Anzac Day

[mightytiges]

Hope all the diggers including my Uncle Stan have a great day despite the crappy weather down here in Melbourne.

Lest we forget!

[WilliamPowell]

Attended the Dawn Service again this year - it is now a tradition for us

Got drenched but don't care, compared to what my Grandfather and all his mates would have went through in WW1 in France as well what all other soldiers have been through getting wet seems like nothing

Had a fantastic army brekkie afterwards at the "Gun Firers" breakfast 

Would recommend everyone going at least once it is a such a humbling & moving experience

As I said it is now a tradition for us

LEST WE FORGET

[Penelope]

the problem is we do forget, otherwise we wouldn't continue the tradition of sending our finest to die in pointless conflicts, sadly

[Gigantor]

I guess ANZAC day does make us sit up and take notice of the futility of war ,even if its just one day in the year

[dwaino]

I watch some pretty moving docos on Nat Geo and History Channel this morning. Almost lost it by the end of one, glad the missus wanted to go shopping when the shops opened otherwise I might of become a mess.

Best and most meaningful day of the year. My Nan's uncle was in the Aussie 9th in Tobruk and my step father's grandfather was in the 21st Brigade on the Kokoda trail. I always think it's moving when I think about had they lost their battles, died, or anything happened differently, the chain of events would of changed friends and family of mine may not be around here today.

While it's good to remember our own blokes (it's ANZAC day after all ), it's good to remember soldiers of the other forces too. All the Turks knew was a bunch of blokes from the other side of the world were invading their turf. I have a massive WWII fascination and used to collect a bit of German militaria (rubble and uniforms). I was reading a compilation of dairy entries from rank-and-file blokes serving in the 2nd SS Panzer Div, and some others of the 15th and 21st Panzer Divs (Rommel's Afrika Korps), and as far as they knew they were fighting evil.

War sucks and everyone loses. Lest we forget.

[Penelope]

you raise a valid point about us invading turkey Dwain, one i'm sure very few Australians ever pauses to consider, particularly those going and waving the australian flag at rock concerts on the Gallipoli penisnula each anzac day

One story that i cant get out of my my mind is Mustafa Attaturk telling his men that he does not want want them to fight, but to die, knowing that re-enforcements were on the way and they had to hold off the anzacs until then. I simply cant imagine what it would be like to go to battle under those orders.

War sucks, full stop.

[dwaino]

I think it was a Mustafa quote, and I can't remember the exact words but it went something like, "God gave us this land to the Turks, and we will fight any invader on Turkish soil." Something to that effect. They really had no idea. And I bet most Aussie's wouldn't have a clue who Mustafa Ataturk was either. I couldn't find the quote I was looking for, but searching for it I found, "Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives.. You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours.. You the mothers who sent their sons from far away countries wipe away your tears. Your sons are now living in our bosom and are in peace. Having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well." Makes one start to think, what is the point? After needlessly killing each other, we just became friends anyway. There is a great photo somewhere too of Simpson having a smoke with a Turkish soldier during the truce when they silenced the guns to collect their dead.

In one of the docos I was watching today, they were talking about the original attack when the British tried sending ships up the Dardanelles to attack Istanbul directly. The reason Churchill sent those particular ships was because they were old and they could afford to be lost. Like everyone in his position, they didn't stop to think that the men and women on these ships were not old and dispensable.

[Penelope]

there is a monument on the peninsular with those words from attaturk.
he was really an enigma. I could not ever imagine any of our leaders saying such conciliatory words for invading soldiers, yet he banished thousands of armeniens to perish in the desert after the the war.

[mightytiges]

there is a monument on the peninsular with those words from attaturk.
he was really an enigma. I could not ever imagine any of our leaders saying such conciliatory words for invading soldiers, yet he banished thousands of armeniens to perish in the desert after the the war.

Some might say battles between siblings or neighbours are more unforgiving and hatreds linger on and on than battles between distant strangers. The Turks would've known the Anzacs were part of a plan to open a warm seaport and pathway via the Black Sea to help supply the Russians on the Eastern European front who were getting hammered by the Germans. We weren't after Turkish territory to keep for ourselves. The Greeks, Italians, Armenians and Kurds (the latter still to this day) on the other hand wanted respective parts of modern day Turkey they considered were historically theirs and that the Turks had taken from them in the past. After WWI, an armistice treaty handed territory to these countries but Attaturk and his Turkish nationalists resisted, and after the Greco-Turkish war, Turkey preserved the territory it now holds via a new treaty and pretty much a large chunk of the Greek populated area of Ionia was forcibly migrated out of Turkey and sent to Greece. The Turkish invasion of Cyprus in the 1960s? just kept the hatred burning between the two nations. I think the Greek parliament in 2000 still held onto the Greater Greece claims but of course they have more pressing matters on the home front to worry about now. Turkey is still trying to fight off territory claims by the Kurds who they consider are terrorists. Thank god we don't have to deal with any of the crap.