Honouring The Fallen

“It’s Darwin to the reverse. It’s not the survival of the fittest. The fittest go first. . . So what was decimated is the middle class. Everybody takes part, but it’s a middle class war. There was no aristocrat who didn’t lose a child, a cousin, a brother, a parent, a husband. No aristocrat who said I’m not going to fight. Oh, ok, they may have been officers, but even if they were majors they were still going to be close to the front. . . Lead the charge, blow the whistle. Any of you seen ‘Paths of Glory’ . . .Colonel Dax, the finest lawyer in France, what does he do when the battle begins? He stands up and blows the whistle, he leads the charge. And he’s the finest lawyer in France. . . This is a counter-Darwinian war.” – Professor Robert Weiner.

“The question we have to ask about commemorating wars is simple, the answer is not. The question is how do we glorify and honour those who die in war without glorifying war itself. How do we do that?

. . .Those who died were perhaps the best of their generation. They were certainly perceived that way. As men of uncommon courage, of clarity of vision, of moral standing. And as such they stand to this day, independent of the miserable and in my view criminal war in which they give their lives. That is why it is necessary to glorify those who die in war without glorifying war itself. Because the sacrifice is much greater than the cause for which it was undertaken.” – Professor Jay M. Winter.