 Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Walter Mathaw. Omar Nelson Bradley, one of our very great soldiers, has been described as a quiet gentleman who might pass for a professor. But there is an unmistakable quality of greatness in his simple manner, his straightforwardness, and his deep concern for humanity. Recognized as a master strategist, he was given command of the forces that spearheaded and carried through to victory the campaigns and the invasion of Hitler's Europe. While the headlines and popular applause fell to others, it was Bradley, the quiet infantryman in his old trench coat, trudging through the scarred battlefields who held the fate of his soldiers in his hands. When it was over, a grateful chief of staff saluted him with this simple statement, all our confidence in you has been justified. It is with great pride that we present the story of General Omar Nelson Bradley. Spring of 1953, almost 10 years after liberation, flags of many nations stand in harmony at the Palais du Chaiot. A general, chairman of the American Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrives to take part with other world leaders in a program of peace based on a union of western strength, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, soft spoken, honest in his opinion. To his intimates, he is known simply as Brad. To everyone, he is Bradley the soldier, the soldier's general, the personification of a great army, a great nation. With all that he stands for, this man has no sense of destiny in his makeup. He never had it. Even when he moved along the broken paths of mankind's greatest war, he moved as a soldier with a soldier's determination. Bradley the strategist, perhaps the greatest in modern warfare. Bradley the man of quiet dignity, but he had a punch that packed a terrific wallop. He smashed ahead with a force of almost a million and a quarter men. No American general ever had exercised direct field command over so many combat troops. The end of the Nazi rule. Here we see him at Berchteskott, the mountain retreat of a tyrant who had felt destiny driven to rule the world. With a soldier's determination, Omar Nelson Bradley had won a brilliant campaign. He had come a long way, this general, geographically and otherwise. From the heart of America, from a state that had known many famous Americans. Mark Twain, Champ Clark, George Graham Vest, General Pershing, President Truman. He was to serve as general under not one president, but three. In addition to Harry S. Truman seen here at Potsdam, Germany, there was Dwight D. Eisenhower, his former wartime chief and wartime president Franklin Delano Roosevelt. 50 miles from the Missouri River on the birthday of Abraham Lincoln, Omar Bradley was born into the home of a poorly paid country school teacher. The year was 1893. In countries such as this, he learned to fish and quail, became an expert marksman. He was the only child. The name Omar came from a family friend, not the Persian poet. Bradley idolized his father, acquiring from him a way of life. To patch up the family budget, the elder Bradley did some farming. From such roots, the boy learned the meaning of patience. The patience that comes with fishing. Bradley was only 14 when his father died. After high school, what? He was hard to say. He sold newspapers, worked at the Wabash Railroad shops at 17 cents an hour. But a Sunday school teacher suggested West Point. And West Point it became. The United States Military Academy. Here had studied Lee, Grant, Pershing. The class of 1915 Brad's class was to furnish 56 generals. One could say of Bradley, as quiet as the Hudson, a trait that was duly noted by his class by upper berth. True merit is like a river. The deeper it is, the less noise it makes. This was Bradley. And they wrote further of him. His most prominent characteristic is getting there. Just how much prophecy was in this remark. Let us see. In World War I, he commanded an infantry company at the Butte Montana copper mines. His own evaluation ruined. He was left out of the fight. 1920, ordered to West Point as an instructor in mathematics. From 1924 to 1939, army schools, routine duty periods with troops in the United States and Hawaii. Then on to general staff in Washington. Finally, in the early part of 1941, commandant of the infantry school at Fort Benning, Georgia. Was he getting there? Well, he was acquiring the reputation of a fine infantry officer. There wasn't a thing these men did that Bradley couldn't or wouldn't do. For he had great physical endurance. February 1943. Bradley was in Florida training a division for duty overseas. World War II was in its second year for the United States. And Bradley was to be included in the fight. Word finally came to report to French North Africa. For the first time in 32 years as a soldier, Bradley was off to war. Selected by Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall, who had been watching this great infantryman for years. Now as Deputy Commander and Commander of the U.S. Second Corps, he helped push the Tunisian campaign to victory. British Commander General Sir Alexander says, well done. Bradley tells all about it in his book, A Soldier's Story. Was he getting there? As they would say out in Bradley's country, he fought to beat the band. After Africa, the invasion of Sicily. Bradley took Second Corps into Sicily under General George S. Patton's command. Plans for the Channel Assault on France were well underway. When General Marshall sent word to Eisenhower, my choice has been Bradley. He meant for Bradley to lead the American forces for the Great Normandy invasion. Operation Overlord. As commanding general of the First Army, Bradley was assured that he was going to lead the American forces and Bradley was assured less than 24 hours after the first Allied units hit the Normandy beaches. The Battle of Europe was to be a dough-boys battle and beating these dough-boys was a man who in the words of General Marshall was fit for any command in the army. A week after D-Day, and we had linked the Allied forces together in a beach head 42 miles wide. A prime objective, the port of Cherbourg. As Bradley's First Army pushed ahead, happy Frenchmen began to breathe the first fresh air of liberation and we began to feel at home. For a hard nut to crack, those Nazis, at all costs they meant to keep us from getting a harbor, a suitable port for our supplies. Nazi commanders now felt the power of Bradley's punch. For once Bradley made up his mind, he moved swiftly, relentlessly. Was he getting there? Following the Battle of Sandlow, he headed the 12th Army Group. As American forces plowed ahead, they moved out of the peninsula, then toured and beyond Paris. 43 divisions were to be deployed under Bradley's command. The 12th Army Group included General Courtney H. Hodges First Army, General George S. Patton Jr.'s Third Army, General William H. Simpson's Ninth Army, and General Leonard T. Gero's 15th Army. No sit-back at headquarters type of general, Bradley inspected a battle in person, traveling in an ordinary jeep. There wasn't a bit of glamour or fanfare in his whole tall, lanky frame. He got the most out of his men by patient good will. He knew every division commander by his first name. When an officer performed as he expected him to, he gave him a free hand. When he hesitated, he tried to help him. And when he failed, Bradley relieved him, and all respected him. Even Patton, Bradley's Chief in French North Africa and Sicily, in fact, George S. Patton became one of his closest friends. What did Bradley think of the boss and vice versa? There was a mutual trust. Stout-hearted and confident of result was the way the Chief described Bradley. Many battles justified faith in Bradley, but one especially was the big break out. The battle for Saint-Lô, and the breakthrough from the peninsula, one of the most decisive battles of Bradley's military career. The breakthrough cracked the back of the Nazi Wehrmacht. Bradley had created it, planned it down to the last occasion. Uprooting meant taking quicker and firmer route in freedom's soil. Out came our armies. The way was open. The way to Paris. The enemy west of Paris was destroyed. As he fell, the liberation of France lay only days away. That the Bradley breakthrough work was due to a soldier's determination. Our hopes now ran high for a quick end to the war in Europe. Paris liberated. Bradley could have gone into Paris himself, but the quiet man from Missouri was not built like that. He had waited for his chief. A liberated nation honored him. Bradley was to receive many decorations, as well as honorary degrees from universities. Someone has said of Bradley that he always behaves as though he were a civilian among men in uniform. Even as Paris celebrated, something was happening. After the fastest flits of modern war, we had to apply the brakes. Logistics that age-old problem of supplying a mighty fighting force on the offensive had run into difficulties. We had lost momentum. The deep stalemate of winter set in. Quite suddenly, counterattack. The Battle of the Bulge. The greatest crisis in Bradley's military career. Dark moments. Unpredictable moments. It was the enemy's dying thrust. We were thrown back. Even when the enemy was a few miles from his headquarters, Bradley refused to move back. He reasons such a move could destroy confidence. Your identification, General, from Star Wars down, solid proof was needed these trying days that you were not a Nazi disguised as an American. The Battle of the Bulge over, the crime soon came into view. There wasn't much more to it after this. Operation Overlord, which had swept a relatively unknown general into great prominence, had blasted asunder the myth of Nazi invoverability. From the Omaha Beachhead to Berlin, a stunned enemy wondered how it could have happened. Farm boy to four stars. Was he getting there? True to American tradition, the job helped make the man. And the man made history. And he never once lost his humility. Was there room for a fifth star? With a soldier's determination, but no, with the determination of a man enjoying the softer moments of peace. Bradley, a top-notch golfer, scores high on the fairway. But a hop-skip and a jump from the fairway was busy Washington. And in post-war America, Bradley played a big role in world affairs. Affairs as they pertained to our survival as a nation. We see him here in the fall of 1948 as Army Chief of Staff. Prior to becoming the Army's Chief, he had spent two years as Veterans Administrator. With him are Air Chief Hoyt Vandenberg and Navy Chief Louis E. Denville. In Bradley's characteristic way, he considered his job another opportunity to serve his country. And America needed him. For a new type of world jitters had set him. The Cold War, modeled by the Kremlin. For example, the Great Airlift of 1948 and 1949. Starved the people of West Berlin came out as from Moscow. So the Red Army imposed a blockade on all overland transport between Berlin and the West. All trades stopped. Industrial paralysis threatened West Berlin. But not for long. The air was still free. And from the Free Nation's port, fabulous supplies for the people of West Berlin. Broke the blockade. Our first victory in the Cold War. This type of war called for a reassessment of our military objectives. And that's where Bradley fit into the picture. He became a globetrotter, a sort of soldier diplomat. Here we see him arriving in Germany. His mission? To discuss plans for collective security with member nations of the North Atlantic Alliance. This was to be insurance against aggression by Soviet Russia. Bradley the world headliner. The story of Omar Bradley would not be complete without mentioning the former Mary Elizabeth Quail, who married Bradley a year after his graduation from West Point. Here she watches Bradley being sworn in as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by Defense Secretary Johnson. With great pride, Mrs. Bradley will tell you that Omar is a considerate husband and father. As Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, America's top soldier took his seat at the first meeting of the Defense Committee of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization held in Washington. To resist aggression, that was the keynote. Yes, there was Rome for a fifth star by act of Congress and the deep respect and admiration of a fellow Missourian. A little trouble with the pin, but both Bradley and the President made it. Farm boy to frequent visitor at the White House. This is early in 1951 at a Security Council meeting. He sits beside the man who along with his father signalized his ideals in life. General Marshall at this time Secretary of Defense. And again at the White House with ministers of defense and military advisors of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Bradley paid almost 300 visits to the White House. Many of them to brief the President on the progress of the war in Korea. Again he visited war rooms, this time under the banner of the United Nations. As a global military strategist, Bradley believed that we should not press our military advantage too far in this one area of Communist aggression. The fighting raged from June 1950 to July 1953. These were precarious times. At stake was our global prestige. Our voice in the free world. This war, war by satellite, was a new type of Soviet aggression where the Kremlin directed a conflict in the front yard of Korean homes. As in World War II, Bradley helped direct Allied forces close to the battle lines. And so it came to pass. From the year 1915, a West Point classmate of Bradley's, Ike by name, went places too, becoming President of the United States. He is playing host here to our top soldier of the nation and other members of the class of 15, time May 1953, shortly before Bradley's leaving active assignments. It seemed fitting at this time to name an American town after Bradley. To quote Bradley, no boy ever came out of an army camp with any more or any less moral fiber and any more or less courage than he had when he left his family fireside. Bradley, West Virginia, on U.S. Route 21, between Beckley and Mount Hope. Did he get there? Well, seems like there's more to do. Mission? To help in military reorganization. He has come a long way, this general from the humble roots of America, to enrich our heritage of service to mankind and love of country. A living monument among the truly great men of history.