Echoes In Eternity

For the majority of my life, I have been a student of the Second World War. I always will be, too. After all, it is the “good” war that justifiably, for the purpose of a succinct description, pitted the forces of freedom and righteousness versus atrocious evil. In correlation, the post-war era, particularly the Korean War and Cold War, is intrinsically associated with it. In recent years, though, I have become more attuned to and fascinated by the First World War. To be honest, I previously had never given the war its deserved acknowledgment. For unclear reasons, despite my grandfather and his brother having served, it never made any sense to me and never held much interest for me.

Of course, profoundly linked to the Cold War, I have studied the Vietnam War. In fact, my undergraduate thesis concentrated on the Tonkin Gulf incident. Yet, Ken Burns’ latest PBS documentary, The Vietnam War, recalled for me the remarkable connection to the First World War. Officially, the United States entered the Vietnam conflict as a main combatant in 1965; realistically, the war had started decades earlier for the Vietnamese at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. In that singular event, not only was the seed planted for the next world war but also the “forgotten” Korean and the “quagmire” Vietnam to follow. For the latter, at least, pivotal moments highlighted in Burns' documentary did not make it inevitable until too late.

Inconceivably, numerous problems the world faces today, over a hundred years later in 2017, can be directly traced to the First World War. While the Second World War may have been the “good” war - and make no mistake, anti-semitism, Holocaust denial and the debate over nuclear proliferation sadly linger to this day - the repercussions of its predecessor still haunts the landscape of current foreign policy and international relations. Ideas about empire, nationalism, colonialism, self-determination, to name a few, are very much prevalent in tactful discussions, heated exchanges and direct clashes between the world’s nations and their citizens. Issues that engulfed the world in catastrophic war a century ago.

Thus, what we do now will not only affect the next generation, but also the one to follow. History has given us a roadmap for the consequential outcomes of those actions and decisions. Now is the time to choose wisely. Frankly, if history is any indication, I give humanity only a modest chance of learning from the past...because there always is some asshole seeking to bet against the odds in their favor. For as Albert Einstein so eloquently warned, “I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.”

©2017 Steve Sagarra