Those who died

The world has shrunk, if we talk simply about distance, but it has seemed to widen the gulf between peoples.

Whether the Americans should be in Iraq or we Canadians in Afghanistan is a topic for another day, but the day we are concerned with now is Saturday when across this nation people will gather to honour our war dead.

The cenotaphs in Canada’s small towns were installed in memory of the two major wars of the past century. On some, plaques were added, sometimes begrudgingly, for those who died in Korea, a war that was euphemistically called a police action. There has yet to be public recognition for those Canadians who died in Vietnam; the war was seen as an American embarrassment and we’ve managed to forget any sacrifices by Canadians.

Lest we forget. Isn’t that the admonition, the plea, of a First World War surgeon and poet?

The Canadian participation in Afghanistan, reluctantly entered into by the Canadian government to appease Washington’s calls for a Coalition of the Willing, has created a growing casualty list of our soldiers, serving in forces that have had to alter their world role of peacekeepers. The Canadian presence in that violent, misunderstood corner of the world is controversial at home, but the troops fighting there are our sons and daughters and as eager as any soldier anywhere—in any war—to live full, rewarding lives. Afghanistan has already claimed too many of their lives and left others shattered in body and mind.

When we wear poppies this week and observe two minutes of silence at 11 o’clock Saturday morning, Nov. 11, it would be well to remember that this country has often asked its armed forces to go in harm’s way, even as ‘peacekeepers’, and that many paid dearly. In a world that is still too big and divided, our soldiers, sailors and aviators have been dying far from home to help this country and sometimes to protect the values we share.

Lest we forget.