The Eleventh Day of the Eleventh Month

[truepenny]

The post I want to make today was made by Vagabond Scholar* three years ago. Really. I went looking for one of Walt Kelly's Armistice Day strips, and not only did Vagabond Scholar have one, but also the quote from Kelly that I would have looked for if I could have remembered it well enough.

I am a pacifist, in the sense that I think violence, whether interpersonal or international, is very rarely the correct response. (Sometimes it is. The Nazis are a cogent example.) But that does not mean I do not respect and honor those men and women who chose, have chosen, choose, and will choose, to serve in the armed forces of their nations, and it does not mean I do not mourn their deaths. In 1996, when I was on Crete with the summer session of the American School for Classical Studies at Athens, we went to the Suda Bay War Cemetery:

On the way to the ferry, we also stopped at the Suda Bay War Cemetery, which was beautifully kept and very moving. John Pendlebury, a British archaeologist killed in the Battle of Crete, is buried there. The appalling thing, even in a cemetery as small as that one, is the number of graves with no names: UNKNOWN BRITISH SOLDIER. Row after row of Unknown British Soldiers overlooking Suda Bay.

Unknown British Soldiers, this is a day to remember you and to assert, again, that your memory is better honored by peace than by war.

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*Today, Vagabond Scholar is using the Kelly quote again and a bunch of Siegfried Sassoon.

Comments

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

By not using the Treaty of Versailles as a vehicle for petty vengeance.

[batocchio.livejournal.com]

Well said, Truepenny. I'll have to use some of Kelly's other 11/11 cartoons at some point, but I think that one may be the best. Thanks for the link. Most veterans I know I'd call pro-soldier and anti-war. They want to make sure troops get what they need, but don't want them to sent on bad, unnecessary missions. I wish more pundits and people in power shared that outlook.

Most alternate histories I can think of aren't very peaceful, probably because drama thrives on conflict, but there are quite a few good SF stories on war and peace, mostly pushing for peace. There's William Tenn's satirical short story "The Liberation of Earth," and Joe Haldeman's The Forever War is a classic. Forever Peace is a thematic sequel. Haldeman is a Vietnam vet (and I quoted him for a Memorial Day piece last year, actually).