By SARAH THOMACK

St. Joseph Post

Today, June 6th, 2019, marks the 75th anniversary of D-Day.

“D-Day… not an end, it was a beginning,” said Devlin Scofield, Assistant Professor of History at Northwest Missouri State University. “It was a beginning of liberation of western Europe and an end to Nazi occupation and all of the horrors that were associated with it.”

Scofield said D-Day is one of the most iconic moments of American participation in World War II and a critical moment in the history of the United States and Europe.

“One of the things that’s so important about D-Day, just strictly from a logistical standpoint, was that Operation Overlord was the largest air, land and sea operation ever undertaken in history,” Scofield said. “Just the numbers involved are staggering, something like, 5,000 ships, 11,000 airplanes and over 150,000 servicemen.”

Scofield said D-Day was a culmination of years of planning and was an assault on five different beaches code-named Omaha, Utah, Juno, Sword and Gold.

“The conditions that these soldiers faced were daunting. The Germans had had four years to fortify the French coastline,” Scofield said. “I think it’s also important to keep in mind that many of these soldiers were young men, many not more than 20-years-old, and were asked to do an incredible task – and the cost that the Allies bore is incredible. Around 10,000 casualties and more than 4,000 who were actually killed.”

After the landings, Allied troops would advance their fight and take Paris in late summer. Germany surrendered less than a year later in May 1945.

Seventy-five years after D-Day, visitors to Normandy can see the American cemetery on the bluff overlooking Omaha Beach with rows and rows of white marble gravestones marking the resting place of the over 9,380 who lost their lives on or after D-Day.

“Having been there myself, I can attest to the hallowedness of the place, and it’s places like this that we can begin to grasp the full measure of what it cost to defeat National Socialism,” Scofield said. “Now, 75 years on, there’s fewer and fewer eyewitnesses who participated in the landings and as the veterans themselves increasingly disappear, I think it’s important to keep alive the memory of their sacrifices and also the values for which they were fighting.”

By BRENT MARTIN

St. Joseph Post

A Kansas Congressman says he appreciates President Donald Trump’s efforts to soften the economic blow of his trade dispute with China, but adds farmers want more trade, not handouts.

Congressman Roger Marshall says he has told the White House that farmers simply want more opportunities to sell agricultural products abroad.

“We keep emphasizing what we want is open trade markets, not a handout, and I think the White House has received that loud and clear,” Marshall tells KFEQ Farm Director Melissa Gregory. “But, on the other hand, farm agricultural bankruptcies are up, record highs unfortunately across Kansas. Mental health issues, suicides are up as well. People are way behind on their loans. So, maybe this mitigation money will help some farmers stay afloat for another three to six months.”

It is not a long-term solution, though, according to Marshall. He says other trade opportunities need to be seized.

Marshall says a good start would be for Congress to vote on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement which would replace NAFTA.

Marshall, a Republican, accuses Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of refusing to bring USMCA to the floor for a vote, because she doesn’t want President Trump to win a victory.

“So, it’s very frustrating to me. I sure cannot control President Xi and the Chinese, but we could take USMCA off the uncertainty pile and move it over to the certainty,” according to Marshall. “I just want to emphasize that we trade four times more of our products with Mexico and Canada than we do with China. So, we need to get USMCA done yesterday.”

Marshall says expanded trade is vital to the agricultural economy. He says that is a message he has delivered to the president.

“And I pressed upon him just as hard as I could that Mr. President, we need to get USMCA done,” Marshall says. “We need to get China done, let alone the European Union and the Japanese markets. So, I think the upside is incredibly up, but it’s also hard times.”