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Odds & Ends 2001
The Choice
To Fight Or Not To Fight
During the week of the terrorist attack on the USA, I listened to the account of a contemporary, who made the decision in the last war, after having been called up for military service, to obey his convictions of being a pacifist.
I recall this was an eighteen year old, an unusual combination of a first class schoolboy rugby player and a sensitive pianist. His two elder brothers had been killed in the Great War and he had already experienced the death of some of his contemporaries. At school he already had doubts about serving in a combative role. He knew the writings of Wilfred Owen, the Great War poet, and Siegfried Sassoon, and was advised by a pacifist school chaplain who was also a doctor.
Events overcame him and he was called up. He confided his misgivings to the regimental chaplain, who tried to arrange a compromise and have him transferred to the Royal Army Medical Corps. The services do not cope with those who change their mind. He was arrested, charged and remanded for trial by court martial. While he was in military custody, he was subject to abuse by military police. He was ordered to pick up his rifle. On refusing, the soldiers threatened that they would 'wrap it round his neck' - all too reminiscent of Christ's ordeal from those soldiers. At his trial he was sentenced to a long period of hard labour. In the Great War he would have probably been shot.
He was transferred to a civilian prison. There the harsh regime was made worse by an extremely sparse diet. He recalls scrabbling for crumbs on the matting floor. In prison he applied to join the Friends Ambulance and was accepted. He then had to appear before a military tribunal, where he was defended by his former headmaster, now a colonel in the army. His plea was accepted but meanwhile he had contracted tuberculosis, probably due to the rigors of hard labour and hunger.
A listener asked him: "What if everyone took a similar view?" His answer was that it won't be a choice of an individual according to his or her conscience. It is no easy options; the Friends Ambulance were noted for bravery in Burma, going unarmed into the jungle, picking up the wounded.
We are now faced with the ongoing uncertainty over the action that may be taken following the terrorist attack. Many of us have doubts and fears. We may see our loved ones closely involved in a combative role. We should have compassion for those who do not support military action.
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
Wilfred Owen
Keith Hall (40-45)