Naples veteran turns to lessons of WWII to speak on Ukraine-Russia War

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Lt. Col. George Beshara (COURTESY)

Out of the 16 million Americans who served in World War II, an estimated 240,000 are still alive.

Lt. Col. George Beshara, now 103 years old, is one of them.

He was born during World War I and fought in World War II.

Beshara, who lives in Naples, joined the Army Air Forces in 1942. Beshara came home and served as an ROTC director, a coach and a teacher. He said watching the conflict unfold in Ukraine is like watching history repeat itself.

Beshara said his friends, the ones who once stood beside him to take down Hitler and save the world, would not believe their eyes.

“We landed in Okinawa to see those graves, our boys took a beating over there,” Beshara said. “That was terrible when I got over there and saw that they didn’t have a chance. We saved a lot of Americans by dropping that bomb.”

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