ANZAC DAY REFLECTIONS
I find ANZAC Day creates a dilemma for me, consequently I rarely attend dawn parades.
I fully support people recognising the human cost of wars and remembering family members who lost their lives on battlefields. A grandfather of mine fought in WW1 and was gassed in the French trenches, which compromised his health for the rest of his life. His wife (my grandmother) lost her young brother in WW2. The sacrifices and human costs of war should never be minimalised.
However, while speeches at ANZAC parades are full of statements promoting peace and the futility of war, those who campaign hardest for peace, promote nonviolence and call for weapons reductions are often treated like criminals. Anyone who dares to mention our own war crimes or that of our allies are generally shut down or demonised. It has become a sort of cultural heresy to question the reputation and glorification of the ANZACs.
I would love to see greater balance in how we talk about war and properly recognise those who have fought hardest for peaceful resolutions.
We shouldn't be glorifying our New Zealand contribution in past wars when no country is immune from committing wartime atrocities. In 1918 New Zealand soldiers slaughtered 40 innocent Arab men in Surafend in retribution for the death of a soldier trying to apprehend an unidentified thief of his kitbag. Our soldiers were widely known to have regularly killed prisoners in both wars (and were ordered to do so by officers), which went against the Hague directives for WW1 and the Geneva Convention signed in 1929.
I would like to remember New Zealand pacifists, like Archibald Baxter, who was severely punished for refusing to fight.
We should also remember Elsie Locke's peace activism that caused her to be viewed as a threat to democracy and be spied on for most of her life. Her son Keith was subject to similar surveillance from the age of 11 and was subject to appalling abuse from other parliamentarians as a Green MP who promoted peaceful resolutions.
Adrian Leason, Dominican Friar Peter Murnane, and farmer Sam Land were arrested for their protest against the Waihopai spy base. They had good cause to believe the base was enabling war activity and causing human suffering. While a jury found them not guilty of wilful damage and burglary, their pacifist beliefs were widely viewed as dangerous.
We should be thanking investigative journalists like Nicky Hager for exposing the war crimes perpetrated by our own forces in Afghanistan, and yet he was publicly demonised by military leaders and the government of the day. Nicky also revealed our military and government's dishonesty in providing misinformation regarding our combat involvement in the Iraq war.
We should be taking a stronger stand to support Julian Assange who exposed US war crimes and is still subject to persecution as a genuine journalist. Around 1700 journalists have been killed around the world while reporting on military conflicts over the last 20 years.
We should be decrying all governments using military force to further political and immoral objectives. We should be denouncing Indonesia's genocidal activity in West Papua (around 500,000 killed), Saudi Arabia's war crimes in Yemen, Israel's ongoing persecution and annexation of Palestinians... and these are just describing three examples of armed conflict occurring in 32 different countries this year.
We should be speaking out against the highly profitable arms market. The United States is the world's largest arms exporter. The top 10 arms exporters include, France, Germany, the UK and Israel. Encouraging and supporting armed conflict means increased exports and profits.
Current global military expenditure is estimated at $2240 billion while only $31 billion was spent on humanitarian aid. Almost 100 times more is being spent on having the means to kill people then save them.
I fully support people recognising the human cost of wars and remembering family members who lost their lives on battlefields. A grandfather of mine fought in WW1 and was gassed in the French trenches, which compromised his health for the rest of his life. His wife (my grandmother) lost her young brother in WW2. The sacrifices and human costs of war should never be minimalised.
However, while speeches at ANZAC parades are full of statements promoting peace and the futility of war, those who campaign hardest for peace, promote nonviolence and call for weapons reductions are often treated like criminals. Anyone who dares to mention our own war crimes or that of our allies are generally shut down or demonised. It has become a sort of cultural heresy to question the reputation and glorification of the ANZACs.
I would love to see greater balance in how we talk about war and properly recognise those who have fought hardest for peaceful resolutions.
We shouldn't be glorifying our New Zealand contribution in past wars when no country is immune from committing wartime atrocities. In 1918 New Zealand soldiers slaughtered 40 innocent Arab men in Surafend in retribution for the death of a soldier trying to apprehend an unidentified thief of his kitbag. Our soldiers were widely known to have regularly killed prisoners in both wars (and were ordered to do so by officers), which went against the Hague directives for WW1 and the Geneva Convention signed in 1929.
I would like to remember New Zealand pacifists, like Archibald Baxter, who was severely punished for refusing to fight.
We should also remember Elsie Locke's peace activism that caused her to be viewed as a threat to democracy and be spied on for most of her life. Her son Keith was subject to similar surveillance from the age of 11 and was subject to appalling abuse from other parliamentarians as a Green MP who promoted peaceful resolutions.
Adrian Leason, Dominican Friar Peter Murnane, and farmer Sam Land were arrested for their protest against the Waihopai spy base. They had good cause to believe the base was enabling war activity and causing human suffering. While a jury found them not guilty of wilful damage and burglary, their pacifist beliefs were widely viewed as dangerous.
We should be thanking investigative journalists like Nicky Hager for exposing the war crimes perpetrated by our own forces in Afghanistan, and yet he was publicly demonised by military leaders and the government of the day. Nicky also revealed our military and government's dishonesty in providing misinformation regarding our combat involvement in the Iraq war.
We should be taking a stronger stand to support Julian Assange who exposed US war crimes and is still subject to persecution as a genuine journalist. Around 1700 journalists have been killed around the world while reporting on military conflicts over the last 20 years.
We should be decrying all governments using military force to further political and immoral objectives. We should be denouncing Indonesia's genocidal activity in West Papua (around 500,000 killed), Saudi Arabia's war crimes in Yemen, Israel's ongoing persecution and annexation of Palestinians... and these are just describing three examples of armed conflict occurring in 32 different countries this year.
We should be speaking out against the highly profitable arms market. The United States is the world's largest arms exporter. The top 10 arms exporters include, France, Germany, the UK and Israel. Encouraging and supporting armed conflict means increased exports and profits.
Current global military expenditure is estimated at $2240 billion while only $31 billion was spent on humanitarian aid. Almost 100 times more is being spent on having the means to kill people then save them.
The "war to end all wars" has never eventuated because, despite all the public rhetoric around the need for peace and diplomacy - personal egos, greed and self-interest dominate.
I struggle with the hypocrisy around ANZAC Day when our military leaders and government spokespeople promote peace while persecuting peace activists and supporting the very systems and alliances that do the opposite.
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