Defending Freedom

Canadian soldiers die in Afghanistan and it triggers emotional, pragmatic, political and a swash of other responses across our country.
Our unfettered freedom to express ourselves is pretty much our right in this unique, unbridled expanse of incredible global geographythat we call Canada. We became a country through exploitation and proclamation. Any historic skirmishes to solidify our borders are fairly insignificant in the big scheme of countrification history. Don’t bother to look up countrification….I just made it up.

We baby boomers and our kids have witnessed armed conflict but mostly in our living rooms. These days it's through the astounding reality of ‘imbedded reporters’.…not to dismiss flairups like those with our native Indian populations or the ongoing spats over the years between our two founding nations or the mainly peacekeeping roles our armed forces have played on the international war scene in the past 50 years.

It is this insulation that makes it so difficult for most Canadians to comprehend our emerging new role that is costing lives. But here is my view.

You see, my parents were both veterans of World War II, one English and one Canadian.
Before I really knew anything else about wars or really bad people in the world, I was taught the meaning of Remembrance Day each November 11th. This was not heavy handed or fearfully presented knowledge. Quite frankly most of the ‘war stories’ I heard from my parents were adventurous and more often than not tainted with some kind of humor. But attached to their story was a message of respect that we the younger generation should have for the sacrifice, courage, bravery and commitment made on our behalf in the defense against those who sought to conquer, destroy and exploit.

Like most of us I know nothing of armed conflict in my country. So my only right to a viewpoint is the freedom I enjoy which, speaking only for myself with thanks to my parents, I wholeheartedly try not to take for granted. The waning number of veterans on Remembrance Day provide another necessary revival of my acknowledgement to every single person who gave themselves over to preserving my freedom.

So when Canadian soldiers die in Afghanistan, how do I feel? It's not an easy question to answer.
We are constantly asked in our media saturated environment of the 21st century to drink the kool-aid of individual rights. This of course is the right to purchase every silver bullet solution that guarantees us solutions to all our problems, from whiter teeth and slim waists to millions of dollars from one little paper ticket with a few numbers on it. There is less and less of a moralistic overview of society. It's all about what "I" deserve.

When a 23 year old soldier dies in Afghanistan all of those rights are stolen from him and a family has hole in it than cannot be filled. In a country where most of the people feel their freedom is granted through a paper document and no one has ever really challenged that concept it is a natural reaction that this is little more than a governmental waste of human life.

Well, I for one and I pray there’s more like me out there, want to remember these soldiers for their bravery in going to the front lines of our battle scarred planet to defend the freedom we take for granted….the same freedom our ancestors came half way around the world to find….the same freedom generations hold as a pipe dream in conflict torn countries.

There is a harsh realty here folks. Freedom is not a right. We must stand up for freedom because there is another reality. There are bad people who will take it away if we don’t. There is another reality. These battles will scar and kill innocent people either by criminal design or the heart wrenching circumstance of wrong place at the wrong time. These events also initiate the psychological dilemma of “why did I survive instead of him….or her or that innocent bystander?”

Through those teachings of my parents, and the common knowledge I gather simply through having an interest in such things, I express the opinion that our soldiers are knowingly defending freedom under extreme risk. As far as dieing is concerned, I don’t think any normal, healthy adult in their 20’s thinks they are going to die. I know far more people who have died driving drunk, died taking extreme yet pretty much unnecessary physical risks or have died just being in the wrong place at the wrong time when senseless events occurred within our own society.

For Canada to ignore the intent of terrorists in our world is akin to other historical miscalculations like Chamberlains declaration of Hitlers lack of evil intent or the self-incrimination expressed by Solzhaneetsyn in describing how Communism got its stranglehold on Russia. Solzhaneetsyns’ Gulag Archepaelago, a soul searching account of what life in Russia became after 1917 when Tzarist ruled was ended by the rebellion and take over by the workers. He revealed a history of decades of human suffering that surpassed any before it and yet was unknown to the rest of the world. And how did this man describe it?

“We didn’t love freedom enough. In 1917 we hurried to submit. We submitted with pleasure. We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward.”

So when Canadian soldiers die in Afghanistan, I remember what was said to me by a Canadian fighter pilot I recently had the good fortune to meet and talk to. He said when we’re keeping them busy over there they don’t have time to plan other stuff.

Before I heard that, I had a much more complicated opinion. Now, I know that as a Canadian swaddled within the borders of this great, safe, nation I grieve for those soldiers killed in Afghanistan. I pray for their souls and those whose grief grips the very core of their own being. I l stand proud for these brave defenders of our freedom. I remember that their lives are not wasted because what is not worth fighting for is of questionable value. A far greater waste is a national ignorance of their sacrifice.

It is a great aspiration, the wish for peace for all mankind. Unfortunately goodness and peace is not something inherent within everyone. Terrible evil lurks in some. It takes conflict to win the battle.

As was explained to me by a well known Canadian writer in a writers workshop many years ago, if you don’t have conflict in your story, you don’t have a story. That my friends is at the core of who we are as human beings. We live the life we are meant to live when we struggle and strive for what is right with in us not what is pragmatic within us.

Our Canadian soldiers set the standard at its highest and sometimes pay the ultimate price. May God Bless them.