Armistice Day

At 11 am on this day, 100 years ago, in a railway carriage in Versailles, German and Allied representatives met to sign the agreement which would officially end the First World War. The terms of the agreement were harshly punitive, a piece of spite on behalf of the victors, which aimed to ensure peace by making the prospective cost of any future war unbearable for Germany. Instead of its intended effect, however, by destroying the German economy and by unnecessarily humiliating and embittering the shattered German people, the terms of the armistice virtually guaranteed the continuation of the conflict in 1939. The Second World War can be accurately thought of therrefore, as a further phase of the great conflict which began in 1914.

The origins of the "Great" war lie in the jostling for power of those European blocs who had already presumed their right to annex most of the globe and help themselves to its resources. Fearful of the consequences of provoking each others' armies, the various European nations had evolved an intricate network of about equally powerful alliances bound together by treaties which they believed would prevent conflict. When an unbalanced Serb nationalist killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the equilibrium between the opposing factions tipped ever so slightly. The ambitions and jealousies of the various treaty partners were unleashed and the treaties designed to prevent war dragged them all into one, and, with them, most of the rest of the globe. Including us, as far away from Europe as you can get. With adolescent enthusiasm our young colony responded by feeding 100,000 young men into the meat grinders of France, Belgium and Turkey.

In Dunedin we have The Cenotaph in Queens Gardens, a towering pillar, honouring those of our city who died. (why are wars usually remembered by building big, tall pillars? Go figure) Over the last few months 4000 plain white crosses have been arrayed underneath it, in memory of the approximately 4000 Otago men who died fighting between 1914 and 1918. Inscribed on the pillar at its foundation in 1924 are the words, "The Glorious Dead". The the words are ironically flanked by axes bound in bundles of sticks: the emblem which would, only a decade after the pillar's erection, be adopted by the Fascists. The armistice entered into by the fathers would be the principal cause of the war fought by their sons.

What is so glorious? These young men died in a melee caused by ambition and pride and stupidity on the other side of the globe. The issues leading to war in 1914 were not worth the cost of one life, let alone the 4,000 from Otago who went bravely away, never to return; let alone the 18,058 who died from all of New Zealand; let alone the 17-20 million who died globally in the first war. The sons of Otago memorialised by all those crosses didn't die for a great cause. They were needlessly slaughtered for no good reason at all. It wasn't glorious. It was utterly, despicably, wantonly, wickedly stupid. Which is why we should never, ever forget them, nor the people who sent them.

Photos. All taken with Nikon D7100

1. Tokina 12-24 F4 @ 12mm; 1/500 f10; iso200. I liked the way the two paths through the crosses connected them with the town beyond. I shot this, as usual, in RAW, which enabled me to deal with the picture’s massive problem: the foreground was in deep shade from the surrounding trees. The area was too big for a flash to be of any help. So, in post processing, I boosted exposure by a stop and a half then made 3 versions of the RAW file, differing from each other by 1 stop, and combined them to wring every last bit of dynamic range from the file.

2. Tokina 12-24 F4 @ 12mm; 1/1600 f10; iso200
3. Nikkor 18-200 @18mm, 1/320 f10, iso200
4 Nikkor 50 1.8G 1/250 f10

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