20th century, a century of war
George Anthony remembers the victims of a profitable business
It is either morbidity or subdued anger, but the slaughter of the First World
War, with its 350 miles of trenches, from the Belgian coast to the Swiss
border, has always had a fascination for me. Early on, the reading of "Lions
led by Donkeys", "In Flanders fields", "Goodbye to all that", "First day of
the Somme", seeing the play and then the film, "Oh, what a lovely war",
visiting the Imperial war museum, and the first four lines of the Wilfred
Owen poem, "Anthem for Doomed Youth",
"What passing-bells for
these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles` rapid rattle,
Can patter out their hasty orisons",
has fed this fascination for years. And the Cenotaph in Whitehall with the
Armistice commemoration there; for the establishment to shed crocodile tears,
every November 11th, has kept it in my mind and everybody else's since that
war ended 82 years ago.
I suppose it was the sheer size and apparent senselessness of it that is so
overwhelming, even though it was so long ago. Perhaps that's why it is still
referred to as the Great War. A.J.P. Taylor, in one of his BBC television
lectures, described it as war of attrition, saying, "That providing the
French and British lost three and the Germans lost two, the Allies would
win." No bows and arrows here, as at Crecy, Agincourt, and the Little Big
Horn. No Waterloo, engaging a mere 140,000 professional soldiery, for only
one day, leaving 62,000 dead. But a monstrous engagement, killing millions in
no time at all.
There have been war's since of course, indeed the 20th century's main feature
has been war on a frequent and huge scale, fought with ever increasing
inhumanity with ever increasingly sophisticated weapons.
Beginning the century with the Boer War, followed by the Russo/Japanese war,
the Gulf war, the French Indo-China war, the Russian Civil war, the 14
countries war of intervention against the Soviet Union, the Spanish Civil
war, the Mexican civil war, the Spanish-American Cuba war, the Liberia civil
war, the Yemeni war, the Guatemalan war, the Nicaraguan war, the El
Salvadoran war, the British Malayan war, the Kenya Mau Mau war, the Vietnam
war, the Six Day Israeli/Egypt war, the Nagorno/Karabakh war, the
Bougainville/Papua New Guinea war, the Burma civil war, the Khmer
Rouge/Cambodia war, the Angola/Unita war, the Nigerian/Biafra war, the
N.A.T.O. bombing of Serbia, the Afghanistan wars, the Falklands war, the
Sudan war, the Ethiopia/Eritrea war, the Japanese invasion of Manchuria, the
Chinese Red Army/Kuomintang war, the Sino India war, the Rwanda/Burundi civil
war, the East Timor war of liberation, the Georgian civil war, the Guinea
Bissau civil war, the Israel attack on South Lebanon, the Kashmir war of
liberation, the Kosovo civil war, the Iran/Iraq war, the Chechnya civil war,
the Tajikistan civil war, the Turkish war against the Kurds, the Uganda civil
war, the Moluccas war of liberation, the Comoros civil war, the Turkish
invasion of Cyprus, the Colombia liberation war, the Zapatista/Mexico
liberation war, the Western Sahara liberation war, the Sierra Leone civil
war, the Somalia civil war, the Sri Lanka/Tamil civil war and the Congo war,
making 56 qualifying as war. With another 26 "nascent international armed
conflicts", have in their different ways, demonstrated the Clausewitz dictum
that "war is politics by other means". Attempts at conquest by one military
power over another to maintain its hegemony, instead of by diplomacy and
political struggle.
Young men and women, still see war as an adventure, but not on the scale of
1914. Even then they had to be lied to, either that it would be all over by
Christmas or, "Gott mitt Uns". Working conditions, long hours and miserable
pay, with appeals to patriotism and defence of country, prompted millions
between 1914 and 1918 to join up for King, Kaiser and "La Patria".
Even though, subsequently, there was something of a sea change in world
mentality, the Russian October revolution, the Kiel naval mutiny, their own
artillery shooting French mutineers and demob mutinies here at home, has not
endured as long as the system which creates war. It did end the age of
innocence they say, and did radicalise the international working class for a
while. But within a mere 31 years, it engulfed even more countries, and still
more millions died. And still the concept of war continues to dominate into
the 21st century, with more countries with ever ready nuclear weapons, and
the European Strike Force, allegedly part of the Maastricht Treaty, being
installed by Blair`s Labour. Obsessed, among other killing machines, with
Trident.
Such thoughts rushed through my mind as I searched the War Graves Commission
web site for two uncles, who joined the army with no intention of entering
the ranks of the "glorious dead." I found paternal uncle and namesake,
Private George Anthony, resident of Stoke Newington and poulterers assistant
at Smithfield Market, killed at the age of 19 years on either September 25th
or 29th 1918, at the battle of Villers-Guislain, near Cambrai. And maternal
uncle, Gunner Freddie Fooks, resident of Clapton and plumbers mate who
expired at the Falaise gap in Normandy, on August 15th 1944, aged 33 years.
I shed tears for these two young men, they probably had no idea what they
were fighting for. But I also had a feeling of great anger; that they, like
millions of others died in a slaughter of innocents. And still Capital, the
creator of wars, survives. As the man said, "War is terrible, but it's also
terribly profitable."?
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