The bombs that changed Britain
7 September, 2010
Today, seventy years ago the air raids on London began. “The Blitz” was the code-name of the operation that saw London under incessant fire for 76 consecutive nights, killing more than 43,000 civilians and destroying more than a million houses. Many other British cities were targeted, many other were killed.
And I simply cannot understand. Five years later, possibly in retaliation, the UK and US bombed indiscriminately Dresden in Germany, killing about 25,000 civilians, only few weeks before the end of the war.
But I can only think of these children. Where are them? Did they survive? What happened to them? Were they separated from their alive or dead parents for ever? Were they sent in Australia to be protected by the war and to be abused physically or for child labour ? What are they looking at? They even seems serene! Is this their house? How can they maintain such a noble pose in the midst of such a disaster? Shouldn’t we learn from them? I am trying to imagine what they are thinking then. How can we keep doing this?
When I was a teenager, there was a poster circulating in our rooms. It depicted the silhouette of a soldier falling under fire. A big “WHY?” flagged the eternal unanswered question. I suppose we were still banking on some ’68 hippy, antiwar moods, but “why”? Seriously, why? Can anyone answer with a serious reason why war must still exists? I don’t think so.
I think some of us may think that wars are an “important” thing that only “important” people may understand. When I was younger and rebellious, this was the answer that I got, for example. But the reality is that there is no reason for wars. No legitimate reasons. Could Nazi Germany have been “arrested” before getting too dangerous invading Countries? Maybe? But learning from the past, should we not look for different way of resolving our controversies rather than bombing people and places?
I know, I keep insisting on this maybe trite topic. But I wish I could die one day knowing why we can’t do better than wars.
