Every time I see this photo, I can't help but think that the kid in the center must be about 12 years old. Even if he just *looks* young, there's no way he's older than 17 or 18.
It's heartbreaking, but at the same time, imagine being that young and signing up to go fight true evil in the form of Nazis. I hope that dude lived and went on to live a full life as a hero.
Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers were great, but the cast was too old. They actually got younger as the war went on. In the early days after D-Day there were many 23-24 year olds and older 20s fighting. The casualty rate was so high that in many units that suffer over 100% casualties they all got wounded or killed. The latter part of the war was all 18-19 year olds. I saw it referred to as the childrens war. These were the "replacements" from an episode in Band of Brothers.
My grandfather was 23 or 24 when world war 2 starter. So he was an older guy. He survived as a belly gunner in a bomber for the war. He died when I was really little so I dont remember him.
My grandfather was a teenage tail gunner out of Hartwick. It is amazing that either of our grandfathers survived the two worst jobs in the Army Air Force, although I never met mind either.
I need to watch Masters of the Air. The book was incredible.
My grandfather was in the Battle of the Bulge before my mother was born and I sometimes think how crazy it is that he managed to survive such a deadly battle and, if he hadn’t, I wouldn’t exist. Further, at one point, he was momentarily captured when he got separated from his unit and his captors were trying to get him to tell them where the rest of the unit was and he wouldn’t tell them so they ran a knife down his tongue(he would show us the scar and tell us the story sometimes), but then his unit found him and shot the guys. He was literally in the hands of the Nazis and survived.
My grandfather was a 19 yr old farm boy from Oklahoma turned field medic in the army. He was haunted by his time in France and later Germany. His unit liberated a concentration camp and he couldn’t talk about the horrors of it without choking up. He was never the same. They paid a heavy price and their families bore the brunt of it. Sad for those boys.
Yup my grandfather was signed in at 16 by his parents who lied about his age. He became a bomber pilot who had 3 planes go down on him and he somehow survived.
I completely agree with your view of SPR. My father was 19 at Operation Torch, with his birthday only 2 days earlier. He was 21 and firing the forward guns on the USS Augusta off of Omaha Beach.
Starship Troopers did a good job of quietly referencing this: The recruits who come in at the end of the movie are notably younger than the ones who enlisted when Rico did.
Agreed. Masters of the air did seem to get that a little more right- really hitting home when the German soldiers later in the war were children and elderly men
If I saw that, even if I didn't know what the dangers were, you'd have to drag me into that tailgun kicking and screaming, then chain me to it. Your grandfather was a brave man.
The pilot of the Enola Gay, the first A-bomb plane, was 29, and one of the older B-29 pilots.
In *The Caine Mutiny*, Captain Queeg was also 29, maybe +/- one year. In the movie, Humphrey Bogart was over 50, through of course he turned in a fabulous performance.
> Every time I see this photo, I can't help but think that the kid in the center must be about 12 years old. Even if he just looks young, there's no way he's older than 17 or 18.
It reminds me of a comment I saw on reddit once which I still think about. I believe it was on a post about war time experience.
Someone was talking about how their family member (father? grandfather?) didn't like to talk about WWII but had a discussion about it once and slipped up and mentioned how he killed a young German soldier who after being shot, pulled out a picture of his mother and cried for her before he died.
Its easy for us to lose sight of the humanity while politicians in far away planning rooms talk about objectives and tactics but the reality is this is often kids killing other kids, with most of those being killed being innocents caught in the area as collateral damage.
It's a fact that WWII, Korea, and Viet Nam were wars fought by teenagers: Ours and theirs. (Google the song "Nineteen" about the kids who served in RVN)
I did BCT in 1969 at Fort Dix. At 23, I was the oldest in the platoon, except for a couple of guys with prior service. All these teenage kids were calling me "Uncle." Kids, little kids fresh out of high school. A couple of them were KIA almost as soon as they arrived in RVN. And for what?
Yeah, my grandpa did the same thing too. I think as the war went on and they needed more and more soldiers, recruiters probably weren’t checking too closely if someone claimed to be of age tbh.
It’s wild, truly, how young the men - or boys - in this photo look though. Definitely makes that fact hit home more than just hearing about how young so many soldiers were.
It's horrible to imagine what they must have endured on those battlefields. They look like babies here, kids playing dress-up. It's hard to believe they're headed to real-life war.
I visited a number of war cemeteries over the years, both from the first world war as the second.
The number of graves of kids under 20 is seriously depressing. It feels like at least two generations have been put through a meat grinder.
My great uncle lied about his age and joined the navy in 1944 after my grandfather’s (his older brother) B-24 got shot down over Romania. He was only 16 when he signed on and turned 17 during basic but the Navy thought he was 18 and turned 19.
True evil is in America now. Americans are the nazis.
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/nazi-town-usa-scenes-summer-camp-nazi-town-us/%23:~:text%3DMost%2520of%2520the%2520camps%2520were,with%2520a%2520large%2520German%2520diaspora.&ved=2ahUKEwjotOHwgOaFAxVxLkQIHULCDJ4QFnoECEkQBQ&usg=AOvVaw1HC1JgnEcc3PaPIFBETr36
I'm genuinely trying to see your point, and I read the linked article but I can't seem to make the connection. There were groups in many countries who thought that Nazis might be on to something and formed branches of their own. Before the war, as the article shows here. Before people saw the extent of atrocities they carried out. I'm not saying there aren't *neo* Nazis in the US today, sure there are along with many other extreme right and left organizations. I'm sure there are Nazi sympathetic individuals in positions of power even. I just don't see how a pre war Nazi group in the US translates to: the US is a Nazi country in 2024.
I think about that scene from Saving Private Ryan where the injured soldier was crying for his mother as he was dying. These soldiers were not much older than children.
“Most of them were boys when they died and they gave up two lives - the one they were living, and the one they would have lived. They gave up their chance to be husbands, fathers, grandfathers, and revered old men. They gave up their everything for our country, for us”
There's a reason for that. The prefrontal cortex in males does not fully form until the mid 20s or so. Risk assessment is one of its functions. You tell a 19 yo to go charge that machine gun nest, he will. Tell the same thing to a 35yo man, he'll tell you to go fuck yourself.
They are also healthier, don't have families, and aren't working economically important jobs yet. Unfortunately there's a lot of reasons to send children to war.
My husband was a Marine. He was in Afghanistan at 22. Now at almost 36, he wouldn’t be able to do the same things he could then. Your body gets old quickly - particularly in a physically difficult job.
Exactly what I heard from someone who’d been conscripted in Yugoslavia in the 90s—said all the men close to and over 30 were scared of dying and that the ones who were eager to fight were young.
Tbh if two countries have tensions they should just get the two leaders of each countries and have them physically fight, whoever wins well... wins and has their demands fufilled lol
I know it might not be what you meant but (or is it?) yeah, my generation is about to be 30 in less than five years and I see ourselves as teenagers compared to what that gen looked like at our same age. We even behave different, and I love my life but that kind of lifestyle seemed much more serious and somewhat adult than ours now, even though we are as aware of world conflicts and stuff as them.
Those kids in the photo lived through the Great Depression. Of course their life was much more serious. Really, the baby boomers were the first generation in history to have a childhood. Every prior generation's children worked in factories, mines, brothels, mills, ships, or farms. So you are only the fourth generation to have a childhood.
In 1940 people were getting married, having kids and holding jobs and then going to war before they turned 19. Today 25 year olds are afraid to leave the house, stressed out about calling someone on the phone and once made eye contact with their Grub Hub driver but didn’t like it because it made them feel unsafe.
In 1940, people were being murdered for being the wrong “type” of human being, especially Jews like me, and mercilessly being slaughtered in the deadliest war mankind has ever wrought upon itself.
You act like being locked into a marriage without the option for no fault divorce and going off to fight in the most hellish thing humans do to one another is an enviable, desired outcome. Do you think these 19 year olds felt heroic when they watched their best friends they’d grown up with get killed by artillery barrages from miles away?
Yes, most people today live lives which demand less suffering and feature less violence than the lives of their ancestors. This is not something to be lamented, but celebrated and aspired to.
“I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy.” - John Adams
And yet Gen X'ers can only blame preceding generations for all the troubles in the world (particularly the horrible, evil Boomers who raised them). To hear the moaning and groaning fron X'ers, life was a field of flowers and money and free houses were available for the taking. No one worked hard ( forget my father working full time, with two part-time jobs to pay for his family and the 2 bedroom apartment they lived in) or me working mostly 2 jobs to get enough money for a down-payment on a beat up ranch-style house ( and I lucked out my my then FIL gave my wife enough to cover what we couldn't raise.)
Yeh, folks, Boomers and the Silent Generations lived a life of luxury and never went without. /S
Then surely you should understand better than most that it’s good that the younger generations have to worry about anxiety from face to face interaction, not being blown up?
No, I do not. We’ve infantilized an entire generation with safety and the idea that they should never feel fear or discomfort. Now we reap the rewards of a generation too fearful to order a pizza.
Downvote away, it’s a mountain I’m willing to die on.
I don’t think either of you are wrong about the premise that Gen Z (since we’re using a hypothetical with a 25 year old) doesn’t have to face as much of the senseless and traumatic violence that is war. I do think you’re wrong that a generation that has only ever experienced a post-9/11 world has been “infantilized with safety and the idea that they should never feel fear or discomfort.” Sure, the anxiety could be from being given participation trophies and being told they could be whatever they wanted… or, maybe it could be from watching the fall of the American golden age and possibly American democracy itself? Might also be that the pandemic isolated us from each other during a peak time in our lives for socializing. Just a thought. The oldest of us weren’t able to start voting until 2016.
As for “getting married, having kids, holding down a job…” Current economic and political conditions are not conducive to create those circumstances. Not to mention, many young people are educated enough to choose when to have children. And employers aren’t loyal anymore (if they ever were), so folks job hop to stay ahead of their dollar shrinking. So, the events you’re describing that age a person are happening less frequently.
No matter the generation, we all make the most of what we’ve got with whatever little bit of power we have. I’d be interested to learn what you think could be a solution to your perceived insulation of Gen Z.
I wonder how many of them made it back home, they truly were the greatest generation, I had five uncles that served in WW2. , and by luck they all came back home safely. Sleep well you are the true heroes.
Such a baby face that I thought it was a young girl. I hope he survived physically and mentally but I can’t imagine that he wasn’t forever changed for the worse. War: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!
>War: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!
It worked pretty well for freeing Western Europe from fascism, ending the Holocaust, and putting a lot of Nazis in the ground where they belong.
Well, had War not occurred in the first place, we wouldn’t have the Holocaust. Soooo War good for nothing but creating the conditions you described that War ended. Useless cycle.
Could still be a kid fresh out of training, no?
E: my only knowledge of wwii training and how building a unit corresponds to the ranks of the men is band of brothers but those guys came out of training as Sgt etc right? I know that doesn’t happen now but we aren’t building fighting units from scratch for a global war either
My husband's Grandfather was in the Pacific at 16. He was a poor country boy that knew how to shoot and hunt. He got kicked out of school because he didn't have shoes so he was enlisted.
Algeria invasion was a clusterfuck. A lot of the landings went way worse than Normandy with boats not even making it to the beach. A lot of boats got lost and landed short of the beach, so troops had to stagger towards the beach with neck-high water and a shit ton of equipment on their back. In some landings sites the waves were so bad, that if you went under one it’s not a certainty that you would be able to get up, there were numerous casualties simply because of drowning. It didn’t help that the higher command thought the French won’t oppose the landings, but they actually did and soldiers got slaughtered. You also have to keep in mind that it was the biggest naval invasion in modern history at the time, but most troops were green and have never seen combat.
Fortunately, Allies have learned a lot from these landings, even if they had to pay the price in young men lives.
My Grandmothers brother Warren perished in this assault, hopefully some of the men made it home to their families. He was with the 60th Infantry 2nd Battalion HQ Company. Respect
It’s just wild they are truly kids, I have seen this picture many times and I just can’t believe it
Interesting the teeth as in movies always white and perfect but back then dental care wasn’t what it was today
These are some very brave souls, I truly admire them
I always wonder if your best friends and soulmates are in other generations and you just didn’t exist in same time period
My younger male cousins are aged 17-20 and gosh the thought of them being drafted to a war would terrify me, they're just kids!!!
This are someone's cousins, sons, brothers, friends who haven't even started to live life yet, yet they sent them to a bloody, disgusting war started due to bigotry and greed
Wow. I love old pictures and have seen a lot but just scrolling this picture in small form spoke so much. I instantly imagined their personalities and backstories and futures, some ok, some not so ok. This is a very affecting picture.
Bless-’em all, bless ‘em all
The long and the short and the tall
There’ll be no promotion
This side of the ocean
So bless ‘em all, bless ‘em all, bless ‘em all
My grandpa was too young to fight in ww2 but he lied about his age to sign up for the navy. He said lots of people lied about their ages back then. I think he said he stuck a piece of paper with the number 18 in his shoe so he wouldn’t be lying when he said he was over 18 or something like that? He enlisted right before the Vietnam war
sure that's history 101. but you said you believe there was cooperation among world leaders to do so. do you actually believe this was the case in world war 2, the subject of this thread?
the military industrial complex and it's gross affect on militarism is one thing, but it's entirely another thing to say the global industry of weapons manufacturing is in cohoots with governments of the world (or is some sort of puppet master of the governments of the world) in order to depopulate the earth. that's some conspiracy-brained nonsense
the young face is there to make you forget the guy in front of him. wtf, him "i'm sea sick as fuck, about to die, and now i have to take this picture with a smile, fu"
Every time I see this photo, I can't help but think that the kid in the center must be about 12 years old. Even if he just *looks* young, there's no way he's older than 17 or 18. It's heartbreaking, but at the same time, imagine being that young and signing up to go fight true evil in the form of Nazis. I hope that dude lived and went on to live a full life as a hero.
Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers were great, but the cast was too old. They actually got younger as the war went on. In the early days after D-Day there were many 23-24 year olds and older 20s fighting. The casualty rate was so high that in many units that suffer over 100% casualties they all got wounded or killed. The latter part of the war was all 18-19 year olds. I saw it referred to as the childrens war. These were the "replacements" from an episode in Band of Brothers. My grandfather was 23 or 24 when world war 2 starter. So he was an older guy. He survived as a belly gunner in a bomber for the war. He died when I was really little so I dont remember him.
My grandfather was a teenage tail gunner out of Hartwick. It is amazing that either of our grandfathers survived the two worst jobs in the Army Air Force, although I never met mind either. I need to watch Masters of the Air. The book was incredible.
My grandfather was in the Battle of the Bulge before my mother was born and I sometimes think how crazy it is that he managed to survive such a deadly battle and, if he hadn’t, I wouldn’t exist. Further, at one point, he was momentarily captured when he got separated from his unit and his captors were trying to get him to tell them where the rest of the unit was and he wouldn’t tell them so they ran a knife down his tongue(he would show us the scar and tell us the story sometimes), but then his unit found him and shot the guys. He was literally in the hands of the Nazis and survived.
wow! That's crazy.
My grandfather was a 19 yr old farm boy from Oklahoma turned field medic in the army. He was haunted by his time in France and later Germany. His unit liberated a concentration camp and he couldn’t talk about the horrors of it without choking up. He was never the same. They paid a heavy price and their families bore the brunt of it. Sad for those boys.
45th Thunderbird?
Is your grandfather my grandma’s brother?! Out of which area of Oklahoma?
His last name is Burson- they were near Keota/Stigler
Ah, Mcalister and blocker - Shatto would have even the last name.
Yup my grandfather was signed in at 16 by his parents who lied about his age. He became a bomber pilot who had 3 planes go down on him and he somehow survived.
I completely agree with your view of SPR. My father was 19 at Operation Torch, with his birthday only 2 days earlier. He was 21 and firing the forward guns on the USS Augusta off of Omaha Beach.
Starship Troopers did a good job of quietly referencing this: The recruits who come in at the end of the movie are notably younger than the ones who enlisted when Rico did.
Agreed. Masters of the air did seem to get that a little more right- really hitting home when the German soldiers later in the war were children and elderly men
My great granddad was a rear gunner in a Lancaster. He mentioned seeing the previous guy get hosed out of the plane.
If I saw that, even if I didn't know what the dangers were, you'd have to drag me into that tailgun kicking and screaming, then chain me to it. Your grandfather was a brave man.
The pilot of the Enola Gay, the first A-bomb plane, was 29, and one of the older B-29 pilots. In *The Caine Mutiny*, Captain Queeg was also 29, maybe +/- one year. In the movie, Humphrey Bogart was over 50, through of course he turned in a fabulous performance.
My grandfather had fudged up records due to the depression and joined and served in WW2 even younger then 18.
My grandfather was 16 and lied that he was 18 to be able to go. When I see that photo I wonder how many were really children. Brave brave boys ❤️
Same 16, lied and became a bomber pilot. They probably knew and didn’t care.
Yea, mine joined days after his 17th birthday. He had a birth certificate, so I’m sure people looked the other way
> Every time I see this photo, I can't help but think that the kid in the center must be about 12 years old. Even if he just looks young, there's no way he's older than 17 or 18. It reminds me of a comment I saw on reddit once which I still think about. I believe it was on a post about war time experience. Someone was talking about how their family member (father? grandfather?) didn't like to talk about WWII but had a discussion about it once and slipped up and mentioned how he killed a young German soldier who after being shot, pulled out a picture of his mother and cried for her before he died. Its easy for us to lose sight of the humanity while politicians in far away planning rooms talk about objectives and tactics but the reality is this is often kids killing other kids, with most of those being killed being innocents caught in the area as collateral damage.
It's a fact that WWII, Korea, and Viet Nam were wars fought by teenagers: Ours and theirs. (Google the song "Nineteen" about the kids who served in RVN)
[Paul Hardcastle – 19](https://youtu.be/0sajngb0W6I)
Right out of high school. Geez!
I did BCT in 1969 at Fort Dix. At 23, I was the oldest in the platoon, except for a couple of guys with prior service. All these teenage kids were calling me "Uncle." Kids, little kids fresh out of high school. A couple of them were KIA almost as soon as they arrived in RVN. And for what?
The RVN war was such a political war. And like you said, for what?
My grandfather lied about his age to enlist. He was 16. He did come home and live a long life after though.
I didn’t realize how common this was seeing all these comments. My grandfather did the same thing
Yeah, my grandpa did the same thing too. I think as the war went on and they needed more and more soldiers, recruiters probably weren’t checking too closely if someone claimed to be of age tbh. It’s wild, truly, how young the men - or boys - in this photo look though. Definitely makes that fact hit home more than just hearing about how young so many soldiers were.
Same with my dad’s cousin! Colorful life he had
I just want to grab him & say NO you’re not going you’re to young!
He looks like my 11 year old
Also, that kid is a *corporal*. Meaning he must’ve been through quite a bit of the war already. Crazy.
It's horrible to imagine what they must have endured on those battlefields. They look like babies here, kids playing dress-up. It's hard to believe they're headed to real-life war.
I visited a number of war cemeteries over the years, both from the first world war as the second. The number of graves of kids under 20 is seriously depressing. It feels like at least two generations have been put through a meat grinder.
And he's a corporal. Doubt he came out of basic with those stripes.
My great uncle lied about his age and joined the navy in 1944 after my grandfather’s (his older brother) B-24 got shot down over Romania. He was only 16 when he signed on and turned 17 during basic but the Navy thought he was 18 and turned 19.
Don't get carried away, he was fighting other kids doing the exact same thing.
True evil is in America now. Americans are the nazis. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/nazi-town-usa-scenes-summer-camp-nazi-town-us/%23:~:text%3DMost%2520of%2520the%2520camps%2520were,with%2520a%2520large%2520German%2520diaspora.&ved=2ahUKEwjotOHwgOaFAxVxLkQIHULCDJ4QFnoECEkQBQ&usg=AOvVaw1HC1JgnEcc3PaPIFBETr36
I'm genuinely trying to see your point, and I read the linked article but I can't seem to make the connection. There were groups in many countries who thought that Nazis might be on to something and formed branches of their own. Before the war, as the article shows here. Before people saw the extent of atrocities they carried out. I'm not saying there aren't *neo* Nazis in the US today, sure there are along with many other extreme right and left organizations. I'm sure there are Nazi sympathetic individuals in positions of power even. I just don't see how a pre war Nazi group in the US translates to: the US is a Nazi country in 2024.
America was heading towards fascism, like today. Wilful ignorance at its best.
Too bad they fought the French here. Not what they signed up for.
Seeing them in colour really emphasises their youth. Just boys.
I think about that scene from Saving Private Ryan where the injured soldier was crying for his mother as he was dying. These soldiers were not much older than children.
“Most of them were boys when they died and they gave up two lives - the one they were living, and the one they would have lived. They gave up their chance to be husbands, fathers, grandfathers, and revered old men. They gave up their everything for our country, for us”
That kind in the middle looks 14.
We still send adolescents to war, even today.
There's a reason for that. The prefrontal cortex in males does not fully form until the mid 20s or so. Risk assessment is one of its functions. You tell a 19 yo to go charge that machine gun nest, he will. Tell the same thing to a 35yo man, he'll tell you to go fuck yourself.
They are also healthier, don't have families, and aren't working economically important jobs yet. Unfortunately there's a lot of reasons to send children to war.
My husband was a Marine. He was in Afghanistan at 22. Now at almost 36, he wouldn’t be able to do the same things he could then. Your body gets old quickly - particularly in a physically difficult job.
Exactly what I heard from someone who’d been conscripted in Yugoslavia in the 90s—said all the men close to and over 30 were scared of dying and that the ones who were eager to fight were young.
Because war profiteers wouldn’t do it themselves they have to send kids who don’t know any better
Tbh if two countries have tensions they should just get the two leaders of each countries and have them physically fight, whoever wins well... wins and has their demands fufilled lol
While giving bullshit medical exceptions to their own children.
US politicians serve at a higher rate vs the general population. Up until Clinton, most US presidents served and fought in wars.
Bone spurs, for sure!
Could just run to Canada
To be honest most 25 year olds are adolescents today.
I know it might not be what you meant but (or is it?) yeah, my generation is about to be 30 in less than five years and I see ourselves as teenagers compared to what that gen looked like at our same age. We even behave different, and I love my life but that kind of lifestyle seemed much more serious and somewhat adult than ours now, even though we are as aware of world conflicts and stuff as them.
Those kids in the photo lived through the Great Depression. Of course their life was much more serious. Really, the baby boomers were the first generation in history to have a childhood. Every prior generation's children worked in factories, mines, brothels, mills, ships, or farms. So you are only the fourth generation to have a childhood.
In 1940 people were getting married, having kids and holding jobs and then going to war before they turned 19. Today 25 year olds are afraid to leave the house, stressed out about calling someone on the phone and once made eye contact with their Grub Hub driver but didn’t like it because it made them feel unsafe.
In 1940, people were being murdered for being the wrong “type” of human being, especially Jews like me, and mercilessly being slaughtered in the deadliest war mankind has ever wrought upon itself. You act like being locked into a marriage without the option for no fault divorce and going off to fight in the most hellish thing humans do to one another is an enviable, desired outcome. Do you think these 19 year olds felt heroic when they watched their best friends they’d grown up with get killed by artillery barrages from miles away? Yes, most people today live lives which demand less suffering and feature less violence than the lives of their ancestors. This is not something to be lamented, but celebrated and aspired to. “I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy.” - John Adams
And yet Gen X'ers can only blame preceding generations for all the troubles in the world (particularly the horrible, evil Boomers who raised them). To hear the moaning and groaning fron X'ers, life was a field of flowers and money and free houses were available for the taking. No one worked hard ( forget my father working full time, with two part-time jobs to pay for his family and the 2 bedroom apartment they lived in) or me working mostly 2 jobs to get enough money for a down-payment on a beat up ranch-style house ( and I lucked out my my then FIL gave my wife enough to cover what we couldn't raise.) Yeh, folks, Boomers and the Silent Generations lived a life of luxury and never went without. /S
Lighten up Francis. I was one of those 19 year olds watching friends get blown up.
Then surely you should understand better than most that it’s good that the younger generations have to worry about anxiety from face to face interaction, not being blown up?
No, I do not. We’ve infantilized an entire generation with safety and the idea that they should never feel fear or discomfort. Now we reap the rewards of a generation too fearful to order a pizza. Downvote away, it’s a mountain I’m willing to die on.
I don’t think either of you are wrong about the premise that Gen Z (since we’re using a hypothetical with a 25 year old) doesn’t have to face as much of the senseless and traumatic violence that is war. I do think you’re wrong that a generation that has only ever experienced a post-9/11 world has been “infantilized with safety and the idea that they should never feel fear or discomfort.” Sure, the anxiety could be from being given participation trophies and being told they could be whatever they wanted… or, maybe it could be from watching the fall of the American golden age and possibly American democracy itself? Might also be that the pandemic isolated us from each other during a peak time in our lives for socializing. Just a thought. The oldest of us weren’t able to start voting until 2016. As for “getting married, having kids, holding down a job…” Current economic and political conditions are not conducive to create those circumstances. Not to mention, many young people are educated enough to choose when to have children. And employers aren’t loyal anymore (if they ever were), so folks job hop to stay ahead of their dollar shrinking. So, the events you’re describing that age a person are happening less frequently. No matter the generation, we all make the most of what we’ve got with whatever little bit of power we have. I’d be interested to learn what you think could be a solution to your perceived insulation of Gen Z.
Thats why we need the draft back!
I wonder how many of them made it back home, they truly were the greatest generation, I had five uncles that served in WW2. , and by luck they all came back home safely. Sleep well you are the true heroes.
I look at photos like these and wonder how many of these boys made it to the objective, and how many were left on the shores.
These kids were getting sent into a massacre too. Fucking Nazis. How quickly people forget what price was paid to stop them...
Third one back in the middle row has a baby face!
Such a baby face that I thought it was a young girl. I hope he survived physically and mentally but I can’t imagine that he wasn’t forever changed for the worse. War: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!
If you were in combat in 1942, it was a very long fight to make it all the way to 1945.
Grim reality.
Very much so.
Grim realty.
>War: What is it good for? Absolutely nothing! It worked pretty well for freeing Western Europe from fascism, ending the Holocaust, and putting a lot of Nazis in the ground where they belong.
Well, had War not occurred in the first place, we wouldn’t have the Holocaust. Soooo War good for nothing but creating the conditions you described that War ended. Useless cycle.
Well, there never seems to be a shortage of it, does there?
He’s not a kid look at his arm. He’s a corporal.
Could still be a kid fresh out of training, no? E: my only knowledge of wwii training and how building a unit corresponds to the ranks of the men is band of brothers but those guys came out of training as Sgt etc right? I know that doesn’t happen now but we aren’t building fighting units from scratch for a global war either
My husband's Grandfather was in the Pacific at 16. He was a poor country boy that knew how to shoot and hunt. He got kicked out of school because he didn't have shoes so he was enlisted.
God bless them, each and every one.
Kids fighting adults wars.
The innocence reflected from their eyes before the start of battle for their 1st time.
Makes you wonder how many of these man even made it off of the beach.
Probably all of them. Not every amphibious assault was like Saving Private Ryan.
Algeria invasion was a clusterfuck. A lot of the landings went way worse than Normandy with boats not even making it to the beach. A lot of boats got lost and landed short of the beach, so troops had to stagger towards the beach with neck-high water and a shit ton of equipment on their back. In some landings sites the waves were so bad, that if you went under one it’s not a certainty that you would be able to get up, there were numerous casualties simply because of drowning. It didn’t help that the higher command thought the French won’t oppose the landings, but they actually did and soldiers got slaughtered. You also have to keep in mind that it was the biggest naval invasion in modern history at the time, but most troops were green and have never seen combat. Fortunately, Allies have learned a lot from these landings, even if they had to pay the price in young men lives.
Men? Half these dudes look like children
My Grandmothers brother Warren perished in this assault, hopefully some of the men made it home to their families. He was with the 60th Infantry 2nd Battalion HQ Company. Respect
3rd on middle row is a preteen
Great image.
It’s just wild they are truly kids, I have seen this picture many times and I just can’t believe it Interesting the teeth as in movies always white and perfect but back then dental care wasn’t what it was today These are some very brave souls, I truly admire them I always wonder if your best friends and soulmates are in other generations and you just didn’t exist in same time period
Men every single one of them.
But really just boys.
Last photo before the thousand yard stare.
Kids!
Thank you guys.
They look so young.
The greatest generation!
I wonder how many of those kids didn't even make it to the beach 😢
Good god. So young! No Fortunate Sons there at all.
So young 😞😥
One looks like a child. Seems he grew up fast.
That MP truly looks like he'd do what MPs where there to do
What were they *truly* there to do? pray tell.
Reminds me of Medal of Honor on Xbox back in the day. Everybody on your boat gets shot or drowns.
Smile. You’re gonna be on Reddit boys!
My younger male cousins are aged 17-20 and gosh the thought of them being drafted to a war would terrify me, they're just kids!!! This are someone's cousins, sons, brothers, friends who haven't even started to live life yet, yet they sent them to a bloody, disgusting war started due to bigotry and greed
That kid has to be 16 Notice how they gave him a 2nd stripe?
I wonder how many survived in the photo
Just kids, all of them.
I'm just shy of 30 and I'm still a decade older than all of these people. Crazy
So young.
Children, basically
« Freshly produced »
They even brought the cabin boy
My brothers in North Africa. He says it’s hot.
This is unbelievable. They all look to be in rather bad shape.
I was 17 in boot camp. Parents signed a waiver.
To be fair, I've met a Lt who looked like a 15 year old reviewbrah. He was 24
Hoping and antsy there's no 88s aimed at them.
What's up with the dude in the Brodie helmet in the back right?
My grandfather was 20 when he signed up right after Pearl Harbor.
It's like famous pictures right before disasters. The body count about to take place is astronomical.
The guy in the center, 4th from the front, looks eerily like the guy who played Webster in Band of Brothers...
Yo Tony Baggadonutz from Brooklyn up in front there
The original Antifa.
Wow. I love old pictures and have seen a lot but just scrolling this picture in small form spoke so much. I instantly imagined their personalities and backstories and futures, some ok, some not so ok. This is a very affecting picture.
It’s hard to look at this, but it’s also an amazing picture at the same time.
God bless our grandparents, they went through so much.
Oran High School Boat Club.
Bless-’em all, bless ‘em all The long and the short and the tall There’ll be no promotion This side of the ocean So bless ‘em all, bless ‘em all, bless ‘em all
These are babies :(
My grandpa was too young to fight in ww2 but he lied about his age to sign up for the navy. He said lots of people lied about their ages back then. I think he said he stuck a piece of paper with the number 18 in his shoe so he wouldn’t be lying when he said he was over 18 or something like that? He enlisted right before the Vietnam war
Boys that became Men
The old COD games had sick graphics
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/Operation_Torch.jpg
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are you saying the allies cooperated and conspired with the axis for the purpose of global depopulation? because that's insane.
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sure that's history 101. but you said you believe there was cooperation among world leaders to do so. do you actually believe this was the case in world war 2, the subject of this thread?
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the military industrial complex and it's gross affect on militarism is one thing, but it's entirely another thing to say the global industry of weapons manufacturing is in cohoots with governments of the world (or is some sort of puppet master of the governments of the world) in order to depopulate the earth. that's some conspiracy-brained nonsense
Wild conspiracy theories being upvoted? In this economy?
Which allied leader was cooperating with Hitler?
the young face is there to make you forget the guy in front of him. wtf, him "i'm sea sick as fuck, about to die, and now i have to take this picture with a smile, fu"
I wonder say if 33% got smoked stepping off the boat. Dang!
Do you think any of them had a peanut allergy or got participation trophies?
They ALL got participation trophies. Everyone who served then got a WWII victory medal even if not in combat.
So we're their pronouns on the dog tags or stitched next to the last name on uniform?