“All is well that ends well, yet somewhere no one sleeps, a small flag flutters somewhere, and somewhere someone weeps.”

The year was 1964, the last year in the decade of peace wedged between the Korean War and the war ushered in by the official lie of Tonkin Gulf, Vietnam.

We were in Audio-Visual. An awkward assortment, we were, all “Killers,” according to the hype of the cadre. The film was colorful and airy, that day, much unlike the red tinted shots of “Red Square” of Moscow that we and countless other grammar schoolers had endured as children in the ‘50s.

Alongside sat a soldier obviously troubled. The film was radiant in effectiveness’s and there was something the soldier must share.

“I weep every time the colors are presented while the band plays “Stars and Stripes Forever,” said he.

I knew the feeling, but was saving my tears for the bus ride home — a ride that many a serviceman in the coming years would never take. Hundreds of thousands of the children of the farms, towns and cities of America would soon join the advisors in Vietnam.

Politicians know that feeling too, and the self-serving among them exploit it to the hilt, especially wartime incumbents facing opposition.

While speaking on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day, the sad, sad day of D-Day, the D-Day of ’24, our President spoke of the ghosts of the boys and men who died there, and what they were trying to tell us.

I can’t speak for the fellows who helped saved the world from Nazism any more than the President can, but I do feel troubled by the politization of sacred grounds by election year incumbency.

It is hard to believe our ancestors gave their lives for the profitable political wars we know today. The Nazis are gone except for those in the employ of our President and funded by we, the citizens of the U.S./source: The Russians, First and then the Associated Press.

World War II General Dwight David Eisenhower did not believe in military brass in the White House, but eventually accepted the challenge and won.

“I shall go to Korea and try to end the war,” he had said, and did. The Armistice he won proved as good if not better than the Victory demanded by others. The history of the former is known. Let us be thankful.

The era of diplomacy wrought by President Ike may have saved the only civilization we know from nuclear war. Sadly, it has been allowed to expire. Peace is now a bad word tied to the isolationism that depends more on diplomacy than the brute force of war or the threat of it to sustain a successful “Foreign Policy.”

“Peace, peace, but there is no peace” in the vocabulary of incumbency, only “endangered democracy” even as democracy fades — not from lack of war but from lack of peace, whose dividends are far greater except for the war profiteers.

The big news of 2022, believe it or not, was the “invasion” of Ukraine by Russia. But who, in fact where the invaders?

Invasions are made of “sterner stuff,” say a sneak attack of Tomahawk missiles killing thousands of innocent people whose numbers are never disclosed.

DC’s invasion of Ukraine was every bit as sneaky. Beginning in the Obama Administration if not before, it was a top-secret scheme to turn neighbor against neighbor to gain control of both. It culminated with the coup in Ukraine in Ukraine’s presidential election year of 2014, and President Biden very recently gave Ukraine permission to attack Russia anywhere it wants. It was revealed in the past that the use of American troops is on the table. The ratchet of no return is clicking while the race is on in DC for “First-Strike Nuclear Capability” — the dream to nuke without being nuked in return.

Where are the demonstrators? They were “Nuked” in 2016 and 17 by “Button” Hillary herself with double-duty Russia hoaxes that left them so confused they can’t see straight. Pray for their recovery.

No, Russia did not invade Ukraine. It was a mission of reconciliation with their own flesh and blood as well as a chance for DC to come to her senses.

In what now seems like weeks, Russian boys waited at the common border while their leader waited — I’d say praying for diplomacy from DC that never came. Only school yard grade insults and name calling from the “Leader of the Free World.”

In they finally rolled, antiquated symbols of misplaced trust that the arms race had ended along with the cold war. Slowly and peacefully they rolled until pulling under a grove of trees hoping for some sense of normalcy.

Again they rolled. Through villages, they felt their way, respectfully and peacefully while communicating with folks who shared ancestors who suffered greatly at the cruel hands of the Nazis before beating them back.

“Too peaceful,” whispered the madam of the coup. “Come on, man,” snapped her partner, “Let there be war?”

And there was war. DC’s latest armor piercing ordnance rained down like a hailstorm from above, cooking the Russian boys in their cramped quarters.

So it was. The Cold War had never really ended, nor the Arms Race. Profiteers smiled.

Politicians in DC delivered, once again, their soaring speeches of patriotism, endangered democracy and fear — the standard of a lifetime of political hypnosis.

Surely the ”leaders of the free world” can do better. If not, they should step aside.

Paul L. Ray, Adel, Ga.