Mr. DODD. Mr. President, before Congress adjourns for recess, I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring a young World War II American pilot--Capt. Charles Ashley `C.A.' Austin, Jr: whose final acts of courage and sacrifice, while legendary in a little village in France, are largely unknown to most Americans. In her quest to reveal her fallen husband's heroism, Etta Rizzo Austin Lepore, who lives in Connecticut, has sought from the Army the posthumous bestowal of the full range of military honors on Captain Austin.

A choice of incredible valor ended the life of Capt. C.A. Austin. Jr., 50 years ago. On July 4, 1944, following a successful tactical bombing mission of German-occupied France, Captain Austin's P-47 Thunderbolt airplane was shot down by enemy fire. His disabled aircraft careened directly toward the French village of Limetz-Villet--to the horror of the villagers watching from the ground. Miraculously, it veered off its course of destruction and crashed in a nearby cornfield. Captain Austin was killed in the crash. The villagers of Limetz were convinced that Captain Austin could have bailed out and saved himself. But Austin chose to stay with the plane and, by maneuvering it from its burning trajectory, save the lives of the helpless people of Limetz. Those who witnessed Captain Austin's final moments have never forgotten the young man who traded his own life for the lives of their families and neighbors. In fact, the people of Limetz-Villet defied their Nazi occupiers when they buried Austin with full honors.

Because Captain Austin's plane had been separated from the squadron he commanded when it was hit by German antiaircraft fire, the returning pilots in his squadron did not know their captain's fate. He was reported missing in action. There were no official recommendations for Captain Austin to be awarded the highest military honors, namely, the Medal of Honor, the Distinguished Flying Cross, or the Bronze Star Medal, because no American serviceman had direct knowledge of the extraordinary circumstances of his death. In a letter from the mayor of Limetz, written in broken English a year after Captain Austin's death, Mrs. Lepore learned of the details of her husband's fate. The mayor wrote:

(i)n a supreme effort the pilot succeed to place his airship in straight line and by wonderful bend . . . avoid the village . . . reaching a small plain far from many. . .

The people and descendants of those whose lives and homes Captain Austin spared revere him to this day, and his story has been woven into the lore of Limetz. Recently, on the 50th anniversary of Captain Austin's death, the villagers erected a monument in his memory. A stolen propeller from the wreckage of Captain Austin's plane, the Etta II, serves as the centerpiece of this memorial.

We Americans have spent much of this year commemorating and reflecting upon World War II--its battles and its strategy, its causes and consequences. We have questioned--as only latter generations can--the course it took. We have interpreted its drama in broad conceptualized strokes. Captain Austin's story brings into focus the reality that World War II--like all wars--consisted of the acts of individuals, either combined in the maelstrom of battling armies or--in the case of Captain Austin, singled out, separated from the confidence of the group, in places of extremity where private conscience provided the only compass.

Captain Austin's single act of grace stands out in the human consciousness. It fortifies a belief that something worthy of hope in the human spirit survives even the most brutal conflagrations of civilization. His is a story that ought to be told and woven into the American lore. Perhaps of all the characterizations of the American role in World War II, this is the most relevant: Hundreds of thousands of American soldiers sacrificed their lives for strangers--Capt. C.A. Austin not the least among them. And in this truth, Americans may glimpse a noble piece of our national identity.

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