Toespraak minister-president Schoof tijdens Memorial Day in Margraten
Toespraak van minister-president Schoof bij de herdenkingsplechtigheid op de Amerikaanse begraafplaats in Margraten ter gelegenheid van 80 jaar bevrijding van Nederland. De tekst is alleen in het Engels beschikbaar.
Your Majesty,
Your Excellencies,
Veterans,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Among the first of our American liberators who landed in Normandy on D-Day was Lieutenant Colonel Robert George Cole – a West Point graduate and paratrooper from San Antonio, Texas.
On June 11th 1944, he led an extremely daring bayonet charge to capture an enemy position near the French town of Carentan.
It went down in history as ‘Cole’s Charge’.
A few months later, on September 18th, he was at the forefront of Operation Market Garden, when he was hit in the head by a sniper’s bullet in the village of Best, near Eindhoven.
Lieutenant Colonel Cole died a hero, and was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for his bravery.
He is buried here, at plot B, row 15, grave 27.
(…)
Robert Cole was one of many who paid the highest price for our freedom.
He shares his last resting place with eight thousand, three hundred other American soldiers.
A further one thousand, seven hundred and twenty-two names are recorded on the Walls of the Missing.
So many lives cut short.
So many scattered hopes and dreams.
So many young people taken away from their loved ones.
And despite the passing decades, it still remains almost beyond belief that all these brave young soldiers lost their lives.
Fighting for the freedom of people they didn’t know.
In a country they may never have heard of before.
To me, one of the most precious features of this quiet and beautiful place of remembrance is something invisible to the eye.
It’s not the stunning views.
Not the lush surroundings, nor the breathtaking design of this cemetery.
It’s the fact that all the graves and the names on the Walls of the Missing have been adopted by local people.
A tradition that started in 1945 and has continued to this day.
That is what true and lasting gratitude looks like.
In coming together here, on this Memorial Day, we honor the legacy and memory of all those who didn’t make it home.
And the government and the people of the Netherlands consider it a debt of honor to keep commemorating them.
It’s a moral duty we gladly accept.
And yet, we live in a time in which peace can no longer be taken for granted.
So commemorating alone is not enough.
Let me ask you this: how often, in recent decades, have we repeated the same line – that ‘freedom is not a given’?
Today we must recognize that these words carry obligations.
That freedom does not come free.
And that we need to invest in defending the freedom that all those who rest here fought so hard to protect.
Honoring that past calls for action in the present.
In that respect, ensuring unity at the upcoming NATO Summit will deliver proof that their sacrifice was not in vain.
That too is a moral duty we owe to Lieutenant Colonel Cole and his compatriots.
We remain forever in their debt.
And we are forever grateful.
They will not be forgotten.
Thank you.