This Memorial Day we especially remember the Americans who have died in the service of their country since the last Memorial Day. Particularly, we remember those who have died fighting the forces of terror and its allies in Iraq and Afghanistan.

At the same time, we remember the Americans who died in other wars – including 520,000 in World Wars I and II, 33,000 in Korea and 58,000 in Vietnam. And we remember too those Americans who died in the performance of their duty when there were no wars.

The Americans we remember this Memorial Day died for our country. They died for freedom.

What makes our country worth fighting for – worth dying for – is that we hold fast to the principle of freedom. Oh, we don’t always live up to our ideals, but we keep trying to. We may fail, but we don’t give up on this great experiment in freedom.

We Americans hold ourselves to a higher standard than other countries. Consequently, Americans are America’s own worse critics. We learn from our self-criticism. We move forward, and we try to do better. We grasp the torch passed onto us by the previous generation and try to make its flame burn a little brighter. Again, we may not always succeed, but we persevere.

What Tom Brokaw called the Greatest Generation passed along to us a bright torch after winning World War II. In just a few days, we will observe an anniversary of D-Day – the Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied France on June 6, 1944. Winston Churchill called it “the most difficult and complicated operation to ever take place.”

The 1998 movie “Saving Private Ryan” depicted part of that extraordinary effort, which served to open up another front in the titanic struggle for Europe. The movie provided a graphic glimpse of the bloody sacrifice on D-Day; statistics provide another view: More than 5,000 American and British troops lost their lives on the beaches of Normandy on that single day.

And Normandy wasn’t the only place where Americans and our allies lost soldiers. An issue of Military History magazine on the 60th anniversary of D-Day pointed out, “it is amazing how many other important events occurred in that same month… .”

The British launched an attack on Japanese forces dug in at Mogaung in Burma, a key to the Allied offensive in that theater of war. The Russians initiated Operation Bagration, which resulted in the recapture of the city of Minsk.

On June 5, the day before D-Day, American and British forces liberated Rome. Three weeks later, the Battle of the Philippine Sea ended as a significant U.S. Navy victory against the Japanese.

Yet, we remember D-day as the pivotal battle of World War II. As another movie, The Longest Day, noted before the credits rolled, it was “the end of the beginning … and the beginning of the end” of that war.

In retrospect, the resounding success at Normandy, though costly, seems to have been inevitable. But it easily could have turned into a disaster. After the battle, U.S. soldiers felt confident that they would be in Berlin before Christmas. In reality, they would find themselves in late December staving off a major German offensive in Belgium – in the Battle of the Bulge. On D-Day, victory in Europe was still 11 months away.

When I reflect upon the events of 1944 and 1945, I am struck by two things: First of all, the high loss of life that military leaders deemed “acceptable.” Certainly such losses would not be acceptable today. Our country has learned to make our weapons smarter – and our military has learned how to use them – to minimize war’s collateral damage: to minimize the risk to our military and to avoid making casualties of innocent civilians.

We Americans value individual human life because we value individual freedom. War is undeniably deadly, but I sincerely believe that no country at war tries harder than ours to minimize the loss of human life.

A second thing that strikes me is how long after D-Day the war was finally won. Even after the monumental success of the immense military operation – which involved more than 176,000 troops, 3,000 aircraft and 5,000 ships – the end of the war in Europe was still almost a year in coming.

In the Pacific, Imperial Japan didn’t surrender for another 15 months. But our forebears – military members, political leaders and the general public – stayed the course. Despite the loss of life and numerous setbacks and disappointments, they did not lose heart or nerve. They stayed the course for our country – for our freedom – and for the relative peace that followed.

We can look to our forebears in World War II – that great generation – for inspiration today. We can admire them not only for their bravery, but also for their perseverance and their dedication to a strategy – a master plan that many could not fathom – to attain a final goal that many would not live to see. Let us remember the heroes of D-Day this Memorial Day.

Let us also think about the brave men and women of all our armed forces who are on duty throughout the world, seeing to it that the liberties we all cherish will not be taken away by those who would do us harm.

Let us think about the young soldiers and airmen, in Kevlar helmets and flak jackets, in temperatures that frequently exceed 120 degrees. Let us remember them and hope they come home safely.

Let us remember on this Memorial Day all those who have made the supreme sacrifice because they love this great country and cherish freedom.

Greg Ripps, a fourth-generation Bexar County resident, has lived in Highland Park his entire life. He has written for numerous publications and currently serves in the Texas National Guard.