D-Day Remembered.



Canadian troops come ashore on Juno Beach.



D-Day means different things to different people, yet history is a generally agreed upon thing. Children are taught the story of those who lay in Flanders Fields, and most adults perceive dangers represented by various ‘isms’ – Imperialism, Fascism, nationalism, communism.

When taken to extremes, when men cannot be checked by reason, force ultimately

becomes the only answer.

In 1914, Canada went to war in joyous outbursts of patriotic fervour.

In 1939, Canadians went to war of necessity. The alternative: enslavement of the

world by Nazis.

In 1950, the country went to war with a new sense of purpose and national identity, (we get this shit out of history books) part of a United Nations effort to ensure that aggression would not pay.

Today our Armed Forces have developed an important role in keeping world peace

when called upon.

To the cynic, Nov 11, Remembrance Day here in Canada, may be about ‘the brave lads who died to keep India British.’

To most it is about recognizing sacrifice and perhaps, in some sense, validation of our own values.

And we all know someone.

Alec Ambroise

Alec Ambroise joined up and served in Europe in the Signal Corps (later transferring to the RCAF).

Would anyone like to be on a troop ship in the mid-Atlantic? He was there. A rumour flashed through the tightly packed men below decks. The Bismarck has broken out and is roaming the seas. The ship makes radical course changes for the next few hours, which comforts no one.

Another uncle, Peter Davidson of Strathroy, was wounded in Italy. The Italian campaign was one of bloody attrition, with house-to-house, hand-to-hand fighting, accentuated by rough terrain and atrocious winter mud.

My great uncle, John Farr, was with the Canadian Third Division, from Normandy to northern Germany at the surrender. His pay book shows his place of birth as Dawn Township. He was a farm boy and likely didn’t finish high school. He was trained as a rifleman and with a light machine gun, also as an artilleryman and signaler.

Yet another uncle, Frank Nalepa of Port Huron, Michigan, stormed ashore on Omaha Beach. It was a bloodbath and the attack nearly failed in the first half-hour. He was lucky, he got through. But 4,649 young American boys became casualties that day on Omaha and Utah beaches.

They are all gone now. When the last Second World War or Korean War veteran passes, it will be the end of an era. It will become a dusty memory, stacked on forgotten library shelves.

I suspect they all came home sadder but wiser, more committed to living life to the fullest.

We take so much for granted. Maybe that's the real message here. We take it a little too much for granted.

If prophecies are self-fulfilling, let us believe that Canadians will continue to serve with honour, integrity and distinction.

This country is a beacon of hope for starving, oppressed masses of humanity in other lands.

Let us remember that too.