Happy World War II Victory Day

Victory_dayToday, August 15, back in 1945 a very significant event happened: World War II ended.

My favorite account of this is from the "Kamp Krusty" episode of The Simpsons, which starts on the last day of the school year:

T minus five seconds and counting.  When the bells ring, the
   students stream out the doors, but before they can disappear for
   good, a teacher properly concludes their education.


   Teacher: Wait a minute!  You didn’t learn how World War II ended!
     Class: [pause their celebration, awaiting the answer]
   Teacher: We won!
     Class: Yay!  U-S-A!  U-S-A!  U-S-A!

GET THE STORY.

And be prepared to party like it’s 1945.

Author: Jimmy Akin

Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."

12 thoughts on “Happy World War II Victory Day”

  1. Over the weekend they put up a statue of that famous kiss in Times Square. They got the woman who claims to be the nurse to do the unveiling.
    –arthur

  3. I have been so focused in the last couple of years on how wrong the use of the atomic bomb was, that I have not stopped to consider that the end of the war should indeed be remembered as a happy occasion. Thank you.

  4. This is not at all to excuse the use of “the bomb” by any means, but the capitulation of Japan was not going to happen at all without tremendous loss of life.
    The firebombing of Tokyo, Kobe and Osaka had already resulted in more civilian deaths than the coming atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The island of Japan had also been effectively cut off from the rest of the world by Allied blockades. Japan was under siege and large numbers of people had already begun to starve.
    Anti-war advocates often talk about non-military means like blockades or trade sanctions as if they were humane and free of terrible human consequences. Most turn out the same way: the common people (non-combatants) starve while the regime hordes food and supplies for itself and the military. The subjugation of a country is never a tidy proposition, whether it is a military action or not.
    I am grateful I did not have to make these decisions. Like Mike, though, I can appreciate the happiness of the war ending. “The kiss” makes the joy of the moment almost palpable.

  6. That kiss would never be published today because the journalist photographer would have ignored it and would instead have asked two guys to pose for the photo kiss so that her newspaper could continue to advance their gay rights agenda.

  7. My mom’s first memory was of either V-E or V-J day — she was, of course, too little to distinguish.
    So, will someone tell me how to party like it’s 1945?
    (I think we still have some mead from the Crusade party if you’re not a stickler for accuracy. 0:)

  9. That kiss would never be published today because the journalist photographer would have ignored it and would instead have asked two guys to pose for the photo kiss so that her newspaper could continue to advance their gay rights agenda.
    Funny you mention that. I clicked on the NY Times link and zoomed in on the photo, and there are two guys kissing, to the right of the original nurse and sailor.

  10. This Kiss would never have been published today. Instead we would have seen headlines adding up the post accupations death toll in both germany and Japan, (yes there were insurgents in both countries after the war and these were real insurgents and not forign fighters possing as natives.) The headlines wouud have been preseded by stories of how both were quagmires and we were lossing the war.

  11. There are thousands of great photos from the World War II era at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fsaquery.html
    Just type in a keyword and you will be amazed at what you find.
    Out of curiosity, I typed in “Catholic”, and was amazed to find hundreds of photographs.
    For example:
    Here is a photo of Sister Aquinas, a nun at Catholic Univerity, who taught war pilots how to repair airplane engines:
    http://tinyurl.com/atho2
    Here is Sister Aquinas teaching other nuns about airplane engines:
    http://tinyurl.com/7ls6k
    Here is a photo of a speaker at an open-air rally of the Catholic Evidence Guild in 1943 in Washington DC:
    http://tinyurl.com/x8fx
    Here are two nice photos taken a mass in 1942 at a Catholic church in a black neighborhood in Chicago:
    http://tinyurl.com/9ddgv
    http://tinyurl.com/cmu7b

  12. There are thousands of great photos from the World War II era at http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/fsaquery.html
    Just type in a keyword and you will be amazed at what you find.
    Out of curiosity, I typed in “Catholic”, and was amazed to find hundreds of photographs.
    For example:
    Here is a photo of Sister Aquinas, a nun at Catholic Univerity, who taught war pilots how to repair airplane engines:
    http://tinyurl.com/atho2
    Here is Sister Aquinas teaching other nuns about airplane engines:
    http://tinyurl.com/7ls6k
    Here is a photo of a speaker at an open-air rally of the Catholic Evidence Guild in 1943 in Washington DC:
    http://tinyurl.com/x8fx
    Here are two nice photos taken a mass in 1942 at a Catholic church in a black neighborhood in Chicago:
    http://tinyurl.com/9ddgv
    http://tinyurl.com/cmu7b

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