UTMC

Things may be better, things may get worse, but we still have war.
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In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.


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U.S.M.C. Major General Butler said,

"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.
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"No Man's Land

by Eric Bogle, performed by The Cutters

Well, how do you do young Willie McBride
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside
Rest for a while 'neath the warm summer sun
I been walkin all day, and I'm nearly done

I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
when you joined the great fallen in 1916
I hope you died well, and I hope you died clean
or young Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene

Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife lowly
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down
Did the bugles sound Last Post in chorus
Did the pipes play The Flowers of The Forest

Did you leave e'er a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithfull heart, is your mem'ry enshrined
Although you died back in 1916
In that faithfull heart, are you forever nineteen

Or are you a stranger without even a name
Enclosed in forever behind a glass pane
In an old photograph, torn battered and stained
And faded to yellow in a brown leather frame

Did they beat the drum slowly, did the play the fife lowly
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down
Did the bugles sound Last Post in chorus
Did the pipes play The Flowers of the Forest

Now the sun's shining down on the green fields of France
There's a warm summer's breeze, it makes the red poppys dance
Look how the sun shines from under that cloud
There's no gas, no barbed wire, there's no guns firing now

but here in this graveyard it's still no mans land
The countless white crosses stand mute in the sand
To mans blind indifference to his fellow man
To a whole generation that was butchered and damned

Did they beat the drums slowly, did they play the fife lowly
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down
Did the bugles sound Last Post in chorus
Did the pipes play The flowers of the Forest

Oh young Willie McBride I can't help wondrin' why
Do those that lie here know why did they die
And did they believe when they answered the call
Did they really believe that this war would end wars

Well the sorrow,the suffering ,the glory, the pain
The killing, and dying were all done in vain
For young Willie McBride it all happened again
And again, and again, and again, and again

Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife lowly
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down
Did the bugles sound Last Post in chorus
Did the pipes play The Flowers of the Forest

Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife lowly
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down
Did the bugles play Last Post in chorus
Did the pipes play The Flowers of the Forest
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"The unwilling, led by the incompetent, to do the unnecessary, for the ungrateful" [found inscribed on a vietnam-era coffin]

..

SOLDIER’S THINGS

Tom Waits


Davenports and kettle drums
and swallow tail coats
table cloths and patent leather shoes
bathing suits and bowling balls
and clarinets and rings
and all this radio really
needs is a fuse
a tinker, a tailor
a soldiers things
his rifle, his boots full of rocks
and this one is for bravery
and this one is for me
and everything’s a dollar in this box

Cuff links and hub caps
trophies and paperbacks
it’s good transportation
but the brakes aren’t so hot
neck tie and boxing gloves
this jackknife is rusted
you can pound that dent out
on the hood
a tinker, a tailor
a soldiers things
his rifle, his boots full of rocks
oh and this one is for bravery
and this one is for me
and everything’s a dollar in this box



In war, there are no uninjured soldiers.

Cheers.

--Jaeger

Over here, Armistice Day isn't celebrated. It's more like ignored. If you look up November 11th on the German Wikipedia, it lists Veteran's Day as a holiday. Under history, it mentions the German troops in Warsaw being disarmed by the Poles, Karl 1st declining any further involvement in affairs of state and Alsace-Loraine declaring it's independence, but not a word about the Armistice.
On November 11th, at 11:11 AM, those regions in Germany that have carnival's (think Rio, rather than Lions and merry-go-rounds) celebrate the start of the carnival season. The end of the war? Never heard anyone loose a word about it on that day.
You might say people are already overwhelmed with remembering the next war and what our guys did in that one.
But a little remembrance at least would be nice. An acknowledgement that WW2 didn't happen out of a vacuum, that we had fucking priors.

Well, the perceived harshness of the terms of armistice arguably helped the rise of National Socialism so one might not want to make a thing out of the day that the World said "No, fuck you, Germany. Fuck yourselves into abject poverty while we all have a good laugh at your expense. And speaking of expense, you're late with those reparations again, do we have to come back over there?"
Just a thought.
Thanks for remembering though.

rolly wrote:Wisdom

You may have a point there. On the other hand, however, I think that is exactly why it should be remembered. So people don't forget how lost glories and injustice, real or perceived, can entice a generation to set the whole world on fire trying to regain them. How a nation no longer able to function because of debts and no way out of these debts can quickly turn to the murderers for answers. We don't just have to remember the evil our fathers did, we must remember how they got there in the first place. So we can recognize it when the winds turn to make it happen again, so we can be ready to say "No!" even before the situation gets so bad that it must actually be said.

Strange because while WWII had its super villain and its imagery of fighting barbarism and cruelty and the sacrifice of many for freedom, I have this feeling that WWI was just a general madness blown out of proportion on both camps, the old alliances forcing every country to take part en engage into war, and the young men joyously leaving to kick some ass, sure to be back as winners for next harvest, then dying of illness in the mud surrounded by corpses left to rot. So I wouldn't have imagined that germany had a reason to suffer from a directed amnesia induced by culpability. Maybe I had this impression because of the way it was depicted by artists as the end of civilisation and the end of the faith in human kind inherited from the renaissance ? But the terms of the armistice clearly laid down the road to WWII. I just wish we'd still remember the lessons of WWII now that racism has become a social norm here and people I once considered friends do not feel embarrassed to post racist comments while pretending to once again defend the freedom of their white supremacist ass, when really, they crossed the line and are fighting for their allegedly pure blood.
Still, respect for those who fought. I didn't, but my grandfather is buried under a wooden cross as veteran and once war prisoner.