April 25, 2024 (EIRNS)—LaRouche organizers, U.S. Army veterans Bill Salisbury and Bob Baker, and Bill Jones, participated today in laying flowers at the Spirit of Elbe Memorial plaque at Arlington National Cemetery, in Arlington, Virginia. The memorial had been placed in Arlington in 1955, ten years after the first contact made during World War II between troops of the U.S. Army and the Soviet Red Army on April 25, 1945, as a means of easing Cold War tensions. Every year, the Russian Embassy in Washington would have a formal ceremony to place a wreath at the Memorial. Since 2022, the U.S. Army, which has jurisdiction over Arlington, no longer allowed the wreath-laying ceremony because of the Ukraine war, no doubt at the behest of higher-ups.
Arrangements had been made this year to hook up this small ceremony through WhatsApp with a larger group gathered in Moscow to mark the anniversary. As the LaRouche group approached the Memorial, they called the organizers in Moscow, who had their people gathered on the streets of Moscow, probably in the vicinity of some war memorial, and could view the ceremony taking place in Arlington. A bouquet of roses was laid at the Arlington Memorial by Salisbury, a Vietnam combat veteran and Purple Heart recipient; and Baker, who served during the Vietnam War.
