Today is the 70th anniversary
of the D-Day landings. A time in which it was clear that we in the West were
willing to stand up for what we believed in. A time in which British, Americans,
Canadians, New Zealanders and even those scandalous Australians, had the
audacity to jump out of planes, to storm beeches and to stick it to a man
severely suffering from a Napoleon complex. All in the name of European
liberation. With at least 12,000 allied casualties and as many as 4,413
confirmed dead. Today there is going to
be a lot of heart-warming stories of old veterans jumping out of aircraft and
giving the gift of their gab ET etcetera. There will be moments of “USA, USA,
USA” as well as “Rule Britannia!” and if we're lucky there might even be a few “Huzzah!”’.
There are also going to be tear jerking stories of fallen comrades, who paid
the ultimate sacrifice for the cause of liberation.
What won’t be mentioned is
current failings and the simple fact that we are no longer worthy of such a
legacy left by great men. Our generation,
well not my generation I’m still a little too young. My father’s generation, is
a careless group of cowards who refuse to stand up to similar men, who are also
tragically suffering from such a complex. In the words of those convicts in the
Royal Australian Artillery “Quo fas et gloria ducunt” – “for whither duty and
glory lead”. I'll ignore the second part of the motto, acknowledging the work
of Wilfred Owen. Though I would state that there is a definite duty to many of
those in Eastern Europe and yet we were still unwilling to create ultimatums.
Many have argued that Britain and the rest of what could be considered “The
West” have no Obligation to Ukraine. This is false in 1994 at the Budapest
Memorandum we had in fact given security assurances to Ukraine on their
Territorial Integrity and Security. Yet for the first time since 1938 with the
occupation and annexation of the Sudetenland, has sovereign national territory
been annexed by another European nation.
The fact that Western News have
stopped reporting on the crisis does not simply mean it has gone away, just
that our attention span is too short, and that they can no longer use it to sell
papers. There are simply other tragedies in the world for us to get “outraged”
by. G7 members seven hours ago (since published) have spoken of further
sanctions and punishments against Russia for their continual violation of
International law. Though it is going to be near identical to the last sanctions. Proving purposeless. The fact is the European Committee should have followed Poland’s proposal of
sanctions. Though Britain and Germany were too worried about being cut off from
all the cheap energy. I think this is to do with this generation’s cowardice
and unwillingness to stand up for the values in which we once held. This may be
considered a cynical viewpoint, but well, many believe that we never had values
whilst I hold firm that we had values it’s just clear that they are now absent. It would be fitting to place that well known Edmund Burke quote here as a conclusion, but I will not fall to this cliché.
