Inside the World War II Memorial there is a wall with 4000 gold stars attached, each represent 100 soldiers who gave their lives during World War II.
Each star is cast individually and is slightly different from the rest. At the base of the stars is a pool representing the tears of a nation...and the words -
"Here we mark the price of freedom".
Below is an excerpt from a speech recently given by John Ashcroft at Regent University.
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"I seize this opportunity of being with you today with a view toward making sure we clarify what we can do to build a future that defends and enriches all of the citizens with whom we live in this community we call America.
The first point that I would like to make about leaders is that leaders are learners. When circumstances present themselves to us, we have the opportunity to learn from them, to adapt as a result of what's happened, of what we've learned in the circumstance. If not we'll be condemned to repeat history.
I've spent alot of time in state government [In Missouri]. I served a couple of years as a state auditor, eight years as state attorney general and eight years as state governor. When I was called to Washington during my state service, it became a habit of mine - because I'm not what you call an "entertainment - intense" person - to walk among the monuments during the evenings. I reacquainted myself with the very principles that I believed were structural factors undergirding the fabric of American life. Two months ago I recreated that walk through the monuments with some of my colleagues from the Justice Department. We must have had 50 or so department employee's and another 25 children ... on a rather chilly, but inspiring evening.
One monument that did not exist during my visits as a state attorney general was the World War II Memorial. As families and members of the Justice department approached it, I was taken with what I consider a very beautiful monument. It reminded me of the tremendous cost of defending liberty. Freedom is never free. It is always costly. Some historians believe the cost of World War II to equal at least 50 million lives.
During the same visit to the World War II Memorial, I remembered having been in London weeks earlier and going underground to a bunker where Winston Churchill directed the resistance. I remembered reading in Churchill's biography about how long he pled with England and the rest of the world to become alert to the menace of Hitler. How insensitive world leaders were to his warnings until we found 50 million casualties being consumed in confronting tyranny in a time that could only be defined in historical perspective as "too late" - at least for 50 million souls.
On a wall in the World War II Memorial are 4,000 gold and bronze stars. It's as if the blue field of our flag had been replicated again and again; but instead of 50 stars, there are 4,000. Each of them represents 100 American lives lost in World War II. Four hundred thousand lives lost in defense of freedom - a noble cause - but lost, in a significant measure, because we were too late.
I thought to myself, "You know, there really are only two times to defend freedom". Once is when it's too early. People criticize you for going in advance. It wasn't long before people began to criticize this administration for going too early into Iraq. But we were criticized for not going into Afghanistan soon enough. We were too late. Over 3,000 lives had already been lost in New York, Virginia and a field in Pennsylvania.
I was stunned by these thoughts as I looked at the stars on the wall of the World War II Memorial. I called over to the 50 or so Justice employees and their families and said, "I just want to make one comment to you. You can defend freedom too early or too late but be criticized in both instances. But if you have to keep score as to who is in favor of defending it too early or too late, mark me down for being too early. There are too many stars on this wall".
If we look at the current challenges that America faces, look to the President of the United States who has decided we will not be late again. The defense of freedom always requires a sense of vision."....
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