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| Library and Archives Canada |
You could learn a lot about Canada’s national psyche from the country’s enduring fascination with the battle of Vimy Ridge, fought 95 years ago this past week. Canadians fought dozens of major battles during the First World War. Vimy fully deserves the honour it carries in the national memory. But the exclusive attention to Vimy obscures other Canadian achievements even more deserving of honour.
Yet it was this battle that broke the spirit of the German Army in the West. The three Dominions together engaged some 40% of the German army. Being a Canadian, of course, Schreiber underscores his point with a final statistical comparison to the U. Unlike Vimy, the Hundred Days was a strategic as well as tactical victory. And while few would dissent from John Moore’s verdict in Friday’s National Post that the First World War should never have been fought, it’s also true that once fought, it was vital that the Western democracies win.
The last veterans of the First World War are gone, and will be longer gone in August, 2014.
Source: David Frum | NP
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