Remembering The Greatest Generation This Veterans Day – Guy D. McCardle
A Salute to the Titans
Ah, Veterans Day. A solemn pause in the raging chaos of life—a time to salute the Titans who stared down hell and punched back. But let’s be clear: this isn’t some tepid reflection on patriotic clichés. No, today we ride through the dust clouds of history to meet the warriors of the Greatest Generation—those grizzled, gutsy badasses who didn’t just survive the 20th century’s deadliest trial by fire but defined what it means to be American.
I’m damn lucky (and grateful) to be alive (for a lot of reasons). Probably the main miracle is that I was born in the first place. My paternal grandfather, at the ripe old age of 19, was a waist gunner on a B-17 during the Second World War. In 1943, a B-17 crewmember had only a 21% chance of completing a 25-mission tour. My grandfather, Guy McCardle, the first (I’m the third iteration), survived 26. He always said that the last one didn’t count, though, because it was a “milk run,” and the enemy didn’t shoot FLAK at the aircraft.
Then there was the fact that his aircraft was so badly damaged on his first mission that he had to bail out over occupied France and make his way back across the English Channel. Half of the 19-year-olds I know these days would have trouble making it to the next town in a car. For his actions in the war my grandfather, Pop as the grandkids call him, was awarded the French Legion of Honor medal.
I speak of him in the present tense cause he is still with us at age 102, living with my 100-year-old grandmother at their long-time home in Pennsylvania. That’s him in the photo below, fifth from the left. I’m told that during that particular mission, they had to land last because the flaps would not deploy, and they were not sure if the tires were flat or not.
Guy McCardle I, fifth from left, checking out the damage to the crew’s B-17 after a successful landing without the benefit of flaps to slow them down.
Ghosts of Normandy and Bastogne
My unlikely existence is not unique at all. Think of those poor bastards who lived through Normandy and Bastogne.
Picture it: June 6, 1944. The gates of hell open, and young men—boys, really—launch themselves into the teeth of death at Normandy. The air reeks of salt, blood, and diesel. Machine guns chatter like rabid hyenas. Yet, they keep going. Some call it courage; some say it was madness. But in that madness lies a strange, beautiful clarity. They didn’t think of medals or parades. No, their mission was raw and primal: kill or be killed, liberate or die trying. Any life they lived after that day was lived in the bonus column. So many met their ends as sandy corpses on a foreign shore.
A Salute to the Titans
Ah, Veterans Day. A solemn pause in the raging chaos of life—a time to salute the Titans who stared down hell and punched back. But let’s be clear: this isn’t some tepid reflection on patriotic clichés. No, today we ride through the dust clouds of history to meet the warriors of the Greatest Generation—those grizzled, gutsy badasses who didn’t just survive the 20th century’s deadliest trial by fire but defined what it means to be American.
I’m damn lucky (and grateful) to be alive (for a lot of reasons). Probably the main miracle is that I was born in the first place. My paternal grandfather, at the ripe old age of 19, was a waist gunner on a B-17 during the Second World War. In 1943, a B-17 crewmember had only a 21% chance of completing a 25-mission tour. My grandfather, Guy McCardle, the first (I’m the third iteration), survived 26. He always said that the last one didn’t count, though, because it was a “milk run,” and the enemy didn’t shoot FLAK at the aircraft.
Then there was the fact that his aircraft was so badly damaged on his first mission that he had to bail out over occupied France and make his way back across the English Channel. Half of the 19-year-olds I know these days would have trouble making it to the next town in a car. For his actions in the war my grandfather, Pop as the grandkids call him, was awarded the French Legion of Honor medal.
I speak of him in the present tense cause he is still with us at age 102, living with my 100-year-old grandmother at their long-time home in Pennsylvania. That’s him in the photo below, fifth from the left. I’m told that during that particular mission, they had to land last because the flaps would not deploy, and they were not sure if the tires were flat or not.
Guy McCardle I, fifth from left, checking out the damage to the crew’s B-17 after a successful landing without the benefit of flaps to slow them down.
Ghosts of Normandy and Bastogne
My unlikely existence is not unique at all. Think of those poor bastards who lived through Normandy and Bastogne.
Picture it: June 6, 1944. The gates of hell open, and young men—boys, really—launch themselves into the teeth of death at Normandy. The air reeks of salt, blood, and diesel. Machine guns chatter like rabid hyenas. Yet, they keep going. Some call it courage; some say it was madness. But in that madness lies a strange, beautiful clarity. They didn’t think of medals or parades. No, their mission was raw and primal: kill or be killed, liberate or die trying. Any life they lived after that day was lived in the bonus column. So many met their ends as sandy corpses on a foreign shore.
Then there’s Bastogne, where men were reduced to frozen specters in the unholy cold. Surrounded, outgunned, and outmanned, they dug in. When asked to surrender, General McAuliffe replied with one word that will echo through the ages: “Nuts.” That’s the Greatest Generation—a middle finger to despair, wrapped in grit and steel.
The Homefront Heroes
Assembling part of the cowling for a B-25 bomber motor at the North American Aviation factory in Inglewood, California in 1942. Image Credit: Rare Historical Photos
While their brothers were slugging it out in the mud and blood overseas, the homefront warriors weren’t sipping cocktails in comfort. No, Rosie the Riveter was hammering rivets, and the factories were pounding out tanks and planes like the heartbeat of a nation on a warpath. Ration books, victory gardens, and blood drives—it was all hands on deck. The Greatest Generation fought a two-front war: one on the battlefield and one in the soul of America. And they won both.
What Made Them Great?
Some say it was their values—duty, honor, country. Others point to their resilience, forged in the crucible of the Great Depression. But let’s not romanticize it too much.
They weren’t saints. They were as flawed as the rest of us. What set them apart was their refusal to quit.
They faced down the Axis juggernaut not because they loved war but because they loved freedom—and were damn well willing to fight for it.
And fight they did. From the sweltering jungles of Guadalcanal to the rolling fields of Europe, they left their mark. Theirs was a time when the world teetered on the brink of annihilation, and they pulled it back with calloused hands and unyielding hearts.
US Marines advanced against Japanese positions during the invasion of Tarawa, part of the Gilbert Islands in the South Pacific. Initially, there were about 5,000 Japanese fighters on the island. The Marines captured 146 of them and killed the rest. My maternal grandfather, Angelo J. Mannino, a proud US Marine, fought here. Yet another of the greatest generation to be remembered today.
Lessons for the Living
Now, as the sun sets on the lives of these few remaining living legends, we’re left to ponder their legacy. What does it mean for us, the beneficiaries of their sacrifice? We, who bicker over trivialities while sipping lattes in air-conditioned comfort, need a jolt of their ferocity and focus. They remind us that freedom isn’t free, that the price of liberty is eternal vigilance—and sometimes, a bloody, brutal fight.
We honor them not by clapping politely at parades but by living lives worthy of their sacrifice. We must remember that our comforts were built on the backs of those who stormed beaches, endured hellish combat, and returned home to rebuild a shattered world, seldom to speak of the hell they had seen.
A Personal Reflection
So, as you sip your whiskey tonight—and I hope to God it’s not some watered-down swill—raise a glass to the Greatest Generation. Think of the ghosts of Iwo Jima and Omaha Beach, and remember that they once walked among us, flesh and blood, fierce and flawed. Their stories are etched in the annals of history, but more importantly, they’re carved into the soul of this nation and into our very DNA.
Let’s not let their sacrifice fade into the sanitized pages of history books. Let’s keep their spirit alive—in our words, our deeds, and our unyielding commitment to the ideals they fought to preserve. After all, the Greatest Generation didn’t save the world so we could wallow in wokeness and mediocrity. They did it so we could carry the torch forward, burning bright and true, even in the darkest of times.
To the Greatest Generation: Thank you. We will never forget. And if we do, may the ghosts of Normandy haunt us forever.
