100 years ago today, an armistice was signed ending the First World War. Millions of lives lost and minimal results, nobody could be said to be true "winners" of this conflict, which was sparked by dangerous nationalism and pride. Lest we forget where nationalism leads, I'd like to present a tabulated list of the dead:
Great Britain: 997,000
France: 1.39 million
Italy: 340,000
United States: 116,000
Russia: 1.7 million
Germany: 1.85 million
Austria-Hungary: 1.2 million
Turkey: Approximately 350,000
Ask yourself if such tremendous loss of life is really worth it to prove one's superiority over another. These losses are staggering, and one can easily say that a generation in Europe in particular was wiped out. Both of my cousins, two brothers from upstate New York, enlisted, and both were killed. Let's honor the dead, and never forget the tragedy that tore Europe apart for four years 100 years ago.
On an interesting side note, I do have the newspaper showing the pictures of my two cousins who enlisted. One was an infantryman, the other a machine gunner. Robert, the infantryman, had enlisted, and his older brother Peter had tried to get a draft exemption as he was needed on the farm after their father died, but the exemption was denied, so he too went over to France.
Peter, the machine gunner, died first at the age of 28 during German shelling on July 15, 1918, which was the opening date of the Second Battle of the Marne.
Robert survived a bit longer, being killed on September 6th, 1918, at the age of 25. He died during the American followup to the German retreat after the Battle of Fismes had been fought.
