By Victor Davis Hanson National Review’s “The Corner” D-Day was the largest amphibious invasion in history since King Xerxes’ 480 BC combined sea and land descent into Greece. The Americans, especially General George Marshall, had wanted to invade France as early as spring 1943, still confident from their World War I experience that they could …
By Victor Davis Hanson Defining Ideas The Roman Emperor Claudius, who reigned from 41 to 54 AD, was never supposed to be emperor. He came to office at age 50, an old man in Roman times. Claudius succeeded the charismatic, youthful heartthrob Caligula—son of the beloved Germanicus and the “little boot” who turned out to …
The obligation to honor the war dead has often conflicted with the need to make distinctions among them and their causes. By Victor Davis Hanson// Wall Street Journal A few years ago I was honored to serve briefly on the American Battle Monuments Commission, whose chief duty is the custodianship of American military cemeteries abroad. …
by Victor Davis Hanson//National Review Going hard to the left was the wrong lesson to learn from their narrow loss in 1968, and they could repeat the mistake. Forty-nine years ago, Vice President Hubert Humphrey was the Democratic candidate for president. The year 1968 was a tumultuous one that saw the assassinations of rival candidate …
By Victor Davis Hanson// National Review American intervention saved Western Europe in World War I, but the result was a failed armistice. One hundred years ago, on April 6, 1917, the United States entered World War I. The ongoing conflict ended just 19 months later with an Allied victory. The United States did not win …
By Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Forgive, but do not forget, and be the strong horse. While we speak, a jealous age will have fled. Seize the day! Trust as little as you can in tomorrow. The Latin poet Horace’s advice of carpe diem— to seize the day and not worry about tomorrow — …
By Victor Davis Hanson// Town Hall | Another day, another Hillary Clinton bombshell disclosure. This time the scandal comes from disgraced former congressman Anthony Weiner’s laptop computer, bringing more suggestions of Clinton’s sloppy attitude about U.S. intelligence law. Meanwhile, seemingly every day WikiLeaks produces more evidence of the Clinton Foundation leveraging the Clinton State Department …
by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Time was, leftists complained of rigged elections, the media paid attention to dirty tricks, and conservatives cared more about results than rhetoric. Donald Trump, in characteristically muddled and haphazard fashion, said he thought the election might end up “rigged” (if he lost). Therefore, he would not endorse the …
by Victor Davis Hanson // Defining Idea Image credit:Barbara Kelley The Greek city-states in the fourth-century BC, fifth-century AD Rome, and the Western European democracies after World War I all knew they could not continue as usual with their fiscal, social, political, and economic behavior. But all these states and societies feared far more …
By Victor Davis Hanson // Town Hall | The Greeks gave us tragedy — the idea that life is never fair. Terrible stuff for no reason tragically falls on good people. Life’s choices are sometimes only between the bad and the far worse. In the plays of the ancient dramatists Aeschylus and Sophocles, heroism …