Address by Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King on V-E Day
May 8, 1945, 9:00 a.m. EDT
Broadcast (CBC):
Fellow Canadians: You have been listening to His Majesty the King speaking to his peoples throughout the world on the occasion of the cessation of hostilities in Europe.
In the name of our country, I ask the people of Canada, at this hour, to join with me in expressing our gratitude as a nation for the deliverance from the evil forces of Nazi Germany. We unite in humble and reverent thanksgiving to God for His mercy thus vouchsafed to the peoples of our own and other lands.
Let us rejoice in the victory for which we have waited so long, and which has been won at so great a price. Our rejoicing, however, would fail to give expression to our true feelings if our first thoughts were not of those who have given their lives that victory, this day, might be ours and not our enemy’s. We would not be true to ourselves were our thoughts not also of those who are sorrowing today for the loved ones taken from them in the terrible holocaust of war.
The word of the defeat of Nazi Germany will bring to all a sense of indescribable relief. It will, however, intensify the grief felt in thousands of Canadian homes for those who will never return. Words can bring little in the way of consolation to hearts whose joy is thus overshadowed with pain. I can only say that, at this moment, the whole nation reverently bows its head in tribute to the men and women of our country who have made the supreme sacrifice. Our comfort lies in the belief that today they belong to the chivalry of God.
Our thoughts, too, are of those who lie wounded, of the maimed and disabled, of those who have not yet been released from prison camps. Our thoughts are of those who fight on in the areas still being devastated by the ravages of war, and of those who suffer privation and want. We pray that aid and comfort may speedily be brought to all in distress.
It is too soon to begin to recount the heroic exploits of those whom today we hold in highest honor. At the moment, I shall only say that our fighting forces have written glorious pages of history for which Canada will remain forever in their debt. We who have lived through the grim years of war may leave it to future generations to unfold the pages of an epoch in which Canada’s contribution to final victory in Europe has found a place next in importance to the contributions of the most powerful allies.
We shall now eagerly await the triumphant return of those who have fought the fight of freedom at sea, on land and in the air, and who have survived the vicissitudes of war. What a welcome will be theirs! As long as they live, their welfare should be our first concern. Especially must we look to the well-being of the dependents of those who will never return. We must endeavor to see that no sacrifice and no service is allowed to go unremembered.
Canada’s great contribution to victory has been made possible by the unbroken partnership of her warriors and her workers. Supporting our armed forces, workers in every walk of life have done their part.
In this hour of triumph over the evil forces of Nazi Germany, I should like all of you who have fulfilled the duties which it was yours to perform all who by word, or prayer, or deed have striven in any form, to feel that you have helped to rid the world of a great scourge. For all time, it will be yours to claim a share in the triumph of right. In the degree to which you have been faithful, you, one and all, are entitled to be numbered among the benefactors of mankind.
We rejoice to think that in Europe the armed forces of Canada have done their full share to defeat the enemy, and have helped in so great measure to defend and to liberate nations to whose history and civilization our own is so closely akin. In this hour of victory let us not forget that but for the resistance of countries which were ruthlessly invaded, occupied and oppressed, our own country might have lost the freedom we have never ceased for a single day to enjoy.
There is much that remains to be done. Over the stricken nations of Europe, hunger, privation and disease now pour in the wake of war. In the liberated homelands of our Allies, we must help to relieve the suffering and to repair the devastation. Until the hungry have been fed, the homeless sheltered and the sick healed, we cannot claim a complete victory over the evil forces which have been seeking the destruction of civilization itself.
Throughout the war, the response of our people to every appeal of humanity has been magnificent. In every land in Europe, the name of Canada spells the mercy of the Canadian Red Cross. By continuing to bind up the wounds and to dry the tears of grief-stricken millions, we can give to the gratitude we feel so deeply its truest and noblest expression.
The United Nations are rejoicing today at the complete defeat of Germany. But the end of warfare in Europe is not the end of the war. There is yet another enemy. The United Nations have still to bring about the unconditional surrender of Japan. The Japanese aggressor must be completely defeated, and his inflated and insane ambitions forever crushed. Our national war effort must and will continue until the war in the Far East has also been won.
We, in Canada, were among the first to realize the world encircling character of the present conflict. We saw with clear vision that the war in Europe and the war in Asia were but one war. We saw in them a combination of tyranny and aggression which aimed at world conquest and world domination. We decided to fight this monstrous design.
The Nazi beast has, at last, been slain in his native lair. It remains to crush Japanese militarism wherever that treacherous viper continues to raise its venomous head. The defeat of Nazi Germany should give us new strength to bring the war speedily to its close in every quarter of the globe. There must be no pause until total victory has been achieved.
A resounding response to the present Victory Loan is one way in which we can all reaffirm our determination to remain steadfast to the end.
Finally, we must fight to a victorious close the war against war itself. The hard struggle for peace will go on long after the guns cease firing. Until we win that struggle, we cannot truly say that we have won the war.
More than two and a half years ago, speaking in New York on the defence of common liberties, I said:
“Victory and peace, someday, will crown the sacrifices of those who fight for freedom. When that day comes, the peoples of the British Commonwealth and the people of the United States will be found at each other’s side, united more closely than ever, but they will be part of a larger company. In that company, all the nations now united in the defence of freedom will remain in the service of mankind.”
In Europe, victory has come; and the rest of that prediction is being fulfilled. It is being fulfilled in a measure surpassing all expectations.
I am speaking to you from San Francisco. Here the representatives of the peoples of the British Commonwealth and the people of the United States are at each other’s side. They are united more closely than ever. But they are part of a larger company.
It is the company of the United Nations, now numbering nearly 50 in all. They are nations which are united in the defence of freedom. They are meeting today in San Francisco to bring into being an organization for the maintenance of peace and security. They are framing a charter under which they will remain united in the service of mankind.
Out of the fires of war, the San Francisco Conference has begun to forge and fashion a mighty instrument for world security. The nations have seen that monuments of stone or bronze no longer will serve to commemorate, for future generations, the service and sacrifice of war.
Already as trustees of the honor of the millions who have given their lives in the cause of the world’s freedom, the representatives of the nations here assembled are looking beyond the theatres of war, and beyond the end of hostilities.
They are seeking to secure for peoples everywhere, and for generations yet unborn, the opportunities of a more abundant life. This they regard as the only memorial worthy of the service of the free nations in the present war.
In its task, the United Nations conference will, I believe, succeed. In that success, victory and peace will indeed crown the sacrifices of all who have fought for freedom.
Victory Order of the Day from Gen. Eisenhower and His Proclamation on Germany’s Defeat
May 8, 1945
The crusade on which we embarked in the early summer of 1944 has reached its glorious conclusion. It is my especial privilege, in the name of all nations represented in this theatre of war, to commend each of you for the valiant performance of duty.
Though these words are feeble, they come from the bottom of a heart overflowing with pride in your loyal service and admiration for you as warriors. Your accomplishments at sea, in the air, on the ground and in the field of supply have astonished the world.
Even before the final week of the conflict you had put 5,000,000 of the enemy permanently out of the war. You have taken in stride military tasks so difficult as to be classed by many doubters as impossible. You have confused, defeated and destroyed your savagely fighting foe. On the road to victory you have endured every discomfort and privation and have surmounted every obstacle that ingenuity and desperation could throw in your path. You did not pause until our front was firmly joined up with the great Red Army coming from the east and other Allied forces coming from the south.
Full victory in Europe has been attained. Working and fighting together in single and indestructible partnership you have achieved a perfection in the unification of air, ground and naval power that will stand as a model in our time.
The route you have traveled through hundreds of miles is marked by the graves of former comrades. From them have been exacted the ultimate sacrifice. The blood of many nations-American, British, Canadian, French, Polish and others-has helped to gain the victory. Each of the fallen died as a member of a team to which you belong, bound together by a common love of liberty and a refusal to submit to enslavement. No monument of stone, no memorial of whatever magnitude could so well express our respect and veneration for their sacrifice as would the perpetuation of the spirit of comradeship in which they died.
As we celebrate victory in Europe let us remind ourselves that our common problems of the immediate and distant future can be best solved in the same conceptions of cooperation and devotion to the cause of human freedom as have made this Expeditionary Force such a mighty engine of righteous destruction. Let us have no part in the profitless quarrels in which other men will inevitably engage as to what country and what service won the European war.
Every man and every woman of every nation here represented has served according to his or her ability and efforts and each has contributed to the outcome. This we shall remember and in doing so we shall be revering each honored grave and be sending comfort to the loved ones of comrades who could not live to see this day.
Commander’s Proclamation
In 1943 the late President Roosevelt and Premier Churchill met in Casablanca. There they pronounced the formula of unconditional surrender for the Axis Powers.
In Europe that formula has now been fulfilled. The Allied force which invaded Europe on June 6, 1944, has, with its great Russian Ally and the forces advancing from the south, utterly defeated the Germans on land, sea and air.
This unconditional surrender has been achieved by teamwork, teamwork not only among all the Allies participating but among all the services, land, sea and air.
To every subordinate that has been in this command of almost 5,000,000 Allies I owe a debt of gratitude that can never be repaid. The only repayment that can be made to them is the deep appreciation and lasting gratitude of all the free citizens of all the United Nations.