Old men forget, yet all shall
be forgot

But he'll remember with
advantages

what feats he did that day.
— Henry V.

SHAKESPEARE did-
n’t have it quite right.
It is true that “all shall
be forgot” but the old
men themselves do not
forget. That’s why they
will be at the war
memorials tomorrow.

The faster the war
recedes, the more vivid
become the memories. Bits
may be blurred but the high-
lights stand out.

Those who went in at
Dieppe will never forget it.
Nor will those who landed
on D-Day; nor those who
suffered on the Burma rail-
way under the Japanese,
watching their friends die like
flies,

But it is true that “all

shall be forgot." Major
Arthur Kavanagh, M.C., «ss
still with us last year, MLC.
standing for Military Cross,
which no Canadian can now
be awarded, thanks to the
politicians.

He's not yet forgotten
but he will be. It is one of
the facts of life. And death.
How many people can tell
you about the charge of the
Light Brigade?

By AD 2000 there will be
only a relative handful of
Canadians who were in the
Second World War, which
will have sunk 55 years into
the past.

Think about that. The
end of the century will be to
1940 as 1940 was to 1885.
And just as the young men
of 1885 could not have had
the slightest idea what the
world would be like in 1940,
so those in 1940 had no idea
what the world would be fike
now.

Good thing, too, or they

might not have been so keen.

In 1885 mechanized war-
fare was not even a dream.
Submarine warfare was a
Jules Verne phantasy. So
were battles in the air. The
rifle was the most common
weapon, Bow and arrow
stuff.

At sea, “ironclads” had
made their appearance in the
world’s navies but sail still
dominated on the oceans. A

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few decades before that the
“wooden walls” of Nelson’s
day were still around.

Time, in the words of the
hymn, is like an ever rolling
stream and we are rushing
down it to oblivion. Values
change more quickly than
moods, as a glance at any
newspaper will show you.

I remember, as a kid,
thinking that the Germans
were terrible for using sub-
marines, Listening to the
teachers on Armistice Day,
and reading boys’ magazines,
one felt that they were rotten
sports.

Submarines were a low
blow. Even worse was the
flamethrower. If old Jerry
ever tried it again, we’d show
him, by God.

But in due course napalm
would be used on villages in
Vietnam and nuclear subs
would roam the world, ready
to wipe out whole cities.
Countries, even. Cruise mis-
siles would be aimed at
Middle East peasants.

Empires — including
what used to be called the
“the greatest empire the
world has ever known,”
would disappear and there
would be more wars than
ever, even if smaller ones,

The men and women of
1940 who joined up to wal-
lop the bad guys were inno-
cents abroad. Many had no
real idea what they were

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fighting for. Joining up was
simply something that was
done.

In 1944 T asked a
Canadian lady who was
working in a YWCA canteen
in High Wycombe why she
had come over. (In those
days there were lots of ladies.
“Wymin” hadn't been
invented.)

It was a dumb question
but in those days I was even
dumber than I am now,

“Pm from British
Columbia,” she said, “and
back home everyone was ask-

ing, ‘What are you going to
do for the war effort?’.”

I thought fleetingly that
British Columbia might be
somewhere in South
America.

We now know what the
British Columbians did. But
it has to be repeated that
they had no idea what things
would be like 50 years on.
You know: Human Rights
Gestapos, most jokes a no-
no, smoking a social offence,
ete.
Would they have been so
keen if they bad known? Ask

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the old men who will soon
be forgotten. And ask the
youngsters of today whether
they would be so ready to
fight as were their grandfa-
thers.

I doubt it. Maybe they
have more brains.

-— The North Shore News
believes strongly in freedom of
speech and the right of all sides
in a debate to be heard. The
columnists published in the
News present differing points
of view, but those views are not
necessarily those of the newspa-
per itself:

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