Lest We Forget...
The march for Gaza, what the fallen were fighting for and how we honour their memory.
11/11/11 - Armistice Day
A day in which we remember those who put their lives on the line for their country. Those who fought in the hope that this would be the war to end all wars. But it didn’t. Those who have been to places like Ypres will know the unbearably tragic feeling of futility in the light of hindsight, the knowledge that the Great War was just the prelude to the even bigger carnage of WW2.
My experience at WW2 of visiting cemeteries like Ranville was terribly sad but nerve felt as tragic as Passchendaele, in that something of real worth was achieved. Nazism was defeated and those that died did not do so in vain.
We remember those two wars in particular because they were fought by mass, citizen armies who were required by the nation to fight. To motivate such armies in a democracy (as we were by WW2), requires a public who support the war effort and the necessary conscription. Those soldiers did their duty because they felt they were fighting for something worth risking their lives for. So what were they fighting for? Or rather, what did they believe they were fighting for? Those who responded to Kitchener’s call and fought on the Somme would not have done so if they had felt they were fighting for an empire that enriched the few and left the masses so under-nourished that the beginnings of a welfare state emerged to address the shocking physical state of those who enlisted. They fought because they believed they were fighting against barbarism, against ‘The Hun’ who did despicable things like killing innocent women and babies. The truth and propaganda aren’t the issue here. The fallen’s perception of what they were fighting for and against is key if we are to truly respect their sacrifice. They believed, as they marched off to war, that they were fighting for decency and civilisation against those who were barbaric enough to slaughter innocent civilians, including children.
In the light of this, are we showing them respect when some among us are trying to prevent a march by those who share the fallen’s aim of putting a stop to barbarism and the massacre of the innocents.
Similarly, WW2 was fought to defeat a highly militarised ethno-nationalist state which engaged in uncontrolled aggression, having been appeased by the likes of the British government, and, having been emboldened by the lack of a staying hand from other powers, showed no remorse in carrying out massacres of innocent civilians. It was fought to restore the rule of law, free speech, and democracy; to restore the right to oppose the actions of the state. This right had been removed in Nazi Germany, with the result that there was no check on its horrendous crimes. Civilised nations don’t carry out genocide, don’t massacre innocent civilians. This was a war the fallen believed it was worth fighting and giving their lives for. Read the messages on the gravestones at Ranville and your heart breaks. These were people who were loved as sons, fathers, brothers and lovers. The decency and humanity of those who loved them shines through in the epitaphs. These men died for decency. I felt some comfort as I was moved to tears, that they had not only fought and laid down their lives for decency, but they had won, at huge cost. The genocidal Nazi regime had been crushed and the civilised, decent society reflected by the gravestones had been restored. Does Suella Braverman really believe we honour their memory by stifling the very free speech they fought for? By preventing people speaking out for an end to the barbarous murder of children? What does she think they were fighting for?
Rishi Sunak too has made a series of disgraceful interventions, helping to whip up tension by calling Saturday's march disrespectful, effectively sending a signal to the likes of the EDL to indulge in public disorder. Right wing media like GB news have piled in, virtually begging thugs to come out onto the streets and violently attack a march for peace on Armistice day. It is despicable to egg on fascist style street thugs to intimidate those marching to end violence.
Even more disturbing, in response to Met chief Mark Rowley doing his job in ensuring the public’s right to freedom of speech and association, Sunak has attempted to intimidate him by saying he will be holding him accountable for any trouble which occurs. Trouble which his government has done all it can to foment, what with Braverman slurring up to a million protestors with the tag of hate marchers when all they are doing is what you would expect in a sane democracy, calling out their government on its failure to back a ceasefire, just as they sabotaged peace talks in Ukraine. Calling the marchers terrorist supporters. During the biggest march so far, involving tens of thousands of marchers, there were 5 attests and one of those was of a man who threw a beer can at a protester. Credit to the UK column, one of the few media broadcasts that actually went to talk to the protesters. They found that the marchers simply want the killing to stop. Terrorists don't call for peace Suella, they use extreme violence to intimidate their targets into compliance; kind of like what Israel is doing currently.
The March itself is not taking place on Remembrance Sunday, it is taking place on Armistice day, a day like any other apart from a silence at 11am. The march starts almost two hours later. For all the talk about the cenotaph, the march isn’t even passing it. On that point, why would people marching to end a genocide desecrate a memorial those who fought to defeat a genocidal regime? It’s typical culture wars hate baiting nonsense.
It is shocking that this government is trying to use the police as an arm of the state to silence its critics. There are statesmen in the UN and an increasing number of countries who are openly calling out Israel for war crimes and this government is complicit. Is this what those we remember fought and died for?
Most chillingly, this is a government that could use the Covert Human Intelligence Sources Act to initiate trouble, giving Sunak the pretext to exert still further control over our supposedly independent police. Don’t expect anybody to whistle blow if state agents provoke trouble, not since the state got away with sending Julian Assange to rot in Belmarsh (as ever, aided and abetted by their most loyal opposition leader Kier Starmer). The fact that the media and the opposition have allowed this government to underline the rule of law and the rights and freedoms of a democracy is terrifying. Starmer’s main concern is not expressing opposition to government policy over Gaza in line with the wishes of the public (a recent Yougov poll showed 76% of the UK population want a ceasefire), but rather to slavishly follow the US line.
It is disrespectful to those who fought for our independence, freedom and democracy in the two world wars than such disregard for a British public that shows higher ethical standards than those who claim to represent them?
I find it utterly despicable that there are elements both in government and the media who are trying to stifle a plea to end the genocide in Gaza by stoking divisons and igniting culture wars in society. They are using not very subtle dog whistle tactics to encourage unthinking elements like the EDL to attack the march. Encouraging racially motivated violence on Armistice Day. How obscene is that? The EDL can perhaps be forgiven for their ignorance, they don’t know any better and are easily manipulated by faux patriots but the manipulators themselves should be ashamed. The effete, dead eyed Islamophobe Douglas Murray took a break for pontificating about poetry to encourage mobs to use force to stifle legitimate expression and objection to genocide. Nigel Farage went beyond the dog whistle, making a blatantly racist pitch via spurious links to immigration (spoiler alert, he’s not referring to Ukrainians here); reference to those with whom there is ‘ no shared history or culture’.
How’s this for shared history Nigel. One in five of the merchant navy in WW1 were Muslim Lascars. The people who kept us in the fight when U boats crewed by men who shared our European Christian culture threatened to starve us into submission.
https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/blog/library-archive/lascars-british-merchant-shipping
How about all those Muslim names on the Menin Gate like Bahadur Khan, who shared in the fate of all those others who gave their lives to fight for Britain? https://www.everyoneremembered.org/profiles/soldier/1604714/
Or what about Shahamad Khan, who won the VC fighting for Britain in Mesopotamia?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahamad_Khan
5.5 million Muslms fought on the allied side in WW2, 1.5 million were killed in action.
1 million muslims served in the British army in WW2 and they were not conscripted, they volunteered to fight for Britain. 47 thousand muslims died fighting for Britain in WW1. These are the people we remember on Armistice day, so there is nothing patriotic in trying to ignite racial hatred on this day.
https://mcb.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/RememberingtheBrave_MCB.pdf
I could go on about shared history. If one goes to the Commonwealth war grave in Ramla you would find the names of Clifford Martin and Mervin Paice.
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/22750633/mervyn-harold-paice
These men shared the historical experience with the Palestinians of being murdered in cold blood by the Irgun.
I suppose the question is what is the purpose of remembrance. Lest we forget what? I have always believed we are remembering and honouring those who died defending morality, decency and humanity. They fought for civilisation. To quote Arnold Toynbee
“Militarism…has been by far the commonest cause of the breakdown of civilisation during the last four or five millenia.”
We remember them because they fought against the militarised barbarism of the likes of the Nazis.They fought for free societies and a moral civilisation founded on decency and regard for fellow human beings. Those on the streets this Saturday calling for an end to genocide honour their memory more than the Suella Bravermans, Douglas Murrays and Nigel Farages of this world.
This spirit of remembrance is evocatively called forth by Elgar’s profoundly moving Nimrod. Listen to it and tell me that the people who gave their lives for decency would want us to stay silent as children are murdered in their thousands. You can’t. They fought for something better than this.
Very well said. It just goes to show the powerful, overly-dominating effect that greed for power and profits have over such politicians......such that they're willing to either justify or ignore such brutality and treatment of innocent people, as seen is current conflicts and wars raging today.
Not to mention armistice means ceasefire...