"Lest We Forget"

To my family and my forefathers whom sacrificed themselves and their futures for all that I have enjoyed in my life, I hope you hear this as my words; defending your gifts:

Remembering our dead and actually learning form their suffering and sacrifice are not the same things. Remembering Canada’s fallen, although sentimental and poignant, is one thing; I have lost family in all the great wars of Canada’s history since 1831 defending our world from those whom would impose their beliefs at the point of a gun or tank turret, a principle for which my grandfather fought and spent four years as a German POW in Bavaria, leaving his infant sons and wife to cold fortune and hope. Remembering these men’s sacrifice, however, (there were no women in combat roles at this time) without “learning” from their sacrifice makes their deaths, their solitude, their pain and the emotional agony they endured pointless.

Canada’s shift from a peacekeeping and infrastructure rebuilding “conscience” and “moralistic leader” of the United Nations and the principles it espouses is tragic, flawed and misguided. I think it important to remember here that Lester B. Pearson and U.S. Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge conceived the UN peacekeepers role with the drafting of the proposal for the UNEF, but it was Pearson’s tireless lobby, commitment to peace, impartiality and the resolve never again to engage in war that pushed the proposal through the general assembly to resolution, establishing the department permanently and winning Pearson the Nobel Peace Prize in 1957. Today our government’s incursion in Afghanistan has seriously altered our country and its world perception, from inspirational leader into little more than a NATO thug, now forcing countries into following “our” beliefs at the point of a gun and accepting and justifying the deaths of thousands of innocents along with those we proclaim to be the guilty. This incursion demonstrates that we have failed to learn the true lessons taught from the blood spilled by my family and many others. The undeclared war we currently wage to ram our societies “acceptability” down the throats of those people with a differing belief, and alternate religion, whom neither asked for our aid nor invited our incursion, demeans “the principles” for which our veterans willingly died. These actions defame the words of our own constitution and charter, and the aspirations of a just society our returning parents whispered into our minds and ears, from their wheel chairs, their hospital beds; with their last letters, their unfocused stares from limbless suits, and the incoherent drunken mumblings of their shell shocked minds. War is useless. No one ever wins a fight, one side loses, hates and resents, and the other becomes something less than they were with “one caveat” and “one caveat” only; when that side’s/person’s life, family, home, country or freedom is being taken away by another with brutal force as we are in Afghanistan. This statement is not meant as provocation, just a real, minute taking, sobering thought; Sad, infuriating and emotion-filled as the thought may be.

I do not downplay, nor for one second devalue the sacrifices of our service personnel today. Their given blood now seeps into the same moral ground as generations before them. These people have paid the same heavy prices, they are after all soldiers. I do, however, shake my head in dismay at the price they are paying when weighed against the principles for which they sacrifice. Our soldiers are not defending their family, home or country. No freedom is being taken away from them with force. The oblique and surreptitious justifications our politicians espouse over “freeing” Afghanistan would by their very words justify China’s invasion of our country because they have a differing belief, an alternate religion, an opposing acceptable norm. I fear as a Canadian, and witness by our governments actions that Canada has lost its way, puffed up by our desire to be rich, our need to now stand on the world stage draped in self-importance, our choice of loud respect, over quiet humble conviction and resolve, which was the fabric of our society, respected around the world, won us the admiration of nations, and the ear and attention of those with whom we disagreed.

“Principles”. These are the things that lives were sacrificed for. Tolerance, understanding, acceptance, objective justice and the knowledge that opening our fists and extending our hands was more powerful and long-lasting than clenching weapons and firing bullets indiscriminately in changing peoples minds. These are the real lessons that should be gleaned from, the blood soaked ground of Dieppe, the Marnes, Flanders, the Korean Peninsula, Indo-china and Kandahar. We should learn from these great triumphs and failures, the just and declared wars in which we fought with valour and distinguished ourselves as people and a nation, and the undeclared wars or failed oppressions in which we engaged, that made our nation less, hypocrites, tarnished in our aspirations; wrongful inflictors of our own self-righteous beliefs and importance and lackeys to Empiric trading partners. Yet today, in the quiet peace, our government and their self-determined policies show us sadly that we have not.

I will close by stating again, to our soldiers, I am saddened by every flag-draped coffin I watch carried across the tarmac to begin its journey home to a family waiting in tears. I wear my poppy for you, in remembrance, as well as for soldiers who fell broken or dead before you in respect. The heavy sadness I feel on this day, however, and it grows each year, is for the principles we have lost, or sacrificed, for the aspiration of a society our politicians have decided we will not be, unguided by the people, the true sovereigns of this land. At the eleventh hour I stood quiet for a moment watching the mighty Fraser run endlessly and removed my poppy as a sign to the end of war and oppression, placed my poppy in my pocket with my hope that others truly thought about sacrifice and what it truly means today. I stood for one more second breathing the fresh chill wind and went home to my life quietly on this date 11-11-11. I entered my warm house, made a cup of coffee turned on my computer and really tried to remember the lessons of war. I leave the results of my thoughts to you now for others to make input, neither offense nor injury intended.

I thank my forefathers once again, for this right and this freedom to state my opinion.

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Tags: afghanistan war, justice, remembrance day, war

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 12th, 2009 at 9:44 pm and is filed under Canadian Armed Forces. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.