In Canada, Australia, India, Kenya, the UK, and the remainder of the 54 Commonwealth nations, today is Remembrance Day, a holiday honoring those who gave their lives for King (or Queen) and country while serving in the armed forces. As such, Remembrance Day is much more like our Memorial Day.
In my youth, this holiday was alternatively called Armistice Day. Officially, it became Veterans Day in 1954, but of course many adults kept calling it by its original name for years and years thereafter. The armistice referred to in the earlier title was the one that ended hostilities on the Western Front of the Great War. That occurred, famously, in Marshal Foch’s railway car, deep in France’s Forest of Compiègne. Though signed by representatives of Germany, France, and the Allies in the wee hours of that morning, the agreed-upon time for the laying-down of arms was “the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month”.
Today, on the 93rd anniversary of that armistice, on Veterans Day, we can go that timestamp one better, adding “of the 11th year”. Hence, my decision to publish this epistle at 11am on 11/11/11.
Over at Peace Tree Farm, I’ve written posts marking Veterans Day on almost every November 11 since 2003. Somehow, I missed it last year, breaking a seven-year streak. In case you’re interested, here are links to those essays:
- On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month (2003)
- Eleventh hour, eleventh day, eleventh month … again (2004)
- 11th, 11th, 11th … Veterans Day (2005)
- How will this war be memorialized? (2006)
- On Veterans Day (2007)
- A different sort of Veterans Day (2008)
- Lest we forget (2009)
I’m not a veteran myself. To be honest, only a few of my friends and family served in the military. I come from a long line of non-soldiers … had a student deferment during Vietnam and then a high enough number in the first draft lottery to avoid being called, my father was 4-F in World War II (he was deaf in one ear), and my maternal grandfather was a temporary New York City cop while many of the real policemen were marching “over there” in World War I. My father’s father did serve, if you consider playing the French horn in Czar Nicholas II’s army band to be military service.
But you don’t have to be a veteran to honor those who did serve. So here’s to Shaun Dale, whose blog Upper Left has been running almost as long as my own, and to Michael Hood of the well-respected BlatherWatch. Here’s to HA commenter-extraordinaire Roger Rabbit and to Robby, occasional HA commenter and erstwhile blogger on the late, lamented Effin’Unsound. And a salute to my Congressman Jim McDermott, one of only 90 House members with military service of any sort. Jim was a Navy psychiatrist treating sailors and soldiers with PTSD during the Vietnam War (to be fair, both of Washington’s Republican Congressmen, Dave Reichert and Doc Hastings, were reservists).
And, in fact, greetings and salutations in honor of all of the veterans hereabouts.
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
— John McCrae (1872 – 1918)
There is one paramount duty we, the living, owe to all who have perished in history’s wars; and that is, to do everything within our power to create a world in which no one has to die in a war ever again.
Roger, I considered referring to Flanders Fields when mentioning Remembrance Day. Poppies as well, since they’ve become the symbol of Remembrance Day.
What I couldn’t elegantly work into the post was the hope that we’ll someday stop adding to the rolls of veterans who are eligible to join the VFW. Leaving Iraq helps, but we’re still pouring far too many (i.e., more than zero) into Afghanistan.
As noted in the post, I honor and salute you for your service in Vietnam.
To my fellow veterans, thank-you for making this a better country to live in, every day in every way.
We honor your service…
One of the things that WWII veterans brought back from the war was strict rules about personal hygiene. These practices as they spread throughout society were one of the major reasons for the uptick in the longevity of Americans in the ensuing decades.
No joke.
Thanks for the post. Allow me to add the name of Vietnam era Navy vet Terry Parkhurst, my most faithful commenter at Upper Left, who blogs about car stuff at Automatter.
And thanks, of course, to all my fellow vets.
To Matt, Great Uncle Jonas (buried in France) and all the other vets I know and those I don’t. Thanks
Today is also Nigel Tufnel Day. Couldn’t help myself.
Fantastic article. My grandfather was also in the army band. He played the cornet in Korea. I dont think you have to be in combat to be considered a veteran. Ive always been very proud of him for his service. Serving your country in any capacity is a very honorable thing.
Speaking of “The Commonwealth”…
We visited New Zealand early this year, and learned some interesting things about their military traditions. Their history with respect to the British is very different from ours. Not all that long after we fought for independence from England, they entered into a treaty which essentially made New Zealand not just a colony, but part of Britain itself. The native Maori actually welcomed this, partly because many of them worked in the whaling trade (think of Queequeg in Moby Dick) and were sometimes mistreated once stuck on board ships at sea. When they became Englishmen, whaling captains were loath to risk the wrath of the Royal Navy.
In return for this, the Maori and the white newcomers (of various descents, British, Dutch and otherwise) swore eternal allegiance to the Crown, and willingly served in many of Britain’s subsequent military adventures, up to and definitely including World War II. The entire nation mobilized and turned its farms and factories to supporting England in its struggle against Hitler, and many New Zealanders traveled halfway around the globe to fight in Europe. Several museums in Wellington, Rotarua and elsewhere have exhibits depicting the heroism of these soldiers, presented with a great expression of national pride. We all owe them our thanks for their contribution to the outcome.
@8
Lol @ nigel tufnel day……and yes, it does go to 11.
@3 Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker recently published a new book in which he argues humanity is becoming less violent.
Slavery is still around, in pockets here and there, but it’s not respectable anymore. War, too, has lost much of whatever respectability it had ever, as the 20th century’s conflagrations made people realize it’s just too costly a way to resolve territorial and other disputes.
War is not inevitable. Although it may spring from aggressive tendencies inherent in human nature, ultimately it’s a behavior — and behavior can change, when people have the will to change it. And nothing provides motivation like thousands of nuclear warheads and the prospect of mutual extinction.
@9 “Serving your country in any capacity is a very honorable thing.”
Yes, it is. “Those also serve who only stand and wait.” For what it’s worth: The late (sniffle) Pop Rabbit never served but he lost a brother in the Pacific, his gay brother fought in Korea (they didn’t have DADT then, but he went to war anyway), and two of his sons (including yours truly) served in Vietnam.
World War I (a/k/a “the Great War”) has become emblematic of war’s horrors in western civilization’s collective consciousness, and Verdun is the iconic battle of that war. Few war stories are more poignant than this one:
http://atlasobscura.com/place/trench-bayonets
War Hero
by: Sean Barnett (1984- )
When we got off the plane-
After a year in Iraq,
There were flags and banners,
They read,
Welcome home troops
An elementary school choir sang,
The local news zoomed in,
Mothers, children, girlfriends and wives,
Clustered to greet us.
Everyone was looking our direction.
There was a frail old man,
Standing in the back, alone,
Without a smile. He saw us,
And approached slowly.
Hands in front of him,
Clenched together.
He took a gasping breath,
In an anxious voice he said,
“I’m so … sorry.”
http://blackcatpoems.com/b/war_hero.html
A Soldier’s Thoughts: Before Breakfast
by: Sean Barnett (1984- )
You weren’t the first,
God knows you weren’t the last
Of all the others,
Your mark stays with me
It was the shot,
I never should’ve taken
And every morning since,
It’s your eyes I see
The death of you,
Has become the life of me.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/book.....17/history
“If any question why we died, / Tell them, because our fathers lied.” Rudyard Kipling
15, 17 – Yes, it’s always the old (who ought to know better) who send the young (who have no idea), isn’t it? That’s why we lucky enough to have grown old have a responsibility to the young. Now that I’m no longer young, I’m doing everything I can to fulfill that responsibility — by my words, my actions, and above all, by the way I vote.
One of the many things I try to do on this blog is function as a sort of bibliography for the literati among HA’s readership (no, not you, trolls).
Ever hear of Vasily Grossman? He’s a Tolstoy deal: Reading him is a long hard slog. Well, you know, you get out what you put in; nothing worthwhile is effortless.
There are many pre-eminent war writers, and to be truly liberal and literate, you must spend some of your limited reading time with at least a few of them. If you like poetry, there’s Wilfred Owen. For the horrors of the eastern front flavored with the repression of Stalin’s Russia, there’s Grossman.
Vasily Grossman was a Ukrainian Jew who was trained to be an engineer but made his mark as a journalist and novelist. At first he tried to be a compliant apparatchik of Krasnaya Zvezda (Red Star), the official Red Army newspaper, but in the end he was overwhelmed by an urge to speak truth to power; and although he was never arrested he was suppressed, denominated a non-person, and the KGB raided his apartment and confiscated not only his manuscripts but the typewriter ribbon they had been written with!
Grossman’s greatest work, Life and Fate, was smuggled to the West with the help of Andrei Sakharov, among others. This is no easy book; the English-language paperback version is nearly 900 pages long. It is a novel. Grossman’s other major work is called Everything Flows.
Through Grossman’s eyes, you will see much: He was an eyewitness to the battles of Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk, and Berlin; and his are among the earliest eyewitness accounts of the Nazi extermination camps.
Obviously, books like these aren’t for everyone. But someone has to read them so the world doesn’t forget what happened when ideologies ran amok in the last century. Someone needs to think about how to keep that from happening again. This is, of course, a task and responsibility for the most intelligent and thoughtful among us.
Trolls, if you’re not up to the task, we understand. Just stay focused on your crass earthly pre-occupations with making money and being selfish — it’s what you were born for — and leave thinking to us. That’s what we were born for.
In case you’ve ever wondered whether I write anywhere besides HA, the answer is yes. I wrote for a newspaper before I became a lawyer, I have published in legal professional books and magazines, I have written for a variety of internet forums on subjects have nothing to do with politics, and I have literary aspirations as well but those are still in the future.
This isn’t bragging, it’s an acknowledgement of responsibility. I have been given certain gifts, which as I see it are intended to benefit the whole community, but it’s up to me to put them to work for that purpose, and I’m trying. It’s hard work and I’ll do the best job I can. We’ll have to wait a while to see what comes of it.
Meanwhile, my job of kicking wingnut asses around the block here on HA is important, but nothing on the scale of Grossman. Wingnuts are small ball compared to Hitler and Stalin. But someone has to kick them. I’m doing that the best I can, too.
My great uncle who served in WWI in the renown Black Regiment out of NYC. He had great stories of WWI and the pictures on the fireplace mantle of their 10 year reunions from 1918 to 1968 when there we less than 20 left. He died at 93 years old. My father was in WWII in the Pacific. My brother still has his army uniform from WWII.
Today is the day to remember the war heroes of yesteryear.
@21…
…and their spawn is an ani-American asshole.
Go figure.
@22 That’s a great record, puddy. I look forward to meeting your forebears at the Eternal Encampment. What was your service? Surely, coming from such a distinguished military family, you didn’t leave a gap in that unbroken string of service, did you? Oh, and if your brother served in WWII, your dad must have kept busy right up to age 93.
#23 Roger can’t you take your mind out of the gutter, even for today?
Roger Rabbit you are disgusting.
@23
once again the senile old rabbit needs to clean out his colostomy bag…Im thinking puddy meant that his brother still has his dad’s old uniform.
i hope to god the state took your driver’s license, because its obvious you dont have a clue about anything…
#26. Totally agree. The senile old doddering rabbit, is full of pellets.
The only thing he can talkabout is himself, his favorite subject by the way. Rabbit is boring as hell, blathering on. All he can do is boast brag and lie about the past and his supposed accomplishments.
He even lies about the time he was fired.
Heard it from another guy the “real” story.
No one is impressed Ragging Rager Rarebutt.
Note at # 25 and # 26 the wingnuts are happy to take the Veteran’s Day Weekend to kick at an actual veteran for expressing his first amendment rights at free expression.
Way to go, guys, REAL classy – and typical. The wingnuts pretend to care about veterans as long as the active service troops and veterans support them fully. The minute they don’t, they are more than happy to stab them in the back.
Whenever I’m reminded of this, I tend to think of the great Bill Mauldin cartoon, where he he’s hiding in a foxhole, and across the barbed wire no-man’s land you can see the helment and eyes of the enemy as he looks over the trench. Will (or Joe, they were sometimes enterchangeable) says to the other: “To hell with it – I ain’t getting up until HE does.”
Nobody wants to be the last guy to die an a war.
Wow the senile Roger Rabbit can’t read. First off senile Rabbit I already described my military service on this blog. You can ask someone with his crazed databaze since you possess mindless moronic minute memory malady. Second off you missed with generational issue.
BTW we understood your rear echelon position in Vietnam. Your told us incessantly over the years.
You are a classless moron!
And we learned rujax did what in the military? Oh yeah ran the other way…