Pearl Harbor remembered...
Publisher’s note: To those remaining and aging survivors, what happened 73 years ago today might seem like yesterday. On that day, 2335 military personnel and 68 civilians were killed, with many hundreds more wounded during an unprovoked attack by the Imperial Japanese Navy which was the catalyst that forced us into the already ongoing WWII. The men and women of that Greatest Generation can never be thanked sufficiently or enough for their sacrifices.
That war was prosecuted and we prevailed, and there have been many battlegrounds since then. We have fought in Korea, Vietnam, the Gulf, Afghanistan, Iraq, and many other places including our homeland.
Where we once had a resolve to vanquish our enemies and protect our way of life, the trend of the last several decades is to placate them in the mode of Neville Chamberlain. We do this to the point that while most Americans support our troops and veterans, our government has systematically weakened our military and what it stands for.
One case in point. On this day that we honor and remember that tragic day of 73 years ago, it comes to light that the memorial in Pearl Harbor is apparently being maintained as marginally as our troops and veterans.
Fox News: PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii – The USS Arizona is one of the nation's most hallowed sites, an underwater grave for more than 900 sailors and Marines killed when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and sank their ship in 1941.
Now, it's the scene of alleged rampant mismanagement.
An internal report from the National Park Service, which operates a visitors' center for a memorial at the battleship, said tour companies sold tickets with the knowledge of park officials even though tickets are supposed to be free.
Another pointed to substandard maintenance, including scuffed museum walls that languished unrepaired and bird feces that wasn't cleaned.
The revelations in documents released last month come just before crowds gather at Pearl Harbor on Sunday for an annual ceremony remembering more than 2,400 sailors, Marines and soldiers killed 73 years ago.
"To watch the desecration of a very sacred, very important place was very disheartening," said John Landrysmith, a former park service guide and 41-year-old Iraq war veteran.