November 11, 1918. It doesn't mean a lot to many people, particularly in the US. World War I wasn't our war, not really; we became involved but we barely had a horse in the race. We weren't there for the worst of it, and we didn't learn much of anything, and now no one really remembers why November 11 should be anything other than thanking veterans and possibly a parade. Hell, we don't even celebrate the day in sync with the British commonwealth; they commemorate the day as Remembrance Day now, and it is much more like our Memorial Day (only probably fewer barbecues and drunken fights).
But November 11, almost 100 years ago, the War To End All Wars ended. When WWII ended, we had VE Day and VJ Day. Victory! Victory in Europe, victory in Japan! It's impossible to know whether it was relief, satisfaction, or true exaltation that made everyone celebrate Victory, but it was a celebration of Victory, winged and proud, presenting the laurels and saying that we had won and that they had lost.
November 11, 1918, wasn't like that. There was elation, certainly; one can't fault anyone who had been affected by the war for feeling joy now that it was over. But the day was Armistice Day. That should stick with us, because though the Allied Powers staunchly refused to acknowledge it, and though at the time perhaps it seemed that the day was a day of victory, November 11, 1918 was merely a day of armistice. Of cessation of hostilities. The dictionary defines "armistice" as a cease-fire, a truce. An end, however temporary, to war, to the violence, bloodshed, death, horror, and inhumanity.
Of course, if you know your history at all (and you should) you know that it truly was just an armistice, albeit one which lasted decades. There was a peace treaty signed which laid punitive damages on the "losing" side that could never be repaid or even tolerated, and as such it was not so much a peace treaty as it was both a punishment and an incitement. It was almost as if the Allies felt cheated of their victory through armistice and desired the Central Powers to reject the terms and go back to fighting. Perhaps there is some truth in this, because all the powers that be had to have known that the public were tired of the war, even if they were winning. And the Allies had to have known that their citizens would approve of harsh measures against Germany, but not the arbitrary continuation of war.
There are plenty of arguments both for and against the idea that the Treaty of Versailles caused WWII, and there are arguments that WWI and WWII were really the same war, just with an intermission for everyone to get better at it. That's not the point. If I wanted to argue those points (and I do, sometimes) I wouldn't be writing this in a blog supposedly dedicated to homilies.
November 11, 1918 is in my mind because it should commemorate a cessation of violence. It should not be a paean to victory or a useless trotting out of veterans to be thanked one by one, many of whom were never in a war and are being thanked by people whose closest experience of combat was when they played Call of Duty: Modern Warfare. It should not even be a remembrance of those who have died while serving in the armed forces, unless that were to be used as a stepping stone.
The day commemorates armistice. A cease-fire. The day is buried in baggage, but at the bottom, there is a core. "These men died to end all wars," it says. "They fought and died in places they may never have heard of, for causes that even now can't be completely understood. And today, 95 years ago, the war stopped.
So I'm not thanking veterans today, and I'm not celebrating. Today is a sacred day, a day to remember that war is not the natural state of things and that no one wins a war, they just lose less than the other side. I will keep holding Armistice Day sacred until it's no longer necessary, when All Wars truly have been ended, when Cease-Fire becomes Peace.
