Robert Edsel's Blog

We set aside two days a year to honor our Veterans:  Memorial Day and Veterans Day.  But other days of the year border on such importance…today is one of them.  More than 2,400 men and women were killed on this date 68 years ago as they innocently went about their duty and lives that Sunday morning.  It was a dastardly act by Japan and it’s warlords as they sought to knock out the Pacific fleet of the United States in one swift blow.  Within days the United States was at war with Japan and its allies, Nazi Germany and Italy.  World War II  had begun in earnest.

Less than three weeks later a meeting would take place at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City that would have far reaching implications.  Visionary leaders such as George Stout, Paul Sachs, and Francis Henry Taylor, expressed concern about protecting this country’s cultural treasures from concerns about a Japanese invasion of the west coast and Nazi bombings on the east coast.  In time these specific fears subsided but were replaced with an even greater concern:  how to protect the cultural treasures of the western world from the path of war that inevitably would lead to the doors of the Reichschancellery in Berlin.

Fortunately we live in a world today that was spared the “what if” consequences of the Monuments Men never having been created. We can visit the world’s great museums and see the vast majority of the greatest accomplishments of man’s creative genius because of their vision and sacrifices.  Pearl Harbor set them into motion.

So on this day, let us remember the brave men and women who lost their lives at Pearl Harbor. May we also acknowledge those who acted and set in motion one of the most benevolent efforts in the history of mankind, an effort that preserved much of the accumulated art, music, and culture produced by thousands of years of civilization, from the path of war:  the Monuments Men and women.

Today marks the 71st anniversary of Kristallnacht, an evening in Germany when hundreds of synagogues were burned, thousands of shops destroyed, and many lives lost.  Nazi Germany’s attack on its Jewish population was fully underway and in the open for all to see.  Theft of their belongings, imprisonment, and mass murder, under the most gruesome and inhumane of circumstances, ensued.

While these horrific events took place in Germany, the lessons we should never forget are universal and lasting. We ignore them at our own peril as a civilization.  Anytime one person or one race preaches superiority at the expense of others, warning bells should sound.

We must therefore consider the fall of the Berlin wall 20 years ago an astounding moment of progress in modern civilization.  What a remarkable achievement that the end of the Cold War came with a spontaneous celebration, not the sound of gunfire or artillery.  It took a long time for this portion of World War II to come to its natural conclusion, but the moment did come.  It should never be overlooked, as a triumph for freedom, and a victory for a more hopeful Germany as a nation.