http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/current/news/stories/clinton.html (Einblicke ins Internet, 10/1995)
HONOLULU (Reuter) - U.S. troops and warships Friday paid homage to veterans of the Pacific theater in World War II and President Clinton called on Americans to honor the legacy of those who defeated the Japanese empire.
With flags flapping in a light breeze, some 7,000 troops, many in camouflage battle dress, marched in formation at Wheeler Air Field to kick off the 50th anniversary remembrance of the end of what Clinton called ``the most horrible thing ever done by man.''
Later, more than a dozen warships and a nuclear submarine steamed in stately procession from Diamond Head to Pearl Harbor as crowds watched from Waikiki Beach. The parade of ships was accompanied by a fly-by of military aircraft, including F-117 ''Stealth'' fighters.
``In this remarkable place so much like paradise, we recall a time when war made the idyllic Pacific hell on earth, and we celebrate the generation of Americans who won that war and insured the triumph of freedom over tyranny,'' Clinton said at the troop review.
Speaking to a crowd that included thousands of white-haired survivors of the conflict that raged across the world's largest ocean from 1941 to 1945, Clinton recalled acts of courage that characterized U.S. prosecution of the war.
``The World War II generation truly saved the world. Our security, our prosperity, our standing among other nations -- all these are the legacy of the men and women, the heroes before us who we honor today,'' he said to loud applause.
Wheeler Field, surrounded by Hawaii's volcanic mountains, was the first base hit when Japanese warplanes attacked the U.S. fleet at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.
Almost 3,600 men were killed or wounded at Pearl Harbor, and many are entombed on the sunken battleship Arizona, where Clinton was to lay a wreath Saturday.
The highlight of Clinton's participation in VJ-Day anniversary ceremonies was to be a speech Saturday at the Punchbowl, a military cemetery where thousands of U.S. servicemen are buried.
Saturday is the actual 50th anniversary of the end of the war. News that Japan would give up reached the United States on Aug. 14, 1945, but a formal surrender did not occur until Sept. 2, when Gen. Douglas MacArthur, the supreme Allied commander in the Pacific, accepted it on the battleship Missouri in Tokyo Bay.