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Lend-Lease Honored In Style
By Margaret Friedenauer
Published August 28, 2006, in the Local News section of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
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An international summit of sorts took place Sunday on the banks of the Chena River.
Russian, French, Canadian and American dignitaries gathered to celebrate the official ribbon cutting of the Alaska-Siberia Lend-Lease Memorial at Griffin Park.
With the help of the memorial, speakers conjured up images of World War II and the role the U.S. and Russian relationship played in combating Nazi Germany.
“Look at those pilots and their clothes,” said U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens, pointing to the memorial. “They will tell you a story.”
The $600,000 bronze and granite monument depicts larger-than-life sculptures of a Russian and American pilot, reflecting equipment and clothing the pilots wore while stationed in the early 1940s at Ladd Field in Fairbanks, now Fort Wainwright.
During the Lend-Lease program in World War II, the U.S. supplied nearly $50 billion in war materials to its allies. Most equipment was sent by ship, but nearly 8,000 aircraft for the Russians were ferried to the eastern front from the Lower 48, over Canada and to Ladd Field where Russian pilots relieved Americans and flew the planes over the Bering Straight and east to Russia. As many as 300 Russian soldiers were stationed at Ladd during program.
The memorial project was spearheaded about six years ago by Alexander Dolitsky, chairman of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center. Sculptor Richard Wallen and stone mason Alec Turner also were in attendance Sunday to see their work celebrated.
“This particular monument is a permanent reminder to mankind of a remarkable chapter in world history, when peaceful nations united against evil,” Dolitsky said. “From 1942 to 1945, the Alaska-Siberia Lend-Lease program demonstrated that both nations could set aside different cultural values and principles to accomplish a common, mutually beneficial goal to defeat Nazi Germany and its allies.”
More than a dozen Russian dignitaries were led by the Deputy of the Russian government and Minister of Defense, Sergei Ivanov. Through a translator, Ivanov spoke poignantly about the importance of World War II in Russia’s history and about honoring the relationship between the two countries.
“By overcoming improbable and incredible difficulty, the American and Soviet pilots went around half the Earth, over a very difficult route, in order to deliver military aircraft to their destination,” he said.
He extolled the roles of Russian and American World War II veterans and talked about the importance of remembering their sacrifices and successes in the allied victory.
“The experience of cooperation that came from the war is a great example for the new generations of defenders. That experience should not be lost, but preserved. It is our sacred duty to have the memories of the past live on forever,” he said. “Glory to the winners of the second World War.”
Russia wasn’t the only country that received war materials from the U.S. during the Lend-Lease program. France, China and India also were recipients, as was the United Kingdom, which received naval assistance and other materials, said UK Consul General Peter Broom at the ceremony.
Broom, citing President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill, said there was never any expectation the U.S. would receive compensation for the materials. Nonetheless, Broom said the United Kingdom is this year making its final 45 million pound payment to the U.S. for its assistance in World War II.
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was in Fairbanks for the ribbon cutting and said although the U.S. and Soviet Union were at odds in the years following World War II, the countries showed impressive cooperation at that time. He said that cooperation is the preferred way to address terrorist threats today.
“The way to pay proper tribute to the achievements of those we honor today is to answer the new dangers that we face with the clarity, unity and courage that those aviators and the men and women who served here demonstrated in those desperate times,” he said. “We hope we will face the troubled word as it is, and not as we wish it would be.”
Canada, also recognized, offered assistance during Lend-Lease providing stopping points throughout Alberta and the Yukon for American pilots to stop from Great Falls, Mont., to Fairbanks as they ferried planes north. Lt. Gen. Eric Findley, the Canadian North American aerospace Defense deputy commander said as a pilot himself, he has great respect for the conditions the pilots endured to ferry the planes north.
“I can only marvel at the courage and commitment of those that had to fly in unforgiving weather with limited communications and infrastructure to get the job done,” he said.
Stevens also spoke of the conditions that made the Lend-Lease route a difficult assignment for Ladd Field and Russian pilots. Stevens was a pilot in China during the war, but said those who flew through Canadian, Alaska and Russia faced harsh weather and rudimentary instruments, often flying in cold headwind and with dead reckoning.
“If you were standing on the runway here at Ladd Field some 64 years ago, you would have seen our pilots getting into a plane and they knew they were tempting fate,” he said. “They were really ordinary men asked to do an extraordinary job.”
Staff writer Margaret Friedenauer can be reached at 459-7545 or mfriedenauer@newsminer.com.
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2421 Hill Rd; Fairbanks, Alaska