Posted on 04/06/2009 4:20:18 PM PDT by CitizenM
Barack Obama, concerned about offending Britain and Germany, rebuffed strenuous attempts by President Nicolas Sarkozy of France to persuade the new American president to make a trip to Normandy this week.
White House officials travelled to France at the start of March to discuss a visit by Mr Obama to Omaha Beach, the site of the American Cemetery, established in 1944 just after D-Day and where 9,387 American personnel are buried. Among them is Theodore Roosevelt Jr the eldest son of the 26th US President.
French officials and senior American military officers walked with White House staff through the cemetery discussing how the two presidents might follow the same route. But even before their trip, the White House had decided that Mr Obama would not travel there this week.
"It wasn't going to happen," said an American official in Washington. "We went through the motions to placate President Sarkozy but giving special treatment to France was not on our agenda.
"During this trip, we wanted to maintain a balance between the British, German and France". A White House spokesman in London declined to comment. Last month, White House officials briefed that a Normandy visit had been considered but it had not been logistically possible.
Mr Sarkozy is said by French officials to be piqued that Gordon Brown became the first European leader to meet Mr Obama and was then lavished with praise by him at a 50-minute joint press conference in London on Wednesday.
----snip----
According to French reports, Mr Obama was to visit the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial at Colleville-sur-mer, just north of Omaha Beach. The pair were apparently to have dined at the nearby chateau de Bénouville in Caen.
The White House rejected the offer....(see rest of story)
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Thank you very much!
for later
In the 80’s I was a part of the Airborne Battalion Combat Team stationed at Vicenza Italy. We jumped into a field near Omaha beach as part of a D-Day ceremony. I cannot speak about the French population as a whole ,but the people in and around that area love America and Americans. Forever etched in my mind is the picture of the little girl who handed me some flowers she had picked as I departed the drop zone. She was with someone who I would guess was her grandfather and when I shook hands with him I noticed that he was crying. We did not say a word to each other, but the look of gratitude in his eyes told me more than anywords could about his feelings for America. Whenever I get down about the direction our country is going I recall that moment in that field far from home. Though the media may paint most of the world as being America haters, I know nothing could be farther from the truth. There are good people like the ones I met that week I spent in France that know what the world would be like if America becomes just another country in the world. That should make us all proud to be Americans.
The story of several American flyers that went to fight in the Battle of Britain. An amazing page turner.
They know this already.
If Obama refused to visit Normandy for fear of upsetting Germans,
then who was he afraid of upsetting if he visited American wounded at Landstuhl ??
The obvious and logical answer is Muslims.
And a lot of Democrats.
Obama was on his I Hate America Tour and wouldn’t dream of showing respect to our military, fallen and wounded.
He’s not a POS-he’s the entire thing.
I am glad that he didn't go. May those soldiers rest in peace. They won't need to turn in their graves.
This European trip has been so revealing about his character, and lack of it. This pres_ent has no heart. He's not human.
Normandy was a trifecta.
We launched Normandy with the aid of our traditional allies, England. Remind them of this.
We launched Normandy to aid the frequently ungrateful benefactor of our military power, France. Remind them of this.
We launched Normandy upon a people of whom it is noted “they are either at your feet or at your throat”, in order to crush their imperial aspirations. Remind them of this.
What an incompetent team that is leading this incompetent President.
Thanks! I’ll try my library catalog.
My daughter saw an elderly French woman. She came up to my daughter and asked, with tears in her eyes, "Are you an American?" My daughter answered, "yes!"
The woman gave her a hug, and thanked her for America's help during the war.
They both had tears in their eyes when they were finished talking.
Thank you, FRiend.
Michelle - Splaylegged.
That is some funny S***.
The one white guy who appeared to be in his late 50s that I heard on television said,”I voted for him [obama] so that I could retire.”
In the interest of not geting banned I will refrain from further comment.
You’re welcome. Help yourself to a Guinness to drink to our soldiers, living and dead.
He such a POS.
Words fail me.
What a damn downward turn our country went.
Damn him.
... Giving attention to OUR SOLDIERS GRAVES: boy what a good point. Somehow I managed to not see that fact.
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