WHAT IS REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY REMEMBERING?
There was a time when buying and
wearing a poppy felt like the right thing to do . The purpose of the
British Legion, to provide practical support for injured ex-military
personnel, was admirable, particularly where those injuries were
incurred during the Second World War. Whilst that aim remains one to
be supported I have for several years found myself unable to wear a
poppy because it feels like it would be conveying the wrong message.
Remembrance Day has been hijacked for more sinister purposes by our
political masters.
Once there was a sense of conveying a
moral message that war was always disastrous for the participants,
and innocent victims, and every possible step should be taken to
avoid it. This now takes second place to building up the image of
our 'heroic' armed forces with no questioning allowed of the dubious
roles they undertake. There are even stories around that the event
has become yet another opportunity for arms dealers to rub shoulders
with senior UK politicians.
I'm far from alone in thinking this,
but you wouldn't know that from the coverage of events given in the
mainstream media. It now seems to be compulsory for all BBC
presenters to be seen to wear a poppy on screen for several weeks
before the actual day. I dislike the term 'poppy fascism', but it
has become common currency in the last few years. Voices expressing
dissent against the establishment viewpoint find it difficult to be
heard, but they are out there, most convincing when expressed by
ex-soldiers, such as Ben Griffin :
If you want an example of what I find
most objectionable about this trend consider the words of Scotland's
First Minister, Alex Salmond, on Twitter :
"This moment allows us to pay
tribute to all of our servicemen and women, past and present, who
have laid down their lives in defence of our country and whose
sacrifice will never be forgotten."
For me the key words in that sentence
are "and present" and "in defence of our country".
Because I'm not aware of any UK military fatalities in my lifetime
which occurred in the defence of my country. There have been many
deaths of service personnel, in conflicts which involved the invasion
of other countries, or in defence on Britain's dubious imperial
legacy. The UK military have also been legitimately involved in
peacekeeping or humanitarian roles (e.g. Bosnia) although I am not
aware that any fatalities resulted from these incursions. The four
major shooting conflicts in which the UK military have been involved
in the last fifty years have been Northern Ireland, the Falklands,
Iraq and Afghanistan.
In the euphemistically named 'Troubles'
the British Army was originally involved to protect the Catholic
community from increasingly violent discrimination, but ended up
largely defending British occupation of it's largest remaining
colonial territory. The Falklands conflict resulted from gross
diplomatic mismanagement and in many ways was more about the
perceived prestige of Britain (and the Tory government) in the world
than 'defending' the Falkland Islanders. It should not be forgotten
that the Thatcher government was so unpopular that it would almost
certainly have lost the 1983 general election without the jingoistic
legacy of that conflict and this was surely a consideration in the
decision to go to war.
The arguments against the legality of
the Iraq war have been aired often enough not to require restatement
here. For this invasion to have had any legitimacy there is only one
measure that matters - did it result in a positive improvement in the
everyday lives of Iraqi citizens? The jury is still out on that one,
but there is plenty of evidence that the biggest beneficiaries have
been the shareholders of large US corporations. Meanwhile the war in
Afghanistan continues after a decade, the original aims seemingly
lost in obscurity. Whether it was the nineteenth century British
attempts to subdue 'The North West Frontier', or the Soviet Russians
or US led coalition invading modern Afghanistan history shows that
this region is impossible to conquer and will have to be allowed to
develop at its own pace. The Taliban continues to have a strong
presence and there is no guarantee that it will not take over once
again soon after the western armies depart. For now the British
services remain part of a military force of invasion and occupation
and are at the very least complicit in the ongoing murders of
innocent Afghan and Pakistani civilians. I am disgusted that my
taxes are put to this use.
Remembrance Day began in the aftermath
of the horrors of the First World War, but the 'War To End All Wars'
did nothing prevent an even longer and more widespread conflict
twenty years later. Can our involvement in both be regarded in the
same light, as a defence of Britain against oppression? That is
clearly the case for the 1939 to 1945 hostilities in which a
particularly evil regime gained control of one country and its
predatory policy had to be resisted. The circumstances which gave
rise to that situation largely arose from the wantonly vindictive
policies of the French government (and others) in the aftermath of
the First World War, but that does not alter the urgency of the need
to directly combat evil. World War One itself cannot be deemed to be
similar. This was a battle between similar evils, with imperial
ruling classes on both sides exploiting their own populations as
cannon fodder to further their position of power in the world. (Only
the Russians managed to revolt against the tyranny imposed on them
and find an early exit from the slaughter, although this did not turn
out well for them in the long term....) This article gives a good
explanation of this scenario and how that is now being wrongly
exploited by David Cameron et al for their own political purposes :
There was a lot of unnecessary derision
for the recent decision to award the Nobel Peace Prize to the
European Union. The EU is far from perfect and is the cause of a lot
of conflict - but not of the bloodletting kind. In achieving one of
its original aims, to maintain peace amongst European nations, it has
been astonishingly successful, to the point where it is now
impossible to imagine an actual shooting war between the likes of
Britain, Germany and France. If we can ignore the conflicts which
followed the break up of Yugoslavia, which were largely of a civil
war nature, there has been no large scale combat in Europe since
1945, almost seventy years ago. To realise just how significant that
fact is try to work out when that last happened.....
Meanwhile war continues in many other
parts of the world, often the direct or indirect legacy of European
post-imperialism. A war death is a war death, wherever and to
whomever it occurs. British victims of war, military or civilian,
are no more or less important than those of other countries.
Can Remembrance Day be reclaimed? I
think it can, but it needs to become not just what it once was, but
something new. Yes it needs to mark the lives lost as a result of
violence, but not simply those who were members of the UK's services.
The deaths of the people of Dresden or the conscripts on the
Belgrano are every bit as tragic as those of British military
personnel. Recognising all the victims of wars in which our military
have been participants would be a step forward. Ceasing to make
claims that all British service people are automatically 'heroes'
would be another (see the Stop The War article above). It's the
horror and pointlessness of war which needs to be reinforced. Above
all else remembrance should be about humanity and not a tool our
politicians can use to justify their actions.
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