Trump’s disrespect for McCain and POWs makes a mockery of his D-Day 75th anniversary trip

Recent presidential visits to the site of the Allied landings on D-Day,  June 6,1944, have not been without controversy about the worthiness of those making the pilgrimage.  Ronald Reagan was in uniform in World War II but never served in combat. George W. Bush was in the service during the Vietnam War but was stationed stateside. Bill Clinton did his best to avoid the draft, and his visit to Omaha Beach generated considerable criticism. Barack Obama was too young for Vietnam.

Now Donald Trump, a Vietnam-era draft evader, will be there to commemorate the 75th anniversary of D-Day. His visit will make a mockery of the event, not because of his flimsy medical exemption for bone spurs, but because of a statement he made on July 18, 2015. Referring to Sen. John McCain, Trump said, “He’s not a war hero. He’s a war hero because he was captured. ... I like people who weren't captured.”

This was no slip of the tongue. He made virtually the same statement in 1999 to CBS News correspondent Dan Rather when Trump was pondering a previous presidential run. The consistency of Trump’s opinion on the subject of prisoners of war has had the effect of consigning one group of combat veterans to a less than heroic status even though their ordeals were often more brutal than those who never became POWs.

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During World War II, more than 120,000 GIs were captured by the Nazis — nearly 23,000 during the Battle of the Bulge alone, 4,000 on a single day of that battle.

One group in particular suffered an especially cruel captivity. From a large group of American POWs, the Nazis selected Jewish soldiers, or those whom in their distorted racial judgments they thought appeared to be Jewish. This group of 350 GIs was removed from a military internment camp and forced to march to a concentration camp adjacent to the notorious Buchenwald camp. For the rest of the war, the survivors were subjected to hard labor digging tunnels for the German army. Less than half were alive by the end.

So much for those considered unworthy of hero status by President Trump.

Also absent from Trump’s lofty standard of heroism would be nearly 140 men of Battery B, 285th Field Artillery Observation Battalion captured near the Belgian town of Malmedy during the Battle of the Bulge by the 1st SS Panzer Division. The Nazis herded the POWs into a field and began shooting them. When the SS troops left, there were 84 American dead.

Prisoners of war are heroes

There is a sinister implication in Trump’s dismissal of the heroism of POWs, and it is that these soldiers allowed themselves to be captured rather than fighting to the death. If this exacting standard of heroism were widely accepted, perhaps only posthumous recipients of the Medal of Honor would merit hero status. The president has notions of valor that are very exacting.

This president has no place on Omaha Beach or at Colleville-sur-Mer, the American cemetery adjacent to the invasion beach, or at Pointe du Hoc where Ronald Reagan gave a magnificent and heartfelt speech that brought tears to his own eyes. That kind of genuine emotion at a sacred place is alien to President Trump. Any words provided him by his speech writers will ring hollow. He will be haunted not by the memories of those who fell to rid the world of totalitarian dictatorships but by the ghosts of his own words.

Trump needs an attitude adjustment

The ignobility of Trump’s dismissive attitude toward POWs extends beyond the captive GIs of the European conflict and extends to the 75,000 Filipino and U.S. troops who surrendered to the Japanese in 1942 after the fall of Bataan and were forced to march 65 miles to their internment without food or water. Hundreds of American soldiers and and thousands of Filipinos died along the march.

As Trump mused in 1999, “Does being captured make you a hero? I don’t know. I’m not sure.” Most Americans are sure, Mr. President. The POWs of every war, from Andersonville to the Hanoi Hilton, knew something about heroism that you will never know.

The White House, in accordance with a 1988 law, last month proclaimed April 9 as National Former Prisoner of War Recognition Day. This is the closest thing to an apology you will ever get from Donald Trump. His presence will not grace the ceremonies at Omaha Beach. He is incapable of the sincerity that the solemnity of the occasion requires.

Ross K. Baker is a distinguished professor of political science at Rutgers University and a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors. Follow him on Twitter: @Rosbake1