Editor,

It was 80 years ago in April 1945 that my father, Counter Intelligence Agent Thomas Richard Ried from Port Orchard, and his fellow GIs in the Army’s 42nd Division liberated the Nazi concentration camp at Dachau. In his diary, my dad wrote that Dachau was not their initial objective, it was Munich. But the day before they were to march on Munich, a secret committee of prisoners in Dachau had selected two of their own to escape so they could find the GIs and tell their story. The two escapees found my dad and the other GIs and described the horrific conditions. The division leaders decided to send several units to Dachau including my dad’s, the rest would go to Munich. Three days later my dad and his fellow soldiers liberated the camp and saw the inhumanity firsthand. My dad wrote that the ovens were still warm.

Decades later, my dad talked about Dachau. He said, “War was not supposed to be fought that way.” He was prepared to fight for America as a sniper and conduct reconnaissance missions behind enemy lines, but he was not prepared for Dachau. I am sure my dad was asking himself, “How could one person twist a country’s laws to his own gain and convince millions that some people needed to be locked up for no legal reason?”

Sound familiar? El Salvador is the concentration camp of the United States. Private “detention centers” in Texas are concentration camps on our own soil. They hold people who have been kidnapped off the streets and from their homes by masked government agents and sent away without due process. Judges are being arrested. Politicians are being threatened by the Department of Justice. Our president isn’t sure the constitution needs to be followed.

If my dad were alive today, he would be with other veterans protesting the cuts to Veterans Affairs, the elimination of programs that feed children and the closing of educational opportunities for those who are not rich. My dad would be on the corner of the busiest street he could find proudly wearing his purple heart and bronze star. He would be holding a sign that would say on one side “I did not fight for this.” And on the other it would say “End the tyranny now.”

My father was willing to give his life for the country he loved. Let us take inspiration from those who have gone before us and fight against all forms of tyranny, especially when it occurs on American soil.

Jeffrey Ried

Oak Harbor