Oshkosh 2023 Live: The Greatest Generation. WWII Veterans And Their Memories
View: https://youtu.be/7Rz9_8Ip8Vo
Glad to see the veterans still participating, including Bud Anderson who's 101.
Sidebar: since Brokaw's 1980s book,, "The Greatest Generation" has become a reflexive response to the WW II generation. He did not explain his description but one of his mentors, Joe Foss, said "We weren't the greatest. We just did what we had to do."
Joe was right.
In WW II the US was allied with the British Commonwealth, the Soviet Union, China, and dozens of other nations. At the end the allies outnumbered the axis between 6 and 8 to 1, and outproduced Germany and Japan by something approaching infinity. In contrast, the American founders faced the greatest power on earth, and took 8 years to win independence. Further citing Joe, without the Founders we would not have a USA.
HOWEVER:
IMO there is no room for doubt that the WW II generation of airmen was The Greatest. Imagine 80 knot biplanes to Mach 2 jets in one career!