Ninety years ago today
Ninety years ago today, at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the War to End All Wars came to a close. Although its carnage was eclipsed by the global disaster that followed twenty years later, the devastation of the First World War was the worst ever seen up to that point.
As I discussed in this post, Dad and I visited the battlefield at Verdun, France a few years ago. After ninety years, the landscape still bears scars of the destruction brought down on that region (my photos of the battlefield are here). The place now bears a certain serenity, and the horror of it all is now muted by the passage of time. Still, after nine decades, World War I stands as an indelible reminder that humans are capable of unimaginable destruction, and sometimes for no good reason at all.
Regardless of whether a given war is justifiable, our soldiers serve this nation, they do their jobs with honor and dignity, and sometimes they give their lives for their country. They deserve our undying gratitude.