There was one person grateful that the attack on Pearl Harbor happened: Winston Churchill.

Almost from the day he became Prime Minister, he was on the phone with Roosevelt doing everything he could to much needed help from his friends across the pond. But America was not going to step into another war with Europe again. It lost too many men during the Great War. Aside from beating Germany, Churchill was in a battle with American people—and their Congress.

Until December 7, 1941. On that day, Churchill won.

He wrote in his fourth book of his Memoirs of the Second World War the following:

No American will think it wrong of me if I proclaim to have the United States at our side was to me the greatest joy. I could not foretell the course of events. I do not pretend to have measured accurately the martial might of Japan, but now at this very moment I knew that the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death.

So we had won after all! Yes, after Dunkirk; after the Fall of France; after the horrible episode of Oran; after the threat of invasion, when, apart from the Air and the Navy, we were an almost unarmed people; after the deadly struggle of the U-boat war—the first Battle of the Atlantic, gained by a hand’s breadth; after seventeen months of lonely fighting and nineteen months of my responsibility in dire stress. We had won the war.

England would live; Britain would live; the Commonwealth of Nations and the Empire would live. How long the war would last or in what fashion it would end no man could tell, nor did I at this moment care. Once again in our long island history we should emerge, however mauled or mutilated, safe and victorious. We should not be wiped out. Our history would not come to an end. We might not even have to die as individuals.

Hitler’s fate was sealed. Mussolini’s fate was sealed. As for the Japanese, they would be ground to powder. All the rest was merely the proper application of overwhelming force. The British Empire, the Soviet Union, and now the United States, bound together with every scrap of their life and strength, were, according to my lights, twice or even thrice the force of their antagonists.

No doubt it would take a long time. I expected terrible forfeits in the East; but all this would be merely a passing phase. United we could subdue everybody else in the world. Many disasters, immeasurable cost and tribulation lay ahead, but there was no more doubt about the end.

Silly people—and there were many, not only in enemy countries—might discount the force of the United States. Some said they were soft, others that they would never be united. They would fool around at a distance. They would never come to grips. They would never stand blood-letting. Their democracy and system of recurrent elections would paralyze their war effort. They would be just a vague blur on the horizon to friend or foe. Now we should see the weakness of this numerous but remote, wealthy, and talkative people. But I had studied the American Civil War, fought out to the last desperate inch. American blood flowed through my veins. I thought of a remark which Edward Grey had made to me more than thirty years before—that the United States is like "a gigantic boiler. Once the fire is lighted under it there is no limit to the power it can generate." Being saturated and satiated with emotion and sensation, I went to bed and slept the sleep of the saved and thankful.

I am glad for Veterans Day. I'm glad for Memorial Day. But there is something special about reflecting on the tragedies and sacrifices made by the men and women who volunteered after the attack on Pearl Harbor to fight in World War 2 on the actual day that the tragedy occurred. I can only imagine—and hope I never do—the feeling of sadness and horror of the American people on that Sunday morning.

But at the same time, I can't help but imagine—and hope I get to feel it someday—the unity the American people felt among each other that morning. There was no left or right, progressive or republican, red or blue; there was American. Yes, politics are important and we should vote for the people and policies we want for our country.

While we do that, though, we do not have to ridicule or make an enemy of those who think otherwise. This nation was built on people who had drastically different beliefs (Jefferson and Hamilton hated each other.) Yet, that is what made America, America.

Today, I'm thankful for the members of our armed services who stepped up 83 years ago; who put country over self and made sacrifices that no one should ever have to make. In honor of them, in honor of their families, and in honor of their sacrifices, let's make sure the country stays the country that they fought to protect.