World leaders mark 75 years since D-Day on Normandy's beaches

Nothing like having a coward come to the ceremony to commemorate true soldiers.

I feel current political issues and differences should have been set aside, so a formal invitation could be extended to President Putin to attend the 75th Anniversary commemorations, if only in recognition and honour to the sacrifice Russia servicemen and women made in WW2.

Te every single one who gave, thank you. We are indebted to you, for ridding us of a hideous ideology, and for our freedoms.

While no Soviet forces took part in the amphibious operation itself, the USSR played an enormous part in the success of Operation Overlord, they need to represented.

Nothing like having a coward come to the ceremony to commemorate true soldiers

Don’t let one of the greatest and most important battles of WW II get in the way of your pettiness. It was this same pettiness by the French and British at the Treaty of Versailles that brought on WW II.

*Te every single one who gave, thank you. We are indebted to you, for ridding us of a hideous ideology, and for our freedoms*

Well said.

Yes, thank you all.

Much as I despise the latest Russian regime, nobody can deny that it was the Russian involvement that halted the Nazi murder machine.

80% of German casualties were at the hands of the Soviets...

They should all be on their knees thanking the Russian soldier!

They should all be on their knees thanking the Russian soldier!

Thanks should be given, but not while on their knees. The Russians benefited quite a bit from US-provided arms and the US\British bombings and march towards Germany.

There were no Soviet forces at D-Day, so why invite Putin? There are other commemorations that remember the sacrifice Soviet forces and civilians made.

Without the Soviets there would not have been a D Day.

The west had to get to Germany before the Russian took all of it.

It is of little doubt that the Russian people and troops starting a war on two fronts that brought about the end of National Socialist Germany,

It is also a tragedy President Putin regime subsequently replaced one tyrannical despot dictatorship with another. My gratitude is solely for the sacrifices made by people of Russia

Nothing like having a coward come to the ceremony to commemorate true soldiers.

Corbyn?

Without the Soviets there would not have been a D Day.

Without the Soviet-German non-aggression pact of 1939 there might have been no war in Europe and no need for a Normandy D-Day landing.

Donald Trump's presence at the commemoration is a disgrace to the service members who served there 75 years ago.

No love for the Red Army? The Battle of Stalingrad had a little something to do with saving Europe from Nazism.

@Anonymous,

Indeed. Often conveniently overlooked by socialist apologists.

The soviets and Hitler divided up Poland

Corbyn lets Hamas do his fighting for him.

Btw, has the British Labour Party done anything about its anti- semitism yet?

Much as I despise the latest Russian regime, nobody can deny that it was the Russian involvement that halted the Nazi murder machine

Not 100%, but they did do their part and I don’t think Putin needs to be there.

Indeed. Often conveniently overlooked by socialist apologists.

20 million Soviets, military personnel and civilians, died stopping the Nazis.

Only a blind partisan would overlook this and start waffling about socialist apologists.

It must be difficult to think clearly at all with such a jaundiced mind.

@Jimizo,

Im not denying the huge and important role the USSR played in defeating the Germans in WW2. But the reality ( not "waffling") is that Russia was allied with the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi party) up to and including the war.

They remained allies for about two years - all the while Russia massively supplying and supporting the German war machine. The Russians were responsible for slaughtering thousands of Poles, eg.

It should be noted that Germany broke the pact - not Russia.

Im not denying the huge and important role the USSR played in defeating the Germans in WW2.

Yes. You didn’t mention this and started waffling about ‘socialist apologists’.

But the reality ( not "waffling") is that Russia was allied with the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nazi party) up to and including the war.

Stop being so transparently disingenuous. You were waffling about ‘socialist apologists’ overlooking the Nazi-Soviet Pact, not the fact of the pact itself.

It was a silly, partisan post without any redeeming features at all.

No love for the Red Army? The Battle of Stalingrad had a little something to do with saving Europe from Nazism.

Now that someone has moved off topic by bringing up Stalingrad...

The Soviet-Japanese non-aggression pact probably had more to do with saving Europe from Nazism than Stalingrad. Without the Siberian army with its winterized equipment and veteran troops freed for redeployment in the west Moscow would probably have fallen and Stalin would have fled to the Urals.

But, imagine the Soviet armies lead by the world’s best tanks and a highly professional officer corps halting the Nazis in the Baltic States, Belarus and Ukraine. A pity Stalin decapitated his officer corps down to the regimental level shortly before the war. Oops! But that wasn’t real socialism but only authoritarianism.

Donald Trump's presence at the commemoration is a disgrace to the service members who served there 75 years ago.

No, it's not. You say that simply because you hate the man. I can guarantee you the vast majority of current service members DON'T agree with your assessment and they would be shaking their heads wondering why someone with a jet fighter avatar would write that.

Trump thinks D-Day is all about him.

No, he doesn't.

20 million Soviets, military personnel and civilians, died stopping the Nazis.

Yes and then turned the entire East block into a giant communist prison. Thank God the US allowed freedom to flourish.

Thank God the US allowed freedom to flourish.

Right, so that many years later, African Americans got to sit in the same bus seats as others.

Sorry, bass, I picked on your comment as it was the most recent. But many comments here seem to use modern day world views to talk about events before the commenters were born. I'm guilty myself.

I was born ten years after WWII ended. I heard a lot from my parents and other family members. I got the feeling that WWI was worse - we lost more family members in the fighting apparently. I also got the feeling that no one really knew what they were fighting for in either war. It was a time when my mother told me they paid the doctor for treatment with rabbit meat. Churchill was loved by my dad but despised by my uncle. My mother also told me that the starting of the National Health Service in 1948 was a far bigger event than the war. I still can't get my head round that, but I think that's my problem. Things were different.

I mourn those who died in the war. And I recognize that many young US soldiers were among the dead. But I don't think many "gave" their lives. They had them stolen.

I'm less big on the freedom thing than allowing people to prosper. But perhaps it's the same thing.

Trump is the most dangerous American president Europe has seen

Trump may be a clown, but he has yet to prove himself as dangerous as some of his predecessors. Avoiding service in Vietnam will be seen by many as heroic. I still remember sitting at a bar in Osaka with a Vietnam vet and a guy who moved to Canada to avoid the draft. "I wasn't that brave," was what the vet said. I can't forget those words.

@zichi

"...pity the U.S. couldn't give those freedoms to all of it's own peoples, like African Americans" 

1954 saw the Supreme Court ruling banning segregation, 1964 passage of the Civil Rights Act, and then the Voting Rights Act in 1965. By that point in postwar America, African Americans had "those freedoms" - on paper at least. Implementation was then the challenge, but the freedoms were indeed ensured by the state.

Serrano: "No, he doesn't."

You're right -- he probably doesn't even know what D-Day is, giving that he was too scared to serve and chickened out. But, whether he thinks it's about him or not is beside the point... he MAKES it about him.

bass4funkToday  01:17 am JST

Thank God the US allowed freedom to flourish.

Where it suited the US to do so. Places run by friendly despots like Pinochet and the Shah weren't so lucky.