Did ya ever notice . . .

Did ya ever notice that

 . . . the windiest night of the week is the one when you have to put out your garbage?

 . . . if there are two or more people in a car, it’s always the driver who’s talking on the cellphone?

. . . the only ones who don’t complain about police brutality are the police?

. . . at least one of the women who has accused Jian Ghomeshi of attacking her went out with him at least one more time? (This is not an endorsement of harassment or violence against women)

. . . everyone’s computer seems to getting hacked these days?  Why isn’t someone hacking the hackers?

. . . if you are wearing track pants or other garments held up with a cord, the only time you get a knot in them is when you really, really have to go to the bathroom?

. . . giving a man a condom in his hotel room somehow does not imply consent? (See disclaimer above)

. . .  beer, wine and whiskey (whisky) left in the glass for several minutes tastes much smoother?

. . . just when you hear lovely music and see an incredibly beautiful woman, your wife nudges you and tells it’s time to wake up?

. . . at our (my?) age, you forget half the things you were going to write in this blog?

. . . everyone thinks they have some interesting trivia to pass along?

So in the spirit of the season, here’s some Christmas trivia:

 - the carol Stille Nacht (Silent Night) was composed and first played on a guitar for a Christmas Eve celebration.  The church organ had broken down.

 - the first song heard during the Christmas truce in the trenches in December 1914 was “Annie Laurie”, sung by a German soldier in perfect English. 

 - Officers on both the British and German sides tried to stop the impromptu truce, but the men wouldn’t listen.  

 - There was no such truce on the French front.

On that note, I’ll wish you all a Happy Holiday.  I’m going to spend a little more of my effort for a while on a new book.

Why We Remember

I have just finished reading a book entitled “Somme” by Lyn Macdonald. The book was written in 1983, so it is probably not readily available.  It is the result and advantage of haunting used book stores over the years. It tells the story of the battle of the same name in 1916.  It does not dwell much about the grand strategy of the battle, nor does it glorify the generals who planned and led it.  In fact it is only kind to a very few senior officers, most of them Colonels and Brigadier who showed some compassion for the men.  Instead it tells the story mainly through the eyes of the soldiers . . . and sailors, for a Royal Naval Division took part in the battle. In fact, although the whole episode comprised several battles, they have all been lumped under the same name, the Somme.

It was the “Big Push”, the battle that was to relieve the pressure on the French who were fighting for their lives at Verdun.  It was also supposed to be the big breakthrough, the battle to break the German line and open up the front for rolling up the German Army lines. In fact, a British Cavalry Corps rested behind the line waiting to exploit the breakthrough.  When the battle was petering out in late October, the Cavalry returned once more to their winter quarters, never used.

It was almost exclusively a British battle, although some “colonial” units did take part, namely from New Zealand, Australia and Newfoundland, then a British colony.  Even today, Newfoundlanders mourn the day when over 700 men of their regiment attacked Beaumont Hamel, and less than 100 survived.  It was a long, bloody fight and it took an awful toll on the men who fought in it, on both sides.  It began on July 1^st, 1916 when 150,000 British troops when “over the top” in what everyone thought was a well-planned attack.  The day ended with 57,000 British casualties, over one third of them dead.  The carnage continued for over four months with attack after attack.  The total ground gained was about five miles deep and eight miles wide, hardly a breakthrough.  The battle petered out on 21 November when the last fifteen members of a company of ninety young men from Paisley, Scotland (where my Mother lived before she was dislocated by the 2^nd World War), who had been trapped behind the German line for a week, finally surrendered.  

I have previously read a book about the French battle at Verdun, resulting from an attack initiated by the Germans, which resulted in over a quarter million casualties.  Or how about the Gallipoli campaign that caused almost one hundred thousand deaths among the allied troops who weren’t able to advance a yard from their initial trenches.

It is hard to quote such numbers and even harder to understand them so is it any wonder that most of the belligerent countries chose to initiate a Remembrance Day on the anniversary of the end of that war.  There had been small ceremonies to remember previous battles, usually by old soldiers and localized in nature.  But it took that one great war (I cannot bring myself to capitalize those words) to give us pause enough to declare a national day of remembrance in several countries. 

Should the day be a national holiday?  If we really are serious about remembering those who gave their lives in all the wars of the 20^th Century, which we now do, and even the most recent wars of this century, then yes it should be so designated.  But if we really do want to make it important to all ages, it should come with the proviso that all work activities stop for the day, including schools, all shops (including “special tourist shopping” exemptions), and all but essential services.  In addition, we must make sure that there are programs for all ages to ensure the special nature of the day.  We must differentiate our programs by honouring of the warriors, but not glorifying war.  We must ensure that people understand the terrible toll that war takes on individuals and on societies.  War is hell, let’s not forget that.

The Islamic State Part 2

So, we’re going to war against the Islamic State.  I apologize for my misgivings in the last blog. 

There has been a lot of criticism about how to address this threat.  Humanitarian aid, which many propose, only addresses the needs of the refugees and dispossessed, but does nothing to ease the threat.  The most ridiculous suggestion I have heard is to seek a diplomatic solution.  Diplomacy means negotiation, but who are we to negotiate with?  The IS has no government that we know of.  It is not a country.  What are we going to negotiate with?  Are we going to give up land and if so, whose land?  What is our bargaining chip?

People blasted Justin Trudeau for his “crude” remarks about the Mideast mission, but he was essentially right in his sentiment.  We do tend to “whip out” our CF-18s every time there is a crisis, be it Libya, Ukraine and now the Middle East.  But that is also what a lot of other countries are doing as well.  The U.S. was the first, but they have been joined the U.K. and France.  Our pilots may have to be careful; there may be a traffic jam over northern Iraq.  Other countries are sending transport aircraft and humanitarian aid.  And then there are countries sending AK-47s and millions of rounds of ammunition, plus anti-tank rounds and mines – but only to the Kurds.  Soon the Kurdish forces will be the best armed in the whole region.  We better hope that they stay friendly.  It does make some sense the Kurds since their peshmerga fighters have been the bearing the main load in battling the IS.  It is as if the world is saying, “We’ll fly around safely above you, but you Kurds must do the real fighting.”

The Kurds cannot do it alone.  Their main objective is to save themselves from further incursions and defend the land they have.  They certainly deserve credit for the fighting they have been doing, but if they move into Syria or Iraq to seek out the IS, they will likely meet a great deal of opposition from those two countries.  After all, their governments have never been particularly friendly to the Kurds.  But to defeat the IS, there will need to be boots on the ground, as I mentioned before.  You will never defeat a force like them from the air or with resolutions and speeches.  They are capable of rapid movement and concentration so any but local intelligence is probably too late to react.  They must be met with a similarly rapidly moving force with better fire power.  This requires trained ground troops, not partially trained militias.  The question is, where will these ground troops come from?  At this point no country has offered such troops.  Nobody wants to get bogged down in such a war.  

The United States is hoping that some of the Middle Eastern countries will offer to do this, but they have their own problems.  The IS is a Sunni movement, so countries with a large population of Sunnis could have trouble guaranteeing that all their troops would remain loyal, which probably rules out Iraq and Syria.  Both of these countries, moreover, have their own internal problems.  Jordan?  Possibly, but only if their country is directly threatened and then only with US or other help.  Iran?  Possibly, but they would be uncomfortable being seen as supporting the U.S.  Turkey?  Certainly they have the military strength to do the job, but may not be keen to support the Kurds who they have had problems with for a long time.  Turkey has said that they will help, and they have been bearing the brunt of refugees from the Syrian civil war (civil war - now there’s an oxymoron if I ever heard one), and now the Kurds.  It is questionable if Turkey would commit large numbers of ground troops, particularly since they could be accused of “invading” Syria or Iraq if they crossed the border of either country (To do the job properly they would have to operate in both countries).  It would also make Turkey a target for extremists.  

Unless one or more western countries are prepared to take on the ground task, we will probably just keep bombing isolated places in Iraq and Syria hoping to kill some IS fighters and inevitably killing some civilians as well.

The Mid-East Threat

It has been a rough month around home, but I have managed to keep up on world events.  Here are some thoughts on one of the trouble spots we see in the news every day.

In the Middle East, we have the emergence of the Islamic State (IS, ISIL, ISIS) of extremist fighters, a group of Sunni fighters who claim to want to return to the seventh century using AK-47s and Twitter.  Every western country has condemned them but none of them actually want to fight them.  The west claims that the IS is a threat to them, but there is no proof of that yet.  The other question being asked is why are some young men from western countries being radicalized and going to Syria and Iraq to fight.  We’ll return to that question later.  The IS rampage is undoubtedly another example of a group seeking power by using religion as a motivator for the masses.  The word “jihad” sparks all kinds of emotions in people.  But it is just another example of militarism.

As for why young men from western countries become “radicalized” and join such movements, the answer may be simpler that we think.  We in the west have created societies that are overwhelmed with safety and security.  This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it can produce some unexpected results.  Young men who grow up in a society that does not allow them to “test their mettle” may become determined to do just that.  They have an urge for adventure and danger.  All ancient societies had some sort of test of manhood.  Not so today in modern societies.  But the human spirit does not stray very far from its roots, particularly when they are told that it is “manly” or “macho” to seek adventure.  Many find the release in sports and indeed the growth of so-called extreme sports would give this some credence.  But some want more.  As Barbara Tuchman said in her book August 1914 about the beginnings of World War I, “and in the opinion of one observer the welcoming attitude toward war owed something to the ‘unconscious boredom of peace.’”

Our Canadian government has spoken out loudly on the IS, condemning them at every opportunity.  The problem here is that they have paid no attention to Theodore Roosevelt’s admonition, “Talk softly and carry a big stick.”  Instead they seem to believe that they should speak loudly but carry no stick at all.  “We’ll just holler here in the background in hopes that someone else with do something.”  This is not the way to carry on foreign policy.  

Although I abhor the idea of war, the unfortunate truth is that the only way to defeat the IS is with boots and weapons on the ground, lots of boots and lots of weapons.  It is estimated that there are now more than 30,000 IS fighters in Syria and Iraq.  They are fluid and mean.  To come to grips with them may require at least 100,000 trained troops.  The Kurdish fighters have shown that the IS is not invincible.  We need to support the Kurds and add to their numbers by surrounding the IS locations.  Talking loudly will not do it.

Whither the Great War

There is a lot of talk, events and even celebrations these days about the Great War – World War 1.  Although why people would want to remember the beginning of a war I have no idea.  But I have been doing a lot of reading about that war over the years including my current reading of Margaret MacMillan’s excellent work, The War that Ended Peace, about the origins of that war.  In some ways this book shows that some things have changed in the intervening one hundred years.  Unfortunately, it also shows that some things tragically have not.  In many countries, nationalism and its companion militarism are alive and well.  Ethnic differences are causing many problems around the world.  Arms races continue with the result that some people seem to think that these new and improved weapons should actually be used.  And despite all of things that we think have changed in the world, human nature stays stubbornly the same. Mazlov’s hierarchy of needs is still relevant. 

Inevitably, there are the critiques, second guessing and what-ifs about the war.  There are those who say that Europe didn’t have to go to war, but they weren’t there.  There are those that say the war should have been fought differently, but they weren’t there.  One of the most ridiculous arguments I have seen recently was from the Canadian writer and historian, Gwyn Dyer.  In an excerpt from his new book that was printed in the Globe and Mail on Saturday, August 9^th, he postulated that it would have been much better if Germany had won the war.  His argument was that Germany would have imposed a much less harsh peace treaty on the losers than the Treaty of Versailles imposed by Britain and France.  This would have led to peace and harmony throughout Europe and prevented the Second World War.  This assertion has no supporting evidence whatsoever.  Germany was a militaristic power and the militarists, who by winning the war would have enhanced their power, would have insisted on sanctions, reparations and other punishments against at least France and probably Britain and Russia.  Germany’s biggest problem would then have been Russia, as it has been through much of Prussian and German history.  Although the ongoing Russian Revolution may have rendered Russia weak in the short term, it would have eventually become strong enough to challenge Germany.  France and Britain could well have joined Russia in retribution for the treaty forced upon them at the end of the Great War.  Hence, we would have had World War 2 in Europe.  

And let’s not forget about the growing enmity between Japan and the US. Although Japan was ostensibly an ally to France and Britain in World War 1, its growing demand for hegemony in Asia, particularly China, was already causing problems for the US who saw themselves as a benevolent protector of China.  The strains that eventually led to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the US entry into World War 2 would still have been there, and the result would, no doubt, be the same.

Mr. Dyer makes the mistake, common among some historians and critics, of thinking like a 21^st Century person rather than a later 19^th Century person, which is what the decision makers of the day were.  The truth was that people in Europe were conditioned to accept war and many were looking forward to it.  There had been several crises in the years between 1900 and 1913, and most people expected that one more spark would lead to war.  War came as no surprise in 1914.  We, who have seen the effects of 20^th century warfare, do not generally want more war, but that was not the case in 1914.  What did surprise the world was the length and intensity of the Great War.  All of the military planners had expected and planned for a short, sharp war with a decisive battle deciding it all.  This is, after all, what had happened in 1870 in the Franco-Prussian War, the last war of any consequence in Europe.  The carnage of World War 1 came as a complete surprise to almost everyone.  It was this unexpected level of destruction that made the war so terrible and memorable.  Nobody expected the war to last that long.  Nobody expected it to be that destructive.  If Germany had defeated France in the two months they expected the war to last, it would have been a war that was expected, and it would probably encouraged other wars in Europe over the rest of the century until one of them became so destructive that it would have become the memorable war – the War to end all Wars.

Any current analyst of the Great War inevitably must see it through the prism of the death and destruction that was that war, just as even the men who dictated the Versailles Treaty had to look at the war.  It coloured our entire outlook of the 20^th century, and even led to conditions that are still causing world problems, the Middle East being one good example.  We cannot escape history, but we also cannot live it from the future.  In the future as in the past, old men will declare wars; but it will be young men, and now women, who will die in them.