Remembrance Today

Poppies, Grief and Heroism

Ted Harrison

• Publisher: Reaktion Books
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781780230528
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Storia mondiale

Each November, Americans celebrate Veterans Day, a holiday that honors our armed services and that marks the anniversary of the signing of the armistice that ended World War I. Veterans Day roughly coincides with Remembrance Day in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom, where millions of people wear poppies—a flower that bloomed across the battlefields of Flanders and became emblematic of the war—and observe a period of silence at war memorials. For many countries around the world, this day is meant to thank those who give their lives to defend liberty and freedom, but as Ted Harrison reveals in Remembrance Today, the day and the poppies people wear were originally meant as a dedication to the intention that war must never happen again. Raising questions that are too often ignored, Harrison explores what it means to be heroic and what glory means in the context of military service. Most important, he asks what the purpose of Remembrance is outside honoring the fallen and comforting those who mourn their loss. He contends that if the prime function of holidays like Remembrance Day and Veterans Day is not to serve as a warning against war and a reminder to pursue peaceful solutions, then these days are futile. An examination of how our ideas of heroism, duty, and grief have lost their way, Remembrance Today is a powerful argument to focus again on the meaning behind this poignant holiday.

1

THE MISTS AND MYTHS OF WAR

THERE ARE THREE WORDS CARVED ON THE CENOTAPH IN Whitehall: ‘The Glorious Dead’. Yet the more I heard about the wars my parents and grandparents had known, the more I realized that those who lost their lives had had their futures and potential denied. So many talented young men were killed in their prime: great writers, artists, physicians, scientists, mystics, craftsmen never fulfilled. What was glorious about that? The dead were missed, mourned, grieved over, regretted, but how did they lie gloriously in their graves? And what if young men of the future had their heads filled with the idea that glory, status and meaning could be attained through fighting? Might it encourage a new generation to go to war to earn a share of that glory for themselves?

Many young men in the past have certainly been lured into military service in this way. Richard Holmes, in his book Soldiers, wrote that ‘we must never underestimate the appeal of uniform, ritual and reputation, especially to the young’.⁶

Linking glory with military action is found in cultures around the world. Sometimes both sides in a conflict, dedicated to the defeat of each other, talk of glory being theirs.

There is a sad passage in the report ‘Voices of Girl Child Soldiers, Sri Lanka’, produced by the Quaker United Nations Office:

The ultimate achievement was to be honored at a ‘Hero’s Welcome.’ A hero’s welcome was a special honor granted to those who risked and/or sacrificed their life in battle by killing and destroying the enemy. The supreme hero’s welcome was celebrated and took place after the girl’s death. If by some chance the girl was not killed in battle and had escaped capture and had not swallowed the cyanide capsule her ‘Hero’s Welcome’ might include a visit from some member of her family. When someone goes out for a Hero’s death, they are honored. I feel sorry for them. Many die and never come back. Some have come back after performing dangerous missions. They are then promoted and become respected.

To talk of the dead of war as glorious is surely to belittle the word. Glory is what is due to God, say Christians: ‘Glory be to God on high and on earth peace to all men’ was the Christmas message of the angels. To glorify is to offer the highest praise and honour. Is every victim of a war glorious? The brave and the cowardly, the tender and the cruel, the caring and the indifferent, can they all be described as deserving of glory? To endorse the idea at Remembrance-tide that death in war is always glorious is to peddle a dangerous lie.

Speaking recently to a young man in his late teens who is actively considering a career in the Army, I asked him what attracted him to the service life. He talked of comradeship and of the pride, and perhaps the glory, of wearing a uniform. He enjoyed the idea of a physical challenge, of pushing his body to its limits. Unlike me at his age, he appreciated discipline and organization. He was uplifted and stirred by military music and ritual.

Had he, I asked him, thought about how he would feel seeing a close friend killed? Or what if he were permanently injured himself? Had he contemplated having to kill another man face to face? Could he live with himself if he ever accidentally killed a child in the course of duty? And how would he feel if, in the heat of the moment or under pressure from his peers, he overstepped the boundaries of acceptable moral behaviour? These possibilities he put to one side, despite being aware of them.

Andy Fowler was seven years old when he watched the Festival of Remembrance on television. He described his memories of the evening in an article he wrote many years later after serving for 22 years in the British Army.

We had the community singing, and then the service with the Bishop of Coventry, auntie telling me that he had been a POW of the Japanese in the Second World War.

Then the poppies fell, dropping onto the heads and shoulders of the young servicemen and women. I was amazed by how many poppies there were and how long it seemed to take, and I was immensely moved. And I believe that something of the soldier entered my boyish soul that evening, one of the reasons why n years later I found myself in uniform.⁷

Did those who adopted the poppy as a symbol of peace, grief and remembrance at the end of what they sincerely hoped would be the war to end all wars ever think that the poppy would one day encourage a young man to join up?

Herein lies the confusion and contradiction of Remembrance-tide. There are occasions when wars can be justified. Unless one takes a consistent stand as a pacifist, a view I can respect but not accept, it is generally agreed that nations have the right to defend themselves by armed force in extremis, should their citizens and/or territory be threatened. Therefore armed forces need to be trained for this eventuality. They need to be at their peak physically, technically and psychologically to go to war to defend by force that which may justifiably be defended by force. To be prepared psychologically, the morale of individual combatants must be kept high. A proven and effective way of achieving this is through generating, in servicemen and -women, a pride in their professionalism. If they are to be effective in resisting evil, in defeating another tyrant like Hitler, should the circumstances arise, no one can be allowed to question orders or harbour doubt. Solemn militarized rituals, such as those associated with Remembrance-tide, contribute towards this state of mental preparedness. Concepts such as glory can motivate trained soldiers. Self-sacrifice in a righteous and just cause, they are told, is honourable and, possibly, glorious.

At Britain’s festival of Remembrance in the Royal Albert Hall, a child comes forward to say ‘thank you from children to those who gave their lives so that we can live and be free’. The same idea was expressed in more formal terms by President George W Bush in 2001. Referring to American war veterans, he said:

many of them willingly entered harm’s way to fight for our freedoms . . . Our Nation will always be grateful for the noble sacrifices made by these veterans. We can never adequately repay them. But we can honor and respect them for their service. As we consider the sacrifices and efforts of our veterans, we must never forget that freedom comes at a cost. Our veterans have much to share with our young people about liberty, patriotism, democracy, and independence. They are living examples of the timeless truth that freedom is not free.⁸

Both the words of the child and those of the president, while superficially plausible, express a dangerous half-truth. Not all wars are fought to defend freedom. Sadly many nations, including those of the ‘free’ West, also go to war without adequate justification or for economic self-interest. The same troops that are ready and waiting to defend right against might may themselves be ordered by political leaders to take offensive action. The fact that they are ready, prepared and trained to defend means that they are also capable of going on the attack. That sense of pride and glory that galvanizes a fighting force to defend its country also prepares the same men to go on the offensive, if ordered to do so by politicians. There comes a point too in the life of many professional soldiers at which, after months of training, they yearn to see action to prove themselves. There is a sense of eagerness to see some ‘real action’. Regrettably too, in the atmosphere of war moral boundaries are crossed and troops from civilized and free countries commit atrocities.

There can be little doubt that the Second World War, when viewed from a British perspective, was a sad necessity. Force was the only option available to counter the ambitions and abhorrent ideology of Nazi Germany. Yet the Second World War presents a more ambivalent set of moral choices when viewed from the perspective of the Soviet Union. There Nazism confronted Communism and the armies of the two tyrants, Hitler and Stalin, fought a bitter and costly war. And it was on the Eastern Front, it is suggested by some historians, that the outcome of the war was ultimately decided.

It can be reasonably argued that through recognizing the noble sacrifice of those who died defending their country against the territorial ambitions of an evil dictator, a new generation might feel inspired to make a similar sacrifice should the need, God forbid, ever arise again. That is a lesson commonly drawn from the history of the Second World War.

But the First World War presents a far more confusing set of moral choices to historians. Furthermore, the conflicts that Britain and the other Allies have been involved in since 1945 present several troubling moral issues. These more recent wars and engagements range from the morally permissible through to the downright illegal. In affording equal honour to all combatants, in every theatre of war, does one encourage and glorify military service irrespective of context?

This hymn, always associated in Britain with Remembrance Day church worship, was written by one-time Conservative politician Sir John Stanhope Arkwright and published shortly after the First World War:

O valiant hearts who to your glory came
Through dust of conflict and through battle flame;
Tranquil you lie, your knightly virtue proved,
Your memory hallowed in the land you loved.

The hymn continues, speaking of those who served as giving all they had and all they hoped for. Saving mankind was in their mind, not saving themselves.

The hymn was written in the aftermath of what future generations have come to view as a pointless bloodbath of unprecedented horror and futility. Yet the words elevate each one of the millions of victims in status. Each one is transformed from a decaying corpse buried in a foreign field to a martyr inspired by the supreme sacrifice of Christ, who died, Christians believe, to save the sins of the world. Each dead soldier may now lie in the dark, still earth awaiting the last trumpet of Judgment Day, but they can be eternally reassured that ‘Christ, our Redeemer, passed the self same way’.

Still stands His Cross from that dread hour to this . . .
Look down to bless our lesser Calvaries.

This hymn describes none of the horrors of war. It does nothing to balance and explore the moral dilemmas involved in resorting to armed force. Instead it makes reference in the line ‘tranquil you lie, your knightly virtue proved’ to the medieval concepts of chivalry when war was fought with the idea of ‘gentlemanly rules’. Indeed, some might argue that if it is a sad fact of the human condition that young men go to war, then this hymn sanctifies one of the human race’s basest instincts. If viewed that way, it is a gross distortion of the Christian message.

And yet, take the words away from the context of the First World War and apply them to the Second World War, and in particular apply them to a man who goes to war reluctantly, with a heavy heart, determined to use only the minimum force necessary, and is killed performing his duties courageously in a righteous cause – might the words of the hymn in this context be justifiable? Is his death a lesser Calvary?

A poem more in tune with the twenty-first century might be this one, ‘What Need I the Waving Flags’ by the contemporary poet Bill Mitton:

I watch these old men march
bereted and badged
as I was in years long gone.
Though I understand
and will honour their need.
I will never join them.
I need no marching or medals
to do honour to comrades dead
the metal would lie heavy
upon my aging chest.
I find no honour in gravestones
the faces in my memory
are still happy and young
I would rather they were here
growing old, honoured by
their children’s children.
I need no military band.
I keep alive within my soul
the music of my comrades’ songs
They are my morning reveille
and my twilights taps
What need I the waving flags
of these patronising politicians,
and hindsight’s patriots
when these self same,
cloaked in self interest,
barter and sell the peace
hard bought by young lives,
whilst their casual neglect
of our injured and our widows
do such dishonour to our dead.
What right have I of medals
For I am here, aging still.
I hold in trust the memories of
such youthful, selfless, sacrifice
their smiles will haunt me ever.
For as our young soldiers still do.
I have, in scaring grief, carried home,
brave men upon their shields.

The aim of this book is to explore the meaning behind the solemn national acts of commemoration we perform. It is to ask why we perform those rituals and for whose benefit. Is it to help relatives come to terms with their grief? Is it to give meaning to the deaths of those killed, or to seek it? Is it to remind ourselves that wars should never be embarked upon lightly? Is it to glorify the ideals of militarism? Are we participating in an act of public thanksgiving? Are we acting from ancient, almost primeval tribal instinct? Has Remembrance become one of the few remaining expressions of national identity in an increasingly global culture?

In addition to asking those questions, similar issues will be raised from the opposite direction. Might the pomp and ceremony of Remembrance encourage young people to sign up for service life for the wrong reasons? What message do politicians take from Remembrance? Does it encourage them to commit troops in their charge to action, rather than deter them? Does the fact that nations continue to go to war suggest that remembrance has failed?

From the answers to these and other relevant questions, new ways of remembering the war dead might emerge. Rituals of remembrance might suggest themselves that, while showing no disrespect to the dead of the world wars, focus more on the future, their primary purpose being to serve as a reminder that wars, far from being anything glorious, are the consequence of human failure and weakness.

Millions of people every November take a poppy from a Royal British Legion representative and place a donation in the collecting tin. The poppy is pinned to an outer garment for a few days and then discarded after Remembrance Sunday. It is one of the familiar rituals of the British year. But how many people consider the true meaning of the gesture and note how the symbolism of the poppy has changed, in several subtle yet complex ways, over the years? Wearing a poppy today is not what it was 30, 60 or 90 years ago. Sales of poppies have never been higher, but this cannot be taken as evidence that Remembrance itself is in a healthy state. There are even early signs that it could soon become a divisive issue, revealing a political fault line in British society. It is time to take stock and consider changes to the practice of Remembrance before honouring the war dead becomes damaged by controversy and division.

2

LEST WE FORGET

AT THE CENTRE OF REMEMBRANCE IN BRITAIN IS A CEREMONY that takes place in London every year, on the Sunday nearest to n November. The ritual that unfolds feels timeless, although it is less than a century old. The normally busy thoroughfare of Whitehall, the wide street of government buil...