I read in the newspaper today that various groups are
outraged on learning that boys in Palestine are signing up for a two-week
course of basic military training. According to the story they are being
trained in how to use AK-47 rifles and what to do if a grenade happens to land
nearby (fall flat on the ground). Apparently this is seen as anti-Israeli
provocation. I didn’t see it that way.
In fact, it reawakened memories long since forgotten. In
grade nine we boys were issued Lee-Enfield rifles and taught marksmanship.
True, the weapons had been modified so that they fired .22 calibre bullets and
had no magazines, but, otherwise, they were the same weapons used by the
Canadian and British military for the previous 40 years through two world wars.
We were also issued Second World War khaki military field uniforms and ordered
to polish the new boots until the dimples disappeared in an even shine. We had
basic parade drill and presented arms with more or less precision.
After the Americans invaded and failed to take Cuba the
Russians, in response, attempted to arm Cuba with nuclear-enabled missiles.
Even though America had surrounded Russia with similar weapons, this was seen
as extreme provocation. As a consequence, we secondary school kids were herded
into school basements and told that if we crouched on the floor with our hands
behind our heads and necks we would be safe from the nuclear bombs that were
certain to fall on us any day now.
Learning to fire Lee-Enfield rifles and marching around in
uniforms as if we were real soldiers was seen as perfectly normal behaviour
when I was growing up. I don’t recall anyone suggesting that this was
anti-American (Canada’s traditional invaders) provocation. And certainly,
learning how to prevent being turned into plasma by a nuclear blast by placing
one’s hands behind one’s head was not seen as some sort of anti-Russian
propaganda.
Ah, but we live in a brave new world where the teaching
children lies about how to survive nuclear blasts or adjacent grenades is now a
sinister propaganda tool. Even worse, showing teenagers how to load and fire a
military weapon, whether of British or a Russian origin, is a threat to world
peace. Funny how these things change.
