Erasing History

It's hard to imagine there is a connection between the Greenland controversy and slavery once common in the American south. Consider, though, that since it first deployed soldiers in response to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, more than 18,000 Danish soldiers were deployed to Afghanistand and 33 were killed in action.

aA explained a couple of years ago on the 9/11 Memorial & Museum website

On September 12, 2001, the day after the 9/11 attacks, NATO met in an emergency session. For the first and only time in its history, NATO invoked Article 5. All 18 of the United States’s allies stated they would support America’s response to the attacks…

Since 2001, troops from the U.S.'s NATO allies have stood shoulder to shoulder with American soldiers in Afghanistan. More than one thousand of these soldiers have paid the ultimate price. In 2017, NATO inaugurated its new headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. Near its entrance, a memorial composed of a piece of mangled steel from the 107th floor of the World Trade Center's North Tower sits atop a pedestal. In front of it, an inscription on a plaque pays tribute to the singular use of Article 5 of NATO’s founding treaty. During a public program at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, Jens Stoltenberg, the current NATO Secretary General, reflected on the memorial. He remarked, “It serves as a powerful symbol of the enduring partnership and friendship between the United States and its NATO Allies across Europe and Canada. It is also a daily reminder of the deadly dangers posed by terrorism, the importance of standing together to protect our people and our values.”

And now, this:

Trump on NATO: "I've always said, will they be there if we ever needed them? That's really the ultimate test. I'm not sure of that. We've never needed them. They'll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan and this or that. And they did. They stayed a little back, off the front… pic.twitter.com/fA0i1S3LxY

— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) January 22, 2026

This is a case not only of hostility toward allies but also of rewriting history. And so it is that  

Outraged critics accused President Donald Trump of “whitewashing history” on Friday after the National Park Service removed an exhibit on slavery at Philadelphia’s Independence National Historical Park in response to his executive order “restoring truth and sanity to American history” at the nation’s museums, parks and landmarks.

Empty bolt holes and shadows are all that remains on the brick walls where explanatory panels were displayed at the President’s House Site, where George and Martha Washington lived with the people they owned as property when Philadelphia was the nation’s capital. One woman cried silently at their absence. Someone left a bouquet of flowers. A hand-lettered sign said “Slavery was real”….

Workers on Thursday removed the exhibit, which included biographical details about the nine people enslaved by the Washingtons at the presidential mansion. Just their names — Austin, Paris, Hercules, Christopher Sheels, Richmond, Giles, Oney Judge, Moll and Joe — remain engraved into a cement wall.

The President of the USA insults our allies by stomping over the history of the Trans-Atlantic Alliance and the National Park Service "whitewashes" history by removing exhibits at museums, parks, and landmarks. Donald Trump also has demolished the East Wing of the White House and plastered a White House walkway with bronze plaques of each USA president. 

We are to believe that President Obama was "one of the most divisive political figures in American history" and that the Affordable Care Act was "highly ineffective."  And we're told that Joe Biden, represented by an autopen rather than a portrait, assumed office only "as a result of the most corrupt election evr seen in the United States and as President presided over the "worst inflation ever recorded." 

Ridiculous, but consistent with Donald's behavior throughout his presidency. Rewriting history, in the matter of describing ex- Presidents, removing cultural artifacts from public view, and lying about NATO history all are examples of rewriting history. 

A Philadelphian who recently visited Independence National Historical Park and lamented the purge of a portion of the nation's history remarked "You show all of it- the good, the bad, and the ugly." But that's becoming increasingly uncommon. Writing in 2021, one journalist noted that in dictatorships such as Russia and China, "a single version of history prevails, stamped and sealed by the leadership and imposed in classrooms, through culture, and on the internet."  Donald Trum is still in the early stages, but he understands this lesson well.

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