11/11: An Unpayable Debt

We owe a great debt and we should never forget. I often think how lucky my generation has been in avoiding the call-up and not having to fight any wars.

I hope that the same is true for my children's generation.

Steve M

I think about the World Wars whenever ANZAC Day rolls around. This is a small country but even tiny towns of a few hundred people have plaques commemorating the men they lost to WWI or II.

It seems a paradox, but freedom often comes from the end of a gun - or is maintained from the end of a gun.

Deane

quote:

---

Originally posted by bhazen:
...
I'm more than a bit angry that the US networks seem to be oblivious to the fact that it's Veterans Day (our version of 11/11)...

---

There was some coverage on Fox News - including criticism of the other channels for not covering it...

BTW Fox reminds me of Radio Moscow:

1978: "You listen to Radio Moscow?? You've been brainwashed, you stupid Commie!"

2004: "You watch Fox News?? You've been brainwashed, you stupid Neo-Con!"

(Or words to that effect).

"Those who fought for peace"
Maybe the ultimate irony, but I wasn't there so can't comment on the mood at the time. I wonder what would have happened if everyone had just refused to fight - but that is just an imaginary world I suppose.
My grandfather fought in WW1, and I still have his pocket diary that he carried every day, and it moves me to tears. He is my hero. I miss him.

JeremyD,

Typical that Fox would try to gain political advantage from what should be a day of quiet reflection and dignity. They don't count, in my book. Kudos CBC (and, I assume, the BBC), which have a much greater sense of public interest and history.

Rasher,

If they hadn't fought in the two world wars, I shudder to think where we'd be. I doubt very much my idyllic childhood would've occurred.

Your grandfather is my hero, too.

Bruce

11/11 marks the end of an utterly pointless war of patriotism. It was a war that could have been avoided unlike WW2 that followed 21 years later.

It started in the autumn of 1914 and our troops were meant to be out of there by Christmas. Does that sound familiar?

Soldiers were not allowed to haul themselves out of their trenches and crawl across no-man's land towards the enemy lines. Oh no, they had to march upright in the face of the enemy and be torn asunder by his machine gunfire. It wasn't just needless loss of life, it was gratuitous slaughter.

Still more perished in the mud than were shot.

Then when Germany realised that it could no longer afford to pursue this otherwise endless battle of attrition and called for armistice, instead of calling an immediate ceasefire it was decided to let it go on until the 11th minute of the 11th hour of the 11th day allowing a few more lives to be lost in final battles, of a war that had already been lost by both sides.

Those who fought the war ending in 11/11 (my grandfather was one of them) were innocent pawns. Those who sanctioned this war should have been shot before it started.

WW2 was a different matter entirely. This was clearly a fight against tyranny and oppression.

8/5/45 is a day to commemorate, lest we forget.

11/11/18 is a just a shameful day, and one best to consign to history.

Regards,

Steve.

[This message was edited by Steve Toy on Fri 12 November 2004 at 4:00.]

An item on the news this morning-apparently 'Saving Private Ryan' was due to be aired across several networks yesterday in the US but was pulled at the last minute as it was felt to be 'inapropriate' (presumably too violent). Please can someone explain what is going on in a society so wholeheartedly addicted to guns and military hardware?

Bruce

Your account above is innacurate based on what I heard on the radio today.

Some local affiliates of national network ABC chose not to air the film because the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), headed by Colin Powell's son Michael, has no clear standards on what it considers "indecent" and also refuses to provide advance warning of what it might consider "indecent" if aired*. So fearing the chance of a hefty fine some locals decided not to air it.

*The FCC refuses to provide advance warning as it doesn't want to be considered a "censoring body" and instead prefers to act on behalf of whining 12 MPG Cadillac SUV-driving soccer moms of good Christian choir boys from Oklahoma, who write/email/call the FCC following any airing of a nipple/leg above the knee/swear word/blood/killing/drug use/teens kissing/etc.

Eric

Thanks. Not sure that all makes it any better! Censorship comes in many forms.


Bruce

quote:

---

12 MPG Cadillac SUV-driving soccer moms of good Christian choir boys from Oklahoma, who write/email/call the FCC following any airing of a nipple/leg above the knee/swear word/blood/killing/drug use/teens kissing/etc.

---

.....and probably have the where withall to prevent their kids doing anything dangerous like fighting a war. (BTW I do not support/agree with the "war" in Iraq).

Howard

What hasn't changed is the flawed system that allows dictators and tyrants to exist beside the phony democracies. Where an ever smaller proportion of the population cannot be bothered to vote for the same self-seeking, corrupt individuals who offer themselves as our leaders.

The first war saw the end of forlock tugging to a titled élite. Automatic qualification for an officership proved a disaster. As did the blind resistance to change of the same conservative élite in the upper ranks of the British army. Seeing these fools first hand was enough for most ordinary people to question by what right they sent millions to their deaths. While their "betters" were safely feasting in their ivory towers out of danger. The men in the trenches were as de-humanised in the eyes of their "superior" officers as the German other-ranks were. Factory fodder had simply become cannon fodder.

It is said that self-praise is no recommendation.
Well, that rules out politicians for a start.

Would it really make any difference if we had estate agents as our politicians?

Nime

I do not have time to discuss fully, but there is a revision going on in historian circles about the conduct of the leadership of the Army in WW1. The war was fought in a time of unprecedented technological change - our Cavalry, for example, rode into battle at the start of the war on horseback: three years later we introduced Armoured Warfare with Tanks.

We went from a small standing Army to well over a million under arms. Tactics that had worked in Colonial wars where rapidly abandoned and new ones tried - and perfected.

Regardless of this digresion, I take the opportunity to recall the Kohima Epitath:

When you go home tell them of us and say
For your tommorrow we gave our today.

Regards

Mike

Spending money I don't have on things I don't need.

Mike is spot on. If you have the time or inclination try 'Mud, Blood and Poppycock'by Gordon Corrigan (now out in paperback I believe)or Tommy by Richard Holmes (you may have seen his war walks series on BBC2).

The whole Saving Private Ryan thing is a direct result of hard-headed people, money and Janet Jackson's nipple.
If Spielberg would allow them to censor the occasional "fuck" uttered by the soldiers in the movie (the use in the context of this movie was ruled by the FCC not to have anything to do with erect members and sexual intercourse) then it would have been fine. Apparently it would have been too damaging to his art to replace “fuck” with “heck” or something that is more commonly acceptable for prime time audiences of network TV. Yeah, right.
If the TV stations weren't afraid of the $100,000 + fines leveled on purveyors of JJ's nipple then they would have shown it.
It's easy enough to rent, we are not "owed" any showing of any movie by TV stations. They are simply in the business of making money, like other red-blooded capitalists. If they are going to get fined for showing a movie then they should do what their business sense tells them.
Our FCC standards are different here, hard to explain. At least they are being consistent in enforcing the rules.
As to observances of 11/11, it is a big deal here in Ohio. Boy Scouts wearing their uniforms to school, parades, the works.
David

It's sad how long established revered and respected War Memorials in the UK (wether it be village, town or city) being quietly removed (sometimes not so quietly) much to the consternation of locals, but not of New Town Steriotypical Shopping Mall Builders or Councils of both ilks ! Yes Proud Military British tradition has as much chance against Greed as everything else, namely Zilch²

Fritz Von Lookingforwardtoanautraluianamericanstyleukwhereeverytownisexactlythesame No Risk There

Pish: I like the Dutch idea of schoolkids looking after a particular War Grave for as year as part of their education !

quote:

---

Originally posted by mike lacey:
I do not have time to discuss fully, but there is a revision going on in historian circles about the conduct of the leadership of the Army in WW1. The war was fought in a time of unprecedented technological change - our Cavalry, for example, rode into battle at the start of the war on horseback: three years later we introduced Armoured Warfare with Tanks.

We went from a small standing Army to well over a million under arms. Tactics that had worked in Colonial wars where rapidly abandoned and new ones tried - and perfected.

Regardless of this digresion, I take the opportunity to recall the Kohima Epitath:

When you go home tell them of us and say
For your tommorrow we gave our today.

Regards

Mike

Spending money I don't have on things I don't need.

---

Mike, this is true. A lot of our perceptions about the Great War come from popular culture (Oh What a Lovely War, All Quiet On The Western Front even Blackadder Goes Forth) and literature - the work of the so-called war poets (Owen, Sassoon, Brooke, etc) has been extraordinarily influential in shaping perceptions of this particular conflict.

Much of the work going on in historical circles at the moment has indeed focused on the widening gap between tactics and practice, and technology - the latter was developing far, far quicker than the former, with disastrous results.

It was this gap, rather than the (in)competence of the leadership, which caused much of the stalemate and those awful wars of attrition. The Great War was quite simply a war that nobody knew how to fight effectively - because technological developments meant that no war like it had been fought before. (Tactics did not catch up with technology until the Spanish Civil War and Mussolini's Abyssinian campaigns nearly 20 years later, and of course were not perfected until Hitler's Blitzkreig against Poland in 1939 - apart from exceptional episodes such as Stalingrad, the Second World War was a fast, mobile war - in complete contrst to its predecessor).

The tactics and attitudes of the generals and officer classes seem extraordinary to us today (the cruelty of shooting shellshocked, frightened boys for dereliction, desertion and cowardice seems especially horrific) but in the context of the time was perfectly "normal". Heirachies were stronger thenn than they are now – in fact it was the universal suffering experienced in the Great War helped break those hierarchies and class distinctions down - a process that was completed during the Second World War.

The causes of the Great War are exceedingly complex (as anyone who's read Joll's classic book will attest). It's not just down to imperialism and toffs taking advantage of forelock-tugging proles in order to send them to their deaths in Flanders and at Ypres. There was genuine enthusiasm for the war among all classes, partly because Germany, in its immediate post-Bismarck pomp was seen - quite correctly - as a threat, both to peace in Europe generally and to Britain's prosperity.

Of course, fervour was whipped up by the popular press in all nations, with some extraordinarily crude but highly effective propaganda, but generally enthusiasm levels were high until the armies got bogged down and the body count mounted.

The war was in fact caused by a decade or more's worth of arms build-up throughout Europe, fear and suspicion of Germany, the terminal decay of the Hapsberg and Ottoman empires and a complex web of alliances which meant that nobody could be drawn into a conflict without everyone else following. Europe was a massive powder keg, Princip's assination of Franz Ferdinand (the Austrian Archduke, not the Scottish punk funk revivalists) merely the spark which set off tthe chain reaction. The war was, sadly, utterly inevitable.

It was this inevitability, coupled with the unspeakable slaughter, that created the isolationist, appeasing tendencies of the 1930s; which of course allowed Hitler, Mussolini and the Japanese to run riot through Ethiopia, Czechoslovakia and China. Rather understandable really, if unforgivable with hindsight.

What always strikes me most about Remembrance Sunday, and this is almost unbearably poignant, is the dwindling number of survivors, that frail band of very old men who lived through those extraordinary times.

Last year, I did some work at the National Archives on this subject for a magazine I was developing (the mag never came to fruition, only reaching dummy stage). At that time – March 2003 – there were 39 veterans left. As of today, there are 19 (there were 20 last week). The youngest is 104, the oldest 108. By 2007 I suspect there will none left, and then there will be no direct link with the past.
(In Germany, the situation is more acute – only one remains, and he's 107).

I remember briefly talking to one of these vets, and he told me - he could remember it clearly although it was nearly 90 years ago - he lost his three best mates in less than a minute when they were blown up in front of his face.

Fortuntely, historians like Max Arthur - his book Forgotten Voices Of The Great War is highly recommended, and one of the most moving books you'll ever read - have worked hard to preserve the testimony of these men (as, I believe, has the BBC).

For anyone interested, I recommend the BBC's magisterial series The Great War from 1964; it's available on DVD and contains testimony from many of the combatants; also for a flavour of the more "revisionist' Great War history, try Hew Strachan's book The First World War (also available on DVD - it was superb Channel 4 series); or Richard Holmes' Tommy, a wonderful history of the experience of the common soldier.

Kevin (BBC Radio 4)

Thanks Kevin - I'm a student of the Great War, and welcome any new resources to read/see. A particular interest of mine is the Middle East theatre, T.E. Lawrence, Kitchener, Allenby etc.
When I visited London last ('99) it was a great thrill to visit the Imperial War Museum and its' Great War exhibit.