If, in any way, my sentiments below are perceived as insensitive or misplaced, I apologize in advance and assure I have no such intention.
Today is a day to remember the tremendous sacrifices of our veterans, a day to be proud of our contributions to peace, democracy and freedom, and a day to pay respect to fallen soldiers.
I am always in a deep thought on Remembrance Day or Armistice Day as they call it here. I am in somewhat of a somber trance while contemplating about how immense a sacrifice – physical and mental – so many men and women, just like me and you, took to ensure that you and I don’t have to. I believe, it may actually be beyond comprehension what that sacrifice means. It’s a wrestle to equate it in our minds, and that in and ofitself is a blessing.
Yet – and I recognize that this may be controversial – I have thought for some years now about the ‘balance of patriotism’ in Remembrance Day.
Canada fought World Wars and other conflicts with other nations. In fact, one often overlooked aspect of the world wars was how nations came together to promote freedom and democracy. Men and women of different colour, religion, ethnicity, socio-economic background, language, country etc. came together under the banner of peace. I am not oblivious to the fact that racial and other tensions existed (and continue to today), but the ability of peoples to come together remains remarkable.
Consider too that many Canadians don’t have Canadians, or even British, veterans in their family lineage. I don’t. My ‘origins’ are Polish. I celebrate Canadian veterans and am fervently proud of Canada’s contribution to the resolution of twentieth century conflicts. I consider myself a disciple of Pearsonianism and could tell you in detail about the contribution of Canada to every international conflict it has entered since the Boar War to its peacekeeping missions in the Balkans and Haiti.
But when Remembrance Day comes around, I also want to remember my grandfather who fought in the Warsaw Uprising, my great uncle who was executed in the Katyn forests, my great grandfather who was a professional soldier for the Russian army before Poland came into existance, as well as the rest of my family that suffered but pushed forward to ensure peace in Europe.
I find myself thinking that it’s not only Allied or Western forces that sacrificed. Men and women, boys and girls of all nations in conflict are led astray by the politics of their day and have died in battles that should never have stripped them from their families and left them in trenches, jungles or deserts, to fight enemies they often didn’t understand for reasons they often couldn’t comprehend. War isn’t and never has been a pretty thing for either side.
If you have read Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front, you can appreciate that we must never forget that soldiers are soldiers and those soldiers are men and women with mothers and fathers and sons and daughters. They fought because they were told. They were on one side because that’s where they were born.
In this vein I appreciate and admire many European Remembrance Day commemorations. Last year in Verdun French President Nicholas Sarkozy was accompanied by Prince Charles, the Governor General of Australia and the president of the Upper House of the German Parliament. Today Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel spent time commemorating the event together. That a German leader and a French leader would come together for such an event was perhaps unthinkable and certainly controversial just decades ago. Year in and year out, high ranking German officials and others are invited to these celebrations. I find that consideration of reconciliation a powerful symbol of maturity and dignity worthy of admiration.
Like many other Remembrance Days in years past this year I spent a lot of time thinking about these issues, and how they fit into the importance of pride of nation, of patriotism. It seems to be increasingly evident as each November 11th passes that they are not mutually exclusive. It is, as ever, important to remember our past holistically, with compassion and a balanced patriotism.
Filed under: History
Mark,
I find nothing controversial about what you wrote. For me, Remembrance Day is the one day of the year I find myself truly engrossed in thoughtfulness. I even asked someone to call me back later, when it looked like our business might go into the 11th hour.
For me Remembrance day is not about patriotism but of sacrifice… that made by men and women around the world who were drawn into conflict and faced the unimaginable either willingly or unwillingly.
It is only right that the hundreds of millions of victims of conflict be given a moment when the rest of us reflect.
There are many around me who want to take this day as an opportunity to associate all sorts messaging about the roots of conflict… and how conflict begins… and who begins it and how certain political doctrines beget conflict.
For me, that isn’t what today is about. It is about my 15-year-old grandfather at Ypres in 1915… and the child on his way to school at 8:10 in the morning on August 6th in Hiroshima… and about the young men who died at Dieppe… and about the young men and women who serve in Kandahar.
On the other 364 days of the year, we can debate the causes and effects and political roots. Today we remember with sorrow and respect for the victims of war.
Will
That’s a well written a mature take on the subject. I think I relate to you since my own origins are also somewhat removed from the past British/Canadian war efforts and war sacrifices of WWI AND WW II – but my ancestors were also involved in these momentous conflicts and their lives were in some measure changed as a result of the geopolitics and war. Or, in the case of one of my great uncles, ended. As a former army officer, he was involved in a Czech resistance cell in the 1941/42 period. The Germans had an informant in his group and my great uncle was arrested and executed. Many other Czechs were also either executed or sent to hard labour camps and other thoroughly bad places for their resistance and attempted sabotage to the Nazi rule. That’s why I commemorate not just the Canadian Remembrance Day but also the May Day when WW II ended in Europe. My grandparents must have been so happy to see the liberation…we have no idea, these days.
Thanks to both of you for your insightful and thoughtful comments!