104th Infantry, US Army

[Mike Minto]

My father was a member of the 104th in Europe during WW2; some of you may well have relatives who were part of that unit. Anyway, they have an excellent website, and recently I read that their next reunion (they have had an annual reunion for more years than I know) will be their last. Alas, just not enough of the vets left alive or capable of attending, I guess. I can only agree with Tom Brokaw that this was at least, 'one of', the greatest generations of Americans. They were born into a country as it was industrializing, a world still able to get caught up in savage conflict brought on by nationalism and territorial expansionism brought on by fears of a poverty not long past, of terrible dictators, and through true sacrifice overcame the human and technological hurdles they faced. They seem to be the last generation of people I can truly say behave as though people are more important than the material things in this world. I can only thank those who came before me, and gave us what we have today, imperfect it may have been, hoping we can regain some of the way we have lost.

[Neal Clayton]

the guest on jon stewart's show last night suggested that the 20th century might have been a sort of 'adolescence' from which we would grow and learn. in that our industrial discoveries gave the representatives of the old world the idea that global conflict was a new and viable enterprise, but people since have realized that such knowledge was much better spent on improving their own lives, rather than the ambitions of a ruling class such as those that existed in WW2 italy/germany/japan.

it's a shame that a generation had to live through such times, but i think history has shown that the author was correct, that people have lived and learned, and become better for it (albeit a generation later to put the hold outs from that era on their last legs, such as soviet russia and china, and to a lesser extent the other european colonial aspirants). there may be hope for us after all ;).

i think that if nothing else, that's the lasting legacy of those who participated in WW2. in previous centuries the 'civilized' world fought one conflict after another. how many times did the british trade blows with france, and the muslim empires with eastern europe, etc. no sooner than one decade(s) old war would end, than another would start. but since WW2 we have not had continent spanning conflict, so the WW2 generation can be content in knowing that now we get it, lets not do that again.