Sombre Somme

Celebrations of the ninetieth anniversary of the Battle of the Somme are currently being held in France. The number of casualties during this five-month battle at the end of 1916 exceeded 1 million. More than a quarter of a million men were killed or missing in action.

The First World War was a war without purpose. It was started by kings and politicians, who were too proud, stubborn or stupid to admit that they had made a mistake. Jesus told a parable about counting the costs of war.

Or suppose a king is about to go to war against another king. Will he not first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand men to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand? If he is not able, he will send a delegation while the other is still a long way off and will ask for terms of peace (Luke 14:31-32).

I cannot imagine what sort of benefits would justify a million casualties or a quarter of a million deaths.

Nevertheless, when the command was given for the soldiers in the trenches to go “over the top”, they would climb out over the bodies of their fallen comrades and run as hard as they could through the mud until they were cut down by a hail of machine gun bullets. Those who were injured quickly were the lucky ones.

What sort of military commander would order men to die in this way? What sort of political leader could believe that such a waste of life was justified? What I cannot understand is why the men did not refuse to go. Why didn’t they walk a way saying “Fight you own stupid war!”

What caused sensible young men to choose to die for such a pointless cause? What madness swept over them that made them willing to die in such a terrible way. Why were they able to be used as cannon fodder for the foolish plans of politicians and generals? The military commentators say that the soldiers believed that they had “proved themselves”. But what had they proved: that politicians can whip up support for foolish causes?

We should remember the sacrifice of the million men, but we should never glorify such a terrible waste of life. We should also remember that when politicians make terrible mistakes, they still get their statues on Whitehall. Those who died in the mud at the Somme paid the price for the blunders of the politicians. There is very little glory in dying in the mud in a pointless war.