Entirety of Randolph Air Force base, its circular design. Its a beautiful base. Its a functional base. It was built just in time to help the air force steadily build its numbers so that it would have an awardwinning air force by 1942, 1943, and they built it to be the showplace of the air force, and it became known as the west point of the air. Because as with engineers and artillery specialists in the army, here is where you learned the craft of flying and supporting flying operations. And so many of the greats in air force history started here and have come back here. A lot of people mention this base as being important to san antonio. It is. Why is it important . Randolph has always been a steady generator for business, steady generator for technology, innovation, and some of the very best of American Society come here. Its one of the most diverse bases in the air force. And if you want diversity of thought, diversity of backgrounds, religions, the air force is a place to go. Randol
School tours to the weeks and the world war ii section. In this area we have set up represents the buildings we quickly put up at the start of world war ii. The reason we had to cook up with them up as we were not prepared for war. The u. S. Military had less than 350,000 soldiers at the outbreak of world war ii. The army, navy and careens and marines combined. By the end of the war we had about 17 million people. To do that we had to put Training Centers all over the country and expand what we had. We had to put Training Centers all over the country and use those types of buildings that are represented. Now, if you notice this is a friend of mine. His name is richard. This is him in september of 1942, when he started his training in georgia. Im wearing boots, coveralls, just the way they did to train. One reason they issued coveralls to train with was world war ii was truly a global war. We were fighting in the pacific in the islands, we were in africa, we were also in europe. So we w
And Joseph Joseph peterburs, he has a special designation with his name as well, call i mace, he did 49 missions before becoming a p. O. W. , then he became, somehow escaped animated and flew with the russian armys, incredible stuff, so with that lets give them all around the applause and again applause as. He so we will start on the end, colonel james harvey, has a special hat on i like to see it because a lot of people think of tom cruz when they see the hat, the unfortunate part though was tom cruz was not the first, shot colonel harvey is part of a top gun squadron and, a group though analysts field, took their airplanes soak their Maintenance Group and became top gun, the First Top Gun pay for the u. S. Air force law. Colonel harvey if he wanted to also little bit about yourself, what do you want people to know about your service in about your time flying combat airplanes and then becoming a top gun . Oh boy, i know its a long list. I never made any model aircraft or anything like
Did yesterday with a quote, but in the introduction to the quote, has anyone not seen private ryan . Anyone not seen it . Thats what i figured. For those of us that have served and particularly those of us that have faced combat that opening scene is something that youll never forget, ever, i hope you never forget it, but the scene most important to me actually came later in the movie. Tom hanks laying on the rubble called over private ryan and he asked him to kneel down, and he said to him two words, earn this. Any victory Worth Winning must be deserved, anda t as the victories are in scale so must be our exertions, deserve victory, Winston Churchill said. We shall not win through the evils in our enemy, we shall win through the merit in ourselves. Deserve victory, and let that be the touchstone of every thought, word and deed. Frankly, i think about that pretty much every day. Am i living up to my own expectations, let alone the expectations of others . Today were going to hear from
Message to troops as they prepare for the assault at normandy. [video clip] soldiers, sailors and airmen of the allied expeditionary force, you are about to embark on the great crusade. Eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty loving people everywhere march with you. In companies with our brave allies and brothers in arms on other fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the german war machine, elimination of snazzy and security for ourselves in a free world. Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well trained, well equipped in battle hardened and he will fight savagely but this is the year 1944, much has happened since the nazi triumphs since 19401941. They inflicted upon the germans great defeats in open battle man to man. Our air offensive has seriously reduced them in the air and those to wage war on the ground. Our home front have given us an overwhelming superiority in weapons and munitions of war and placed at our disposal great fighting