Dear Editor:

Re: July 5 Trevor Lautens
Column.

Trevor! That column about
Dominion Day and compulso-
ry military service was
humour, right? Can you actu-
ally believe that substituting
‘Canada,’ a word my four-

-old understands, — for
‘Dominion’ a jingoistic word

that no one understands, is
worth writing a column about?
Switch coffees

But | don't write about that.
I write about compulsory tili-
tary service. As we fal! deeper
into the present morass of mil-
itary scandal, knee-deep in
prevaricating officers and mur-
derous “peacekeepers,” | won-
der what you want our youth to
lea? Discipline? Integrity?
The rightness of our leaders?

Is the present really so
dreadful that we must reach
into our mythical past to
dredge up the discredited poli-
cies of misguided politics?
Marching up and down the
parade ground doesn’t face

modern problems. It merely
yearns for the simplicity of the
past.

I didn't learn the history of
Canada’s war contributions in
’» school either and I attended in

the ‘50s and ‘60s.

I was bora in 1947. 1
leared from my parenis and
from my own reading and
from television which coinci-
dentally, is currently featuring
_a plethora of Second World
War documentaries.

The right-minded educa-
tors of that era (they must have
been right minded cause they

. tived in the glorious past) were

: getting on with life and build-

ing peace, not glorifying war.

_- My uncle was a simple
Saskatchewan farm lad who
went to war not to save you or
I or democracy, but for excite-

ment and to. escape the.

Depression and the boredom
‘of the prairie farm life:

’_. He was blown to bits in a
- tank 10 days before the end of

the war in Europe. He (or
whatever they could find) lies
in Holten Canadian War
Cemetery in Holland. I’ve
been there — and to Vimy and
to Dieppe and to the
Normandy beaches and to
Monte Casino. These places
are shrines.

Trevor — go stand amidst
the thousands of gravestones
of Belgium and France mark-
ing the short lives of ignorant
young men sent to their deaths
by ignorant old politicians.
Stand on Vimy Ridge and
imagine the horror of charging
up that hill into the guns.

Try to picture the waters of
Dieppe running red. But don't
try to teach these feclings to
my children in school and
never send them against their
wills out on a peace time
parade ground to pretend that
war is anything but human
greed and stupidity.

This is a fine country at a
wonderful time in histcry.
Let’s be thankful each day that
we live here peacefully. Our
war histery should teach us

“something. Pride doesn’t come

to mind, Let's leam to prevent
it from ever happening again.
Kevin Pike

North Vancouver

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