2014 is the anniversary of some dreadful battles for liberation across Europe; 1944 was a year when the tide began to turn and the forces of good began to overcome the forces of darkness and evil.
My father was a paratrooper during the war; he gave seven years of his life to serve his country, and fight for the freedom of all people whatever their race, colour or religion… he was very conscious of that. He was conscripted when he was just nineteen, and was not demobbed until 1946. He did not fight in the Netherlands, but in many other theatres of war including Monte Cassino, North Africa, France and Greece. When we visited the Oorlogsmuseum at Overloon, I found it very disturbing, because although my father did not fight across this land, many young men of his age did, and many, many young men died.
The museum is wonderful, fascinating, and really tells the story of the war in the Netherlands and in other areas, including the Far East. Visit it if you can, and if you go in the bomber simulator think of the young men who would have really experienced what you are.
https://www.oorlogsmuseum.nl/en/home/
Lois Elsden 
When I was still a student my friends and I visited Verdun and the battlefields of Flanders. The memory of those never-ending fields of white crosses and bayonettes sticking out of trenches that buried young WWI soldiers under tons of mud will stay with me for the rest of my life. War, no matter where or when it happens in the world, always seems to be designed to make a handful of ruthless greedy people very, very rich while snuffing out the lifes of millions.
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True… I had such a strange feeling walking through the trees going to the museum, and looking at he lumps and bumps of the woodland floor and knowing that they were caused by war… and that many, many people, mostly young people had died here…
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When I was young I pictured wars being fought by middle aged men like John Wayne in the movies. Truth is most of them were teenagers or barely older. They were mere boys who may never have had their first kiss or a dance and a beer. Life is so short and so precious that no wars make sense. I can’t watch it on T.V. anymore, none of it makes any sense. Cartoons make sense!
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I can’t watch TV programmes about the war…
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