Dick Kazan Posted: Wed Feb 07, 2007 11:07 am
The ground rocked with tremendous force, as if an earthquake made it tremble. But it was just the 1st of 1.7 million shells the British would fire in a 5-day bombardment on the Germans. With each explosion, the sound would echo for miles among the black plumes of smoke and everything in its path would be thrust high in the air.
This was the start of the Battle of the Somme in 1916, that was supposed to turn the tide of World War 1 for the Allies after two years of massive death and destruction that had led to a stalemate.
I recalled this long-ago battlefield as I read about President Bush escalating the Iraq war, supposedly to turn the tide for today's Allies. I also read with heart-felt grief, "Carson Marine killed in Iraq," [Daily Breeze, 2/7/07]. It is a gut-wrenching story of a brave young man, 22-year-old Sgt. Alejandro Carrillo of Carson [CA], who leaves a grieving widow and a 3-year-old son who will never know his father as well as a devastated family reeling from his death.
But on July 1st, 1916 the British soldiers, most in the age range of Sgt. Carrillo were in one massive series of fox holes totaling 25 miles and the German troops of similar age were directly across from them in their fox holes. The two sides were separated by a barbed-wired, shell pocked, grimy no-man's land. When the bugles blew, thousands of British troops stormed out of their bunkers and charged the German side.
The German machine-gunners began mowing them down by the thousands. When the day ended, there were 19,240 British dead and nearly 40,000 more were wounded. To that point, it was the bloodiest day in British military history. There is no accurate count of the German deaths but it is estimated at several thousand souls.
Nearly five months later when the Battle of the Somme was finally over, there was no victory. At the deepest point in penetrating the German lines, the British had gained 2 miles at a cost of nearly 420,000 British soldiers, which is about 40 casualties per foot. It is estimated the Allies suffered over 600,000 casualties and the Germans over a half million. And for what?
The last thing many of these soldiers saw was the bullet ridden bodies of the dead and dying and the body parts of those blown to bits by mortar fire and explosives. And later their families would receive "We regret to inform you" notices.
As with our President today, often those who made the decisions that cost so many people their lives were far removed from the battlefield and didn't have to see this carnage first hand. Each night they went home safely to their families, to the comforts of home, smugly telling themselves they had done their duty for God and country.
When World War 1 ended two years later, these brave young soldiers who were killed in combat had no voice for they lay quietly in their graves and lived only in the hearts of the families who mourned them. But their silence speaks to us now if only we will listen. They ask us not to do with the lives of our young soldiers what was done with theirs.
Congress has the authority to cut-off the funding for the Iraq war which would bring the soldiers safely home. Instead, they continue to fund the rapidly growing cost of the war, as they condemn it.
But at long last, Congress is hesitantly beginning to act to end this war, although they are still willing to pay for military operations well into 2008. And as in the past, they may yet become timid and backoff from even that postion.
Please write or call your U.S. Senators and your Congressman and insist they take action to end the war now. And please make your voice heard in the media, such as with letters to the editor of your local newspaper. By taking these steps, we can help to bring peace as we stop the killing and not add to the devastation like that being felt by the Carrillo family and by so many others who have lost their loved ones.
Dick
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