Misguided, Surreal & Most of all Offensive

I make no apologies for blogging about something that I have blogged about before – and undoubtedly will do so again. Nor do I make any apologies to those who will undoubtedly profoundly disagree  with me.

"Like my poppy? - it's the new
arms industry procurement logo. Got the
idea from my old mate Donald Rumsfeld"

It  was with supreme surreal offensiveness that our Prime Minister walked down the steps of the aircraft as he landed in the middle east yesterday. He proudly sported his red poppy to remember the “glorious dead” of two World Wars (and many many other conflicts). And his mission in the middle east? – to drum up support for the UK military and defence equipment industry. To ensure that British business gets its share of the billions that Arab states will spend on arms in the coming years. And today, I have just learned that his discussions in the Gulf have resulted in "a defence industrial partnership" between the UK and Gulf States - call me cynical but that sounds like a devious euphemism for "politicians and big business gets loads of money but ordinary folk get sucked into war and destruction". A "defence industrial partnership" -  signed  just in time for Remembrance Day. The whole charade had a surreal and yet terrible Monty Pythesque ring about it.

Will Government Cabinet Records show, when they are made public in thirty years' time, how Cameron arrived at his decision to go on this trip“Oh I love a lovely war! Let’s sell some more weapons so that we can kill some more. We haven’t killed and maimed quite enough yet! Our industry and business men are so hard up, bonuses have to be paid! And anyway, I'm looking for a few cosy well paid Directorships when I give up this Prime Minister lark. And just to add that extra bit of zing let's sell arms to the middle east – it's already  a powder keg of violence and unstable nations, they'll love it - it will be a bottomless pot of money .........and, I know, let's do it in Remembrance week while we wear poppies. That'll give it that bit of sparkle - the Arab's will love that touch". Maybe Cameron's next overseas' jaunt will be to sign up a "defence industrial partnership" with Israel - that'll liven up the news broadcasts a bit as Israel turns Palestinian homes and children to desert dust. Or what about a "defence industrial partnership" with Argentina - then we could have a re-run of the Falklands War! "After all" Mr Cameron might argue "it saved Mrs Thatcher at the time and you can sink a few ships as well - that'll give our shipbuilders more work in  replacing them. There must be  few Directorships there! Oh! the possibilities brought about with death and destruction are endless - and so rewarding too for big business and politicians. I mean, look at Tony Blair - took the UK into an illegal war and now is feted and hugely rewarded by big business (paid into his off shore accounts no doubt) and for his after dinner speeches - I'll have some of that!" But, does Cameron never think? Has he actually got no brain cells or nous – to do this in Remembrance week and to sport a poppy as he does it! Or is he, as seems more likely, sticking up a metaphorical two fingers to the victims of his arms sales? He tells us, when interviewed, that the arms sales to Gulf countries are “entirely legitimate”. Well, in a commercial sense maybe they are; but the moral legitimacy is another question in my book. Of course, he might also respond, that if we don’t sell arms to the Gulf (or anywhere else) then someone else will – that is the usual justification that is trotted out. I must remember to mention that justification to the next drug dealer I see being arrested – “that’s your way out”, I will whisper as PC 49 cuffs him – “It’s good enough for the arms industry and our PM – tell them that if you don’t sell the dope than someone else will – so that’s all right”!

"Dulci et decorum est Pro patria mori"

As I watched in Cameron descend the aircraft steps and saw his red poppy bright against his dark suit the gloriously dreadful, prophetic and oh so true words of Osbert Sitwell’s 1918 poem  “The Next War” came into my mind. Sitwell’s poem written in November  1918 as the Great War drew to an end forecasts the next great conflict (the 2^nd World War) exactly – and indeed, each ensuing conflict as we continue to produce and sell arms, maintain arsenals and glorify soldiering.

THE NEXT WAR – BY OSBERT SITWELL

The long war had ended. 

Its miseries had grown faded. 

Deaf men became difficult to talk to, 

Heroes became bores.

Those alchemists

Who had converted blood into gold

Had grown elderly. 

But they held a meeting, 

Saying,

‘We think perhaps we ought

To put up tombs

Or erect altars

To those brave lads

Who were so willingly burnt, 

Or blinded, 

Or maimed,

Who lost all likeness to a living thing, 

Or were blown to bleeding patches of flesh

For our sakes.

It would look well.

Or we might even educate the children.'

But the richest of these wizards

Coughed gently; 

And he said: 

'I have always been to the front

-In private enterprise-,

I yield in public spirit

To no man. 

I think yours is a very good idea

-A capital idea-

And not too costly . . . 

But it seems to me

That the cause for which we fought

Is again endangered.

What more fitting memorial for the fallen

Than that their children

Should fall for the same cause?'

Rushing eagerly into the street, 

The kindly old gentlemen cried

To the young: 

'Will you sacrifice

Through your lethargy

What your fathers died to gain ? 

The world must be made safe for the young!'

And the children

Went. . . .

1914 - Granddad on back row far left - before the carnage

As I have become older – I would like to say grown up or matured, but I will leave that to the judgement of the reader – I have become increasingly intolerant of aggression, violence and ultimately war and militarism of any kind.  I increasingly resent the glorification of violence passed off as entertainment in films, where all has to be explicit in order that we experience ‘reality.’ Except, of course, that "film reality" isn't reality at all - it's acted. The actors take off their greasepaint and return to their luxury life once the last battle has been fought; the dead rise from the battlefield and walk off set chattering as they go. Real war is for real and means real death, terror and a lifetime afterwards of misery, ill health and, too often, poverty. Certainly, I have reached the point in my life where should another conflict develop I would declare myself a pacifist or conscientious objector. I could have no truck with harming my fellow man.

I could wax long and not very lyrical about this issue. But instead I will  again retell the story of my grandfather. It is not a special story - it is one which I guess could be replicated a million times - but for me it says much about our double standards and attitudes to war, arms and the ambitions of politicians and big business.  In my possession I have two handwritten letters. One is a page obviously torn from an exercise book and written in green ink – in a beautiful copperplate hand. The other is an exact copy – dated the day afterwards (March 26^th 1919). The first letter is a draft and has some  blanks where my Grandfather left  spaces  to put in bits of factual information – his army number, a date etc. The second is a final copy which  he obviously copied out the day afterwards. Presumably, there must have been a third copy which he sent. The letter is a begging letter – a plea from a desperate man to the War Commissioners in Chelsea for an increase in his war pension so that he can support his family. His pension had been granted at the beginning of March and he was writing at the end of March so he was obviously anxious to improve his award - perhaps they were desperate for food, perhaps the workhouse beckoned. I say that it is an exact copy. This is not strictly true. The first draft says that his wife – Janey (my Grandmother who died long before I was born) - is suffering from a 'nervous breakdown' but by the time that he does the copy on the following day he has changed this to a 'serious illness' and he says 'she is not strong'. For whatever reason he felt that it was not appropriate to use the term 'nervous breakdown' - I wonder why? Stigma? 'Serious illness' sounds more dramatic? Perhaps Janey didn't want to admit her condition. In the end it doesn't really matter but I can understand his anxiety.

I have to confess, that although I have no great emotional bond with my grandfather or indeed my family as a whole, whenever I read the letter I get a lump in my throat. He was a very ordinary man of little schooling. By trade a journeyman whitesmith (a worker in tin and pewter). He lived his whole life – except when he was shipped off to France in 1914 to defend King and Empire - in a tiny house with no hot water or bathroom. He had a beautiful handwriting style and his use of English was impeccable. He was sent off to a far off country to fight in a war that was not of his making, was wounded on two occasions and returned to his country not as a hero (except perhaps to his wife and his neighbours) but had to beg for more money from the government because the injuries he had sustained meant, as he says, that 'I shall be handicapped while ever I live.'

So, what did the letter say? (I copy exactly as he wrote):

Gentlemen,

I  Joseph Derbyshire of 5 Rigby Street, Preston, Lancashire most humbly petition you to review my pension of eight shillings and threepence (8/3)per week granted to me on the 7/3/19 for twelve months, for the wounds which I received in action during the war.

I don't think this amount satisfactory and I think that you will agree with me when I tell you that I have a Wife (who is suffering from a serious illness and she is not strong) and a Child who is three years old depending on me and I cannot yet follow any employment and particularly my own trade that of a journeyman Black and White smith nor do I think I shall ever be able to do the same at my work as I did before the war.

My Regimental address was 23807 Pte. Joseph Derbyshire, 9^th Batt. Loyal North Lancs Regt. and I was wounded through the chest and lungs on the 21^st Oct.  1916 and I was in Hospital six months  before I recovered. Shortly after this I was suffering from dysentery and had to be sent home on the 12^th Sept. 1917 to recuperate. I was again wounded on the 27^th May 1918 and taken prisoner with a broken leg. Through some cause or other this leg is now shorter that the other and as my work demands me to be on my feet most of the time I shall be handicapped while ever I live.

Hoping this will receive your best attention .

I remain,

Yours humbly

Joseph Derbyshire

As I read the letter I pictured him in my mind’s eye sitting, all those years ago, carefully scribing his letter. I remembered that he died at 61 – a remarkably young age and I always remember him looking an old man. Indeed I have a photo of him sitting on his back door step with me – it must have been shortly before he died. He looked far older than his 60 years. He had had a very hard life. And I wonder what it must have 'cost' him, a proud man who had just given four years of his life to serve his King – to write a begging letter. Today we would not tolerate a pension for war wounds that was only for 12 months. Today our expectations would quite rightly be so different. Would I have written such a humble, polite letter - I think not! (although I sense in it a bit of  'steel' when he uses phrases like 'I think that you will agree with me'). I also remember that he always walked with a pronounced limp – perhaps a left over from his broken leg.That ordinary people, like him should be plucked from their everyday life to 'serve King and country' as politicians and business gears up for war I find offensive. I think  of Wilfred Owen’s bitingly critical war poem 'Dulce et Decorum Est'

.........If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
    Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
    And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
    His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
    If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
    Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
    Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
    Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, –
    My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
    To children ardent for some desperate glory,
    The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
    Pro patria mori.

And of Siegfried Sassoon’s  ironic 'Base Details':

.........If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath

I’d live with scarlet Majors at the base

And speed glum heroes up the line to death.

You’d see me with my puffy petulant face,

Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel.

Reading the Roll of Honour. 'Poor young chap,'

I’d say – 'I used to know his father well;

Yes, we’ve lost heavily in the last scrap.'

And when the war is done and youth stone dead,

I’d toddle safely home to die – in bed.

My grandfather  was lucky, he survived the conflict and did die in bed – but the Great War lived with him all his life. While the officer class, the  wealthy, the politicians and the monarchy came back to England  paraded their medals and glorified the valiant youth who had been sent to their death – and then toddled safely off to bed -  the reality was a life time of pain or poverty  for ordinary men. While the rich lived the life of the glitzy society  of the roaring 20s my grandfather and millions like him were trying to make ends meet on a meagre pension, being the 'humble' servants” of the War Commissioners in Chelsea. The letter was a physical manifestation of Sitwell’s damning poem – and Cameron’s actions in a terrible way, this week “square the circle”.  “Let’s sell some guns and bombs, keep business booming (literally and metaphorically!), fill the pockets of business and politicians, don’t worry about the dying and the maimed” The despicable, morally and intellectually bankrupt US  Defence Secretary and friend of Tony Blair, Donald Rumsfeld, gave us the benefit of his wisdom, morals and insight us a few years ago when he told us that all military excesses and war, death and casualties  can be justified with the never to be forgotten moral philosophy based upon the “stuff happens” imperative. Cameron is clearly keen to emulate him. You may think that things have improved; maybe they are better than when my Granddad wrote his begging letter but the National Charity "Help for Heroes" still has to raise millions because the government and the arms businesses who have profited from war do not ultimately pick up the real cost of the injured and the maimed. As I put my Grandfather's tissue thin, almost a century old letters away this morning there fell out of the box in which I keep them his two cap badges - cheap tin badges  displaying the legend "For King and Empire - Services Rendered"  - a cheap tin "reward" from the great and good for a life ruined. Stuff happens!

King and Empire were really grateful gave him two cheap tin badges
to wear with pride.

As I read the pages and look at the creased  sepia photographs, I think, too, how my grandfather could never in his wildest dreams have imagined on that night in March 1919 as he sat down to write his begging letter that almost a hundred years later his grandson would take his scribbling which have somehow survived the years and the photos of him standing proudly in his uniform and scan them into a computer (what would he have made of that!). And then 'publish' his words on something called the internet so that they could be instantly read by everyone on the planet – should they choose to look.  What a very long way we have come with our technology – aren’t we so very clever!  But at the same time we still glorify war, our Royal family still dress up in military costumes and wear  medals that they have not won, our Prime Ministers still send young men off to war and then wring their hands when a young soldier is killed.  And our  current PM goes to foreign countries and, in this week of remembrance, sports a poppy and drums up support for the selling of weapons of war and destruction. Does Mr Cameron not understand or even recognise the surreal and offensive nature of what he is doing?   We/he might be oh so very clever but  our morals and ethics lag far behind our technology.

Somewhere in northern France - with wounded comrades and
his lungs never to be the same again. This was an extra
"reward" from King and country. He (front row 2nd from right) and thousands like him
could treasure their disabilities with their tin medals and cap badges
 for the rest of their lives.

I only have small memories of my grandfather but from what I remember of him he was very quietly spoken and gentle and in that respect I often think of President  Eisenhower, a man prominent as a wartime general and  who later became President of the US. He confessed in his later life that he regretted his time as a soldier saying:  ‘Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed’.   Or, another US President - John F Kennedy’s comment  'War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today.' I don’t think my grandfather ever became a conscientious objector but I know that he deeply regretted what the war had done to him and his family.  I'm sure that had he been alive my grandfather would have whole heartedly agreed with Harry Patch, the last serving British "Tommy" to survive. Patch died aged 110 in 2009 and famously said just before he died  "politicians who took us to war should have been given the guns and told to settle their differences themselves, instead of organising nothing better than legalised mass murder". For me, I have no hesitation in going along with Einstein who commented  'He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file and sends others to kill has already earned my contempt and sorrow. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would suffice.'  I have absolutely no doubt that David Cameron fits that description exactly – even the most cursory consideration would have told a thinking person that drumming up arms sales – especially in a region already riven with war and conflict – is unacceptable. To do this and at the same time sport a poppy, the mark of sorrow and regret for all those who have died and suffered in war, is both grossly stupid and worse highly offensive.