break through heavily fortified German defenses and begin the liberation of Western Europe.
A total of 4,414 Allied troops were killed on D-Day itself, including 2,501 Americans. More than 5,000 were wounded.
The group traveling from Dallas includes six Medal of Honor recipients from wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam who wish to honor the World War II veterans.
There are also two Rosie the Riveters, representing women who worked in factories and shipyards during the war.
Hundreds of thousands of military women from Allied nations also worked in crucial noncombat roles such as codebreakers, ship plotters, radar operators and cartographers.
There are various ceremonies to commemorate the day in France and to thank veterans, some of whom will make the long trans-Atlantic journey despite advanced age, fatigue and physical difficulties.
“We will never forget. And we have to tell them,” Philippe Étienne, chairman of commemoration organizer Liberation Mission, told The Associated Press.
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