Friday, January 6, 2023

The Darkest Cost Of Our Longest War

Continuing where I left off yesterday, Canada continued to participate in the missions into the former Yugoslavia to bring order into the various countries springing up out of it. In its wake, war criminals would face justice- or avoid it the easy way by suicide.


Here we have a remnant of one of the two planes that flew into the World Trade Centre on September 11th, 2001. A day that changed the world.


Canada went to war in Afghanistan as a result, our longest war, from 2001-2014.


It was a ferocious war fought in deserts, mountains, and valleys, far from home, against an enemy whose world view was a dark one.


This transport was brought back as an exhibit that has its home here. It hit an IED. Miraculously, the soldiers and reporter inside were saved from serious harm- the underside of the main body of the vehicle had been built to withstand this sort of thing.


A remarkable painting by Douglas Laing, painted in 2009. This is War: Canadian Soldiers In Afghanistan, depicting soldiers during Operation Medusa in 2006.


And this is Waiting For Twilight- Patrol Base Wilson, by William MacDonnell in 2008.


A throwback to the nosecone art of the Second World War, this was added to a helicopter.


But in the end, what was it all for?  The very people overthrown by the West early on in the war- the Taliban, whose world view is abominable- are right back in power again. Women and children will suffer the most. Maybe it was hopeless to begin with.

This photograph, of a Canadian soldier interacting with an Afghan child, carries particular poignancy.


A section of the Museum looks at the commemoration of war. Here we concentrate on peacekeepers, with an early model of what ended up becoming the national peacekeeping monument seen here.


And at the heart of this space is a model of the National War Memorial.

42 comments:

  1. That war in Afghanistan is still going on, is it. Will last forever. Some never learn to get along.

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  2. Sometimes I wonder whether all these wars are worth fighting and what benefits they bring to the citizens and nations.

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  3. ...do we ever take the time to count all of the costs of war?

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  4. Tension in the Balkans is on the rise again. It never ceases. And we have handed Afghanistan back to the Taliban to inflict their barbarism anew.

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  5. It is sad these war seem to be never ending. What a waste! Take care, enjoy your day and happy weekend!

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  6. It is hard to imagine any vehicle withstanding an IED. Thank you for sharing!

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  7. Es una buena labor, la de mantener la paz.

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  8. It's hard to imagine a world without war.

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  9. I was pleased to hear that the people in that vehicle survived the explosion.

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  10. The long siege and quite the exhibit ~ neat photos ~

    Wishing you good health, laughter and love in your days,
    A ShutterBug Explores,
    aka (A Creative Harbor)

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  11. Your national war memorial is especially beautiful. I don't know what will happen to Afghanistan in the end. It doesn't look good.

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  12. It is the first time I get to see real life photos from Afghan war

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    1. It was documented, but because it's more fresh in the past we tend to not think of it in museum terms.

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  13. I did like the paintings you shared by Douglas Laing and William MacDonnell.

    All the best Jan

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  14. The facts about the war with Afghanistan made me stop and think. A long, long war which has achieved little.

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  15. Such great history lessons you give us William.

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