Veteran day - National Independence Day

[Jaga]

November 11 became the most important day in Poland since Poland celebrated the restoration of its independence after WW I!

[leslie]

Jaga
I guess that 1100h on the 11th day of the 11th month is the most important time in Britain, and what remains of the Commonwealth and remembers the dead of the 1914-1916 Great War and every war and conflict since in which British and Commonwealth forces and civilians have been killed. (That time and date was when the Armistice was signed at the end of the Great War.) We have a magnificent memorial service on TV just prior to that day (this time it was Saturday night) when the British Legion heads representatives of every possible association in Britain connected with wars and conflicts we have been and are involved in. This precedes today 11th November - Remembrance Day when at 1100h everything stops for 1 minute in Remembrance of the people - forces and civilians - who died in the Great War (1914-1918 {1917 - 1918 for USA} the Second World War 1939-1946 and all the other conflicts in between and since.
Red poppies are sold and worn to show remembrance of the dead, the red signifying the blood they spilt for us and the red poppies of Flanders in France where the poppies were growing as our men were dying. The money raised is used by the British Region to help in many ways, ex-servicement in need of help

The message associated directly with the dead described above is "WE WILL REMEMBER THEM"

Jaga, why 11 November in Poland as Independance Day?

Leslie

[rdywenur]

Here in the states we have Veteran's Day but it is not as I remember it to be when I was much younger. We use to have a parade. The veterans would be on corners selling poppies..today it is the flag (I prefer the poppy) I don't think the veteran's of today are shown any respect as they once did. I rememeber reading just recently that today's veteran's are homeless, jobless, suicidal etc. That is so sad.

[hollister]

Somehow this seems appropriate today:

The End and the Beginning by Wislawa Szymborska
Translated by Joanna Maria Trzeciak

After every war
someone has to clean up.
Things won't
straighten themselves up, after all.

Someone has to push the rubble
to the sides of the road,
so the corpse-laden wagons
can pass.

Someone has to get mired
in scum and ashes,
sofa springs,
splintered glass,
and bloody rags.

Someone must drag in a girder
to prop up a wall,
Someone must glaze a window,
rehang a door.

Photogenic it's not,
and takes years.
All the cameras have left
for another war.

Again we'll need bridges
and new railway stations.
Sleeves will go ragged
from rolling them up.

Someone, broom in hand,
still recalls how it was.
Someone listens
and nods with unsevered head.
Yet others milling about
already find it dull.

From behind the bush
sometimes someone still unearths
rust-eaten arguments
and carries them to the garbage pile.

Those who knew
what was going on here
must give way to
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing.

In the grass which has overgrown
reasons and causes,
someone must be stretched out
blade of grass in his mouth
gazing at the clouds.

[leslie]

Chris (Holli)
I have more faith in today's generation, even the yobs and so on than Szymborska. This was shown to me today at 1100h in my small town - there was no movement or noise anywhere for the two minutes of silence and I even noticed a group of teenagers standing there silent for the time. OK , they may go and knife somebody tomorrow, but it shows that they are not 100% lost.
Leslie

[justjohn]

rdywenur said:

Here in the states we have Veteran's Day but it is not as I remember it to be when I was much younger. We use to have a parade. The veterans would be on corners selling poppies..today it is the flag (I prefer the poppy) I don't think the veteran's of today are shown any respect as they once did. I rememeber reading just recently that today's veteran's are homeless, jobless, suicidal etc. That is so sad.

The Origins of Veterans Day in the US


In 1921, an unknown World War I American soldier was buried in Arlington National Cemetery. This site, on a hillside overlooking the Potomac River and the city of Washington, became the focal point of reverence for America’s veterans.
Similar ceremonies occurred earlier in England and France, where an unknown soldier was buried in each nation’s highest place of honor (in England, Westminster Abbey; in France, the Arc de Triomphe). These memorial gestures all took place on November 11, giving universal recognition to the celebrated ending of World War I fighting at 11 a.m., November 11, 1918 (the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month). The day became known as “Armistice Day.”
Armistice Day officially received its name in America in 1926 through a Congressional resolution. It became a national holiday 12 years later by similar Congressional action. If the idealistic hope had been realized that World War I was “the War to end all wars,” November 11 might still be called Armistice Day. But only a few years after the holiday was proclaimed, war broke out in Europe. Sixteen and one-half million Americans took part. Four hundred seven thousand of them died in service, more than 292,000 in battle.

Armistice Day Changed To Honor All Veterans

An answer to the question of how to pay tribute to those who had served in this latest, great war came in a proposal made by Representative Edwin K. Rees of Kansas: Change Armistice Day to Veterans Day, and make it an occasion to honor those who have served America in all wars. In 1954 President Eisenhower signed a bill proclaiming November 11 as Veterans Day.
On Memorial Day 1958, two more unidentified American war dead were brought from overseas and interred in the plaza beside the unknown soldier of World War I. One was killed in World War II, the other in the Korean War. In 1973, a law passed providing interment of an unknown American from the Vietnam War, but none was found for several years. In 1984, an unknown serviceman from that conflict was placed alongside the others. To honor these men, symbolic of all Americans who gave their lives in all wars, an Army honor guard, The 3d U.S. Infantry (The Old Guard), keeps day and night vigil.
A law passed in 1968 changed the national commemoration of Veterans Day to the fourth Monday in October. It soon became apparent, however, that November 11 was a date of historic significance to many Americans. Therefore, in 1978 Congress returned the observance to its traditional date.

[Jaga]

I am so glad so many of us still remembers this day! Check google:
www.google.com

they also have special graphics for today:)

[kaima]

John

Thanks for refreshing the story of Armistice day. It reminds me of grade school in the 50's and Sr. Mary Bertha telling us that during WW I the US showed REAL national patriotism, and that the nation has gone downhill since then. WW II for her showed the degeneration of the patriotism; there weren't the parades and the rallys and the flags of WW I. Perhaps that is the first time I heard that in WW II most soldiers waited to be drafted rather than volunteer.

Today of course, we look upon both of those wars as cataclysmic, and with our short memories we probably rank WW II as the worse of the two.

If only the dream had been fulfilled - and 'the war to end all wars' really was so.

Kai

[Pawian]

leslie said:

Jaga, why 11 November in Poland as Independance Day?

Leslie

On November 11, 1918, WW1 finished and Poland resurrected after 123 years of foreign occupation and non-existence.

Three partitions powers: Germany, Austria and Russia were weak and defeated, so Poles started organizing their state again. How easy!

[hollister]

Leslie, I am glad you have hope - I'm not sure I do.
I just got back from the Remembrance Day Ceremony at US CENTCOM and the highest ranking US Officer that was there was a Colonel (who was ordered to be there). All the other countries who attended were represented by their HIGHEST ranking officer. I was so ashamed - not I was offended! If the US Officers do not think the day is important enough to take the time to show up - how can anyone else - I felt it was deeply disrespectful not only to the US veterans but to the other countries as well.
I still think the poem is appropriate - some one has to put thing right again and the job is not glamorous but it has to be done. Those that serve silently, not seeking glory or honor deserve respect and homage as well - so that the young can look up in the sky with little or no worries.

To change the topic a bit ... Our friend Scatts has posted a wonderful reflection on Independence Day on his blog. I hope he doesn't mind if I put the link up here.
scatts.wordpress.com/ If you have a moment, Scatts thoughts are well worth the time.