A commemoration ceremony marking the anniversary of D-Day was held at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, at a site known as the Circle of Remembrance. The gathering brought together officials and foreign military representatives to honor what organizers described as a sacred anniversary.
Defense and air attachés from a number of embassies were introduced and thanked for attending. Representatives came from Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and the United Kingdom, underscoring the international character of the remembrance.
The ceremony opened with a prayer. The invocation asked for faith for the battles of the present day and for a love that reflects the sacrifice of the one who laid down his life for others, before those gathered were invited to be seated.
Jane Dropa, Chair of the Friends of the National World War II Memorial, delivered the first address. She welcomed those present to the Circle of Remembrance, describing it as a deeply meaningful place to mark one of the most consequential days in modern history.
Dropa noted that the gathering took place where a plaque bearing the words of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's D-Day prayer resides. Those words, she said, serve as a reminder of how much was at stake on the morning of the landings.
She recalled that on June 6, 1944, the world was holding its breath. The outcome was not certain and the cost was not yet known, she said, as the liberation of Europe, the defeat of tyranny and the future of freedom itself hung in the balance while the world waited for the invasion.
Dropa also described how the prayer reached the American public. On the morning of the landings, she said, American newspapers printed the prayer, and that evening the president invited the entire country to read it along with him during his radio broadcast, as young men crossed a dark and dangerous channel before dawn over Normandy.