Transcription and Translation

Picture it, North Africa, World War Two. My grandfather, who was drafted by the Italian army, was a chauffeur for the Fascists. Like many Italian peasants, my grandfather didn't want to be there, especially the Italian army. This organization was famous for its ineptitude. They couldn't even maintain control over a poor third-world nation like Ethiopia. One day the allies bombed my grandfather's convoy. His car suffered a direct hit. Although his passengers (most likely some general and his assistants) died, my grandfather miraculously survived. What did my grandfather decide to do? Like any individual who is drafted for a cause that he didn't believe in, he along with others in his squadron planned to surrender to the first Americans they could find.

Surrender to the Americans?

During World War two, if you were captured by most armies, you risked being tortured. If you were caught by the Russians you were sent to Siberia where conditions were as bad as they could get. But if you gave up to the Americans, it was almost like a holiday. They would treat you well, give you a job, let you live in a house and even give you an allowance. And that is exactly what happened to my grandfather the POW. He was first sent to Norfolk, then somewhere in Utah. For a time he even lived with a family. He got to see up close what it meant to live in a prosperous country where citizens could build a life for themselves. After WWII he returned to Italy to his wife and daughter and proceeded to have three more daughters (including my mom). So what to do? He did not want his daughters to be trapped in a dead-end town with zero economic prospects. It was simply too expensive to educate all four of his daughters in Italy. But in America, society was just. People could become educated for free and there was ample opportunity. Unfortunately the US became very restrictive towards immigrants in those years, and so my grandparents did the next best thing - they moved to Canada.

Looking back then, it is very clear why my grandfather did what he did. The US and Canada represented economic opportunity, a place with a civil society where individuals could acquire the tools to build a life for themselves. There weren't any harsh ideologies to hold people down as there had been in Europe in the first half of the 20th century. No facism. No communism. As a POW in the US, he was treated better than as a free citizen in his own country. Imagine the power of that idea. This was America's secret weapon.

But what have we become here in the land of the free? Most individuals from around the world no longer look up to the US like my grandfather did. My grandfather was told by his superiors that the US was his enemy, but he saw it as his salvation. Now most foreigners have nothing but contempt for what our country has done. We're the ones who send our POWs to gulags. Our schools, from grade school to the institutions of higher learning are segregated by wealth.

America's greatest asset was its values. The land where you could build a life for yourself. The land where people were treated fairly, with respect. Where you could show up at the doorstep, work and educate your four daughters.

What happened?