In Feb. 19’s Sun Journal the cartoon by Dave Grunlund is of the raising of the flag on Iwo Jima. It’s an image that has become synonymous with the extraordinary sacrifice and determination of American servicemen in World War II, a war we fought with allies to defeat the murderous, imperial ambitions of both Germany and Japan.

How horrifying, then, that the prior day we heard President Donald Trump claim that it was Ukraine that began the war there, while he appeases Vladimir Putin and salivates over the money to be made by doing business with Russia.

As we all know, it was not Ukraine that began this war — it was Russia, determined to claim territory and undermine the Ukrainian people’s desire for self-determination and civil liberties. To claim otherwise, as Trump does, is shameful, and a dishonor to the valiant men and women of Ukraine (including their president Volodymyr Zelenskyy).

I imagine the men who raised that flag on Iwo Jima horrified and rolling in their graves as this American president tramples on the liberties that define the United States and as he allies himself with a murderous tyrant.

Shame on him.

Jane Costlow, Auburn