Lessons of D-Day will always matter

D-Day matters. D-Day will always matter. Which is why the decision of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to leave the commemoration service in France halfway through will be an eternal beacon in the history of political self-harm.

U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Queen Camilla, King Charles III, French President Emmanuel Macron and Brigitte Macron participate in the 80th-anniversary D-Day ceremony in Ver-Sur-Mer, France.

Everybody was there: Trudeau, Macron, Biden, Scholz, PM-to-be Keir Starmer. Skipping out early was an insult to Britain, Canada, America and the French, to the last Normandy veterans left, to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who took time out from World War II: The Sequel currently being filmed in Ukraine. It was an insult to Conservatives, Jews, gays, women, the Roma, the civilian war dead, Mulberry harbours, helmets, and French sand.

And then this tiny, socially awkward man made it worse, saying he hadn’t planned to attend the full ceremonies even before the election was called. “Isn’t that … worse? Does he not see that’s worse?” asked awed onlookers.

Then he said it was wrong for Labour to politicize his error, even though he himself had left for a political interview attacking Labour, whose leader will soon take over Sunak’s job, so it didn’t work, did it.