71 years ago today, in 1944, my grandfather, at the age of 19, was shot down over Nazi Germany in one of the largest air battles of WWII. He spent the next 18 months a prisoner of war in Stalag-17B, before being force marched across Austria in 18 days on whatever food he and his fellow P.O.W buddies could scrounge from the Austrian countryside. I turned 20 last week, Ive never been shot at, Ive never fired a weapon at anyone, and Ive never had to jump out of a burning plane loaded with 5,000 pounds of bombs 20,000+ft in the air over a hostile country. Instead I can pack my bags to go to school in the greatest country in the world thanks to people like my grandfather who put their lives on the line to defeat one of the greatest evils this world has seen
Posted on: Sun, 11 Jan 2015 23:30:27 +0000
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