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REPUBLICAN PRESS RELEASE

May 26, 2007

SEN. CRAIG SPEAKS TO HUNDREDS IN FRANCE TO HONOR THE FIRST AMERICAN FIGHTER PILOTS

Speech part of a week-long effort to remember Americans buried across Europe

Media contact: Jeff Schrade (202)224-9093

(Paris, France) As millions of Americans hit the highway on Friday to enjoy the Memorial Day weekend, U.S. Senator Larry Craig and U.S. Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson raced across the Atlantic ocean to join Air Force Chief of Staff Michael Moseley, and other officials from the United States and France, to remember the first American pilots who died during World War I.

They met early Saturday morning near Paris at the Lafayette Escadrille Memorial – built on land donated by the French government and constructed with private funds in 1928 to remember the famed American pilots of the Lafayette Escadrille – a squadron of American volunteers who flew for the French government before the United States entered World War I.

"The contribution of those Americans cannot be underestimated. They left the safety of their homes to fight for freedom – to fight for the liberty of the French people," said U.S. Senator Larry Craig, ranking member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.

Several hundred local French citizens were gathered as the senator from Idaho gave his remarks. Many wore historic military regalia and carried the battle flags from that conflict that ended in 1918. Bands from the U.S. and French Air Forces were on hand, along with local mayors, school children, and representatives from a variety of governments, including the Polish Air Force.

As the ceremony began, a formation of four French Mirage jets, followed by a flight of four American F15's, flew in low and fast over the crowd at over 400 miles per hour. Their speed was a far cry from the pilots they were there to honor, those from the first world war whose cloth-covered biplanes were lucky to reach 80 miles per hour.

"I am humbled that so many here in France have come here today to remember the Americans who gave their lives on behalf of the liberty so long ago," Craig said. "Just as brave and determined French pioneers of the early 19th century settled in places like Coeur d’Alene and Boise in my home state of Idaho, the Americans interred here were the pioneers of American combat aviation."

That point was emphasized by the man in charge of the U.S. Air Force, Chief of Staff Michael

Moseley. He gave Sen. Craig, Sec. Nicholson and several other members of the U.S. Congress a personal tour of the memorial which holds the remains of many of the 65 Lafayette Escadrille members who perished during the world’s first air war. Moseley made a point to stop at the tomb of Raul Lufbery and speak about the man considered by many to be a founding father of American fighter pilots. During World War I, Lufbery had 17 combat victories while flying for the French. He later went to train other Americans when the U.S. entered World War I.

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Larry Scott

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