November 11th, Remembrance/Veterans Day

British soldiers in a trench during the Battle of the Somme, 1916. (Wikimedia)

When I was a kid in Canada Nov. 11th was about remembering the millions of people killed in the world wars.

I remember sitting in a classroom trying to visualize some poor bastard in a cold, muddy trench being overrun by German soldiers. Maybe shooting one or two with his clumsy, slow-firing rifle just before being bayoneted to death and slowly dying in the slop while realizing he’d never see home again as the frenzied shouts in German began to fade from his awareness.

My dad served in the Canadian infantry during WWII when V-2 rockets were raining on London and his comrades were reduced to traces of fabric in the bricks of bombed buildings. (The one thing he mentioned.)

Like virtually every other veteran back then, my dad never traded on his service. I never heard anybody say ‘thank you’ to him. He didn’t expect it. He was never pissed off if a store sold Christmas items before Nov 11th. Never expected a discount at the restaurant. Never talked about people ‘disrespecting veterans.’

War was to be avoided. The people who died were seen as victims. Both wars were seen as massive tragedies. Many eventually saw them as completely avoidable.

Then Vietnam happened.

The United States lost to what Secretary of State Kissinger called “a fourth-rate power” (just as it failed to win in Korea) and the truth emerged that years after US politicians knew Vietnam was un-winnable they continued to waste US and Vietnamese lives in order to save face and get re-elected.

58,220 recent US high school graduates and millions of Vietnamese lost their lives for absolutely nothing beyond an uptick in the Dow Jones and the careers of dishonest politicians.

Today US tourists and businesses flood Vietnam. US airlines offer daily flights to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, you can stay at a lovely Hilton Hotel and enjoy a Starbucks coffee. The communist “dominoes” never fell and never threatened the US ‘way of life™’ as we were repeated told would happen if those kids didn’t keep dying for us.

Thus, many people lost confidence in the credibility, competence, and honor of the military industrial complex and the hawkish politicians they purchased every election cycle.

SO . . . the public relations folks in the military vowed that next time would be different.

And when 9/11 happened the military, the intelligence “community,” and the defense/war industry exerted maximum controll of every aspect of US news and public relations.

Journalists were “embedded” with troops as relentless cheerleaders for the war. Touching, emotional profiles were featured of wounded or killed soldiers. Virtually zero coverage was given about the ”other side’s” losses. No touching profiles about their maimed kids.

Stories about US drones bombing weddings and funerals, about bombing civilian rescue teams that arrived, about bombing the wrong buildings and hospitals, and especially about how there was never a credible plan to ever stop the wars — were all suppressed, even if it meant crushing the 1st Amendment and putting leakers/truth-tellers in prison.

Questions about the legality of the invasion of sovereign countries were never asked nor answered. Even to this day.

Instead the NFL owners were paid millions by taxpayers via the military to have players on the field for the anthem - for the first time ever.

Every major sporting event suddenly started with an honor ceremony for the military.

And on the brand new social media, millions of pro-war memes were created and circulated to encourage the validity of warfare as a LEGITIMATE way of solving problems and the death of millions of civilians in foreign countries as NECESSITY.

So now November 11th has been morphed into a day to openly encourage more war — and warfare as a PROFESSION. Soldiering as a desirable CAREER for high school kids. (With the permanent standing army the Founders specifically warned against.)

Invading foreign countries and killing people wholesale is sold as a legitimate insurance policy against any risk of a lower standard of living for us back home.

And we are decreasingly asked to remember that poor bastard in the WWI trench, who lost his life only because a teenager shot a Duke in a far off country of little significance.

Instead we’re asked to thank the people KEEPING WAR ALIVE today. And to worry that early Christmas decorations might offend their honor.

And it’s all by careful design and driven by financial and industrial interests that require trillions of taxpayer dollars.

And it works! Because most people think exactly what they’re TOLD TO THINK BY AUTHORITY FIGURES.

“Yay, war! Yay, war! Yay, war! All praise to warriors and their profession of making our lives so much better."

For my part, I still just think about that poor, naive kid in 1916 who died 100% needlessly in a cold trench far from home because a teenager in Sarajevo shot a rich Duke causing three cousins who each ruled Russia, Prussia, and Austria-Hungary (all of whom were grandchildren of Queen Victoria who ruled the UK) to fight over which of them would milk the family tax cows of Europe for the next few decades.

And largely because of the shitty treaty created by the political braintrust at the end of WWI, another 60,000,000 people had to die because it gave rise to yet another politician wanting total control of all the tax cows in his region.

Remembrance Day? I just remember to say screw all the politicians of the world and hope that people will one day stop dying and killing for any of them or encouraging anyone else to do it.

That can only happen when we build a better system to supplant human governance at the barrel of a gun, which is what eight billion of us live under, whether we admit it or not.

Humanity deserves a better system. There’s something to Remember.