Post 50: Lessons of War

BREAKING OF HEARTS

Acknowledgements to Henry Reed and  ‘Naming of Parts’; part one of his Trilogy titled ‘Lessons of the War’

Today we have breaking of hearts. Yesterday
We had ethnic cleansing. And tomorrow morning
We shall hear who has died after firing. But today,
Today we have breaking of hearts. In the garden
Late roses, buddleia and fuchsia still flower
And today, we have breaking of hearts.

This is the Media headline. And this
Is the upping of slaughter, whose excuse doesn’t wash
When the bodies pile higher. And this is the living despair
Of those left with nothing but fear. In the garden
The last of the leaves spiral, windblown and free
Which those left behind cannot be

This is the senseless destruction, and this
Is mendacious excuse for revenge. And please do not say
There’s justification, or reason, in ‘eye for an eye’
When everyone’s blind. In the garden
Bird flocks search fields for wasted crops
Which those left behind have not got

Today we have breaking apart. Tomorrow
We will see it continued; the innocents, hostage to terror
While the world waits in horrified limbo, for what’s coming next
As the missiles rain down. In the garden
The bees join in searching for late season nectar
But today; today we have breaking apart

 

Apologies for the despairing tone of that ode; which, as acknowledged, is a parody of the well known poem by Henry Reed, ‘Naming of Parts’.

This was the first of three that he wrote under the Title ‘Lessons of the War’ relating to the second world war; and, if you have not read ‘Naming of Parts’, I recommend a perusal; which will, hopefully, go a long way to explaining my version!

I have been trying to establish how many wars are going on in the world right now. On ‘The Geneva Academy’ website, I discovered that over thirty two countries are involved in an armed conflict.

In Asia these break down to nineteen non – international and two international ( between India and Pakistan and India and China) .

In Europe there are seven armed conflicts; including Russia and Ukraine.

In Latin America there are six armed conflicts; evenly split between Mexico and Colombia.

In the Middle East and North Africa there are forty five armed conflicts.

And in Africa there are more than thirty five International armed conflicts.

But that’s not the end of it. The UN reports that the world is experiencing the highest number of violent conflicts since the second world war. On Wikipedia you can find a seemingly endless list of war, ranging from minor conflicts to full blown carnage. There are Terrorist Insurgency wars (the most common), Civil wars (as ongoing in Afghanistan and several African states), drug wars (Colombia and Mexico) and, last but not least, ethnic violence (as ongoing in South Sudan).

I’m not quite sure why I started off on this tack; or how to satisfactorily wind up this post. Suffice to say that, despite all the evidence to the contrary, I think/hope that the increasing awareness, especially by the young, of what’s going on in our world, expedited by global social media, is reaching into every country on earth, for the first time in living history. Even where despotic regimes control the output of social intercourse, technology can find a way of breaking through the barriers of repression and deadly ideology; and cast an enlightening realization of the incredible mess we are getting our world into.

There is a lot of fear and ignorance around the influence of AI at the moment; but, it can’t be worse than the subjective, biased application of human intervention; and, surely it can’t react with the vengeful emotion to deadly acts of terror; which never improve or mitigate horrific situations.

This old woman might get a bit irritated about increasing remote technological ‘advances’, that can replace pen, paper, reference books and the like. But I recognize that these new tools could help us deal with the challenges coming down the line; and maybe the climate change crisis will be the tipping point that makes us stop and think; when there will be no other choice but to mend our wasteful, blinkered vengeful ways.