Bush Feels ‘Enormity of the Loss’ at U.S. Cemetery in Normandy

Excerpts from President Bush’s Memorial Day speech at the Normandy American Cemetery in France:

We have gathered on this quiet corner of France as the sun rises on Memorial Day in the United States of America.

This is a day our country has set apart to remember what was gained in our wars and all that was lost. Our wars have won for us every hour we live in freedom. Our wars have taken from us the men and women we honor today and every hour of the lifetimes they had hoped to live.

This day of remembrance was first observed to recall the terrible casualties of the war Americans fought against each other. In the nearly 14 decades since, our nation’s battles have all been far from home. Here on the continent of Europe were some of the fiercest of those battles, the heaviest losses and the greatest victories.

And in all of those victories, American soldiers came to liberate, not to conquer. The only land we claim as our own are the resting places of our men and women....

All that come to a place like this feel the enormity of the loss. Yet for so many there’s a marker that seems to sit alone. They come looking for that one cross, that one Star of David, that one name.

Behind every grave of a fallen soldier is a story of the grief that came to a wife, a mother, a child, a family or a town. A World War II orphan has described her family’s life after her father was killed on the field in Germany. “My mother,” she said, “had lost everything she was waiting for. She lost her dreams.”

There were an awful lot of perfect linen tablecloths in the house that never got used--so many things being saved for a future that was never to be.

Each person buried here understood his duty but also dreamed of going back home to the people and the things he knew. Each had plans and hopes of his own that parted with him forever when he died.

The day will come when no one is left who knew them, when no visitor to this cemetery can stand before a grave remembering a face and a voice. The day will never come when America forgets them. Our nation and the world will always remember what they did here and what they gave here for the future of humanity....

On Memorial Day, America honors her own. Yet we also remember all of the valiant young men and women from many allied nations, including France, who shared in the struggle here and in the suffering.

We remember the men and women who served and died alongside Americans in so many terrible battles on this continent and beyond. Words can only go so far in capturing the grief and sense of loss for the families of those who died in all our wars.

For some military families in America and in Europe, the grief is recent, with the losses we have suffered in Afghanistan. They can know, however, that the cause is just. And like other generations, these sacrifices have spared many others from tyranny and sorrow.

Long after putting away his uniform, an American GI expressed his own pride in the truth about all who served, living and dead. He said, “I feel like I played my part in turning this from a century of darkness into a century of light.”

Here, where we stand today, the New World came back to liberate the Old....

Our security is still bound up together in a transatlantic alliance, with soldiers in many uniforms defending the world from terrorists at this very hour.

The grave markers here all face west, across an ageless and indifferent ocean to the country these men and women served and loved.