by ken svay » Mon Apr 25, 2016 12:00 am
We like our myths. A digger this week said that we should spend more time looking after the victims of our latest wars and less time waving flags. Ex servicemen all over the world get a bum deal. Thatcher didn't want cripples in the Falklands victory parade and in Australia so many quite young men have killed themselves including my friend Bill. The real cost of war comes later when the politicians have used up the boys and don't want to spend money fixing them.
Even after WW2 many diggers never went to reunions, the RSL or marched on Anzac Day. John Howard was responsible for the huge resurgence in interest by the young after about the late nineties. I want to dawn services back in the day when no one went, especially in the Vietnam era.
I have a photo from about 1986 at the dawn service in Perth with my little boy on my shoulders and there were maybe ten thousand there. Nowadays it is more like 40,000. We even let the South Vietnamese veterans March nowadays but the RSL were dead against it- go figure.
We like our myths. A digger this week said that we should spend more time looking after the victims of our latest wars and less time waving flags. Ex servicemen all over the world get a bum deal. Thatcher didn't want cripples in the Falklands victory parade and in Australia so many quite young men have killed themselves including my friend Bill. The real cost of war comes later when the politicians have used up the boys and don't want to spend money fixing them.
Even after WW2 many diggers never went to reunions, the RSL or marched on Anzac Day. John Howard was responsible for the huge resurgence in interest by the young after about the late nineties. I want to dawn services back in the day when no one went, especially in the Vietnam era.
I have a photo from about 1986 at the dawn service in Perth with my little boy on my shoulders and there were maybe ten thousand there. Nowadays it is more like 40,000. We even let the South Vietnamese veterans March nowadays but the RSL were dead against it- go figure.