#223 – Going to Afghanistan

/in , /by

Saturday we went to a surprise party for a close relative who’s going to Afghanistan for a one-year Army assignment. The relative, a very fine man, is an engineer in civilian life, and has 23 years in the military, including active duty in the Gulf War, and for a majority of his career, primarily in the Army Reserves. He joined the Army out of high school; the Army gave him a positive direction in life.
Even he does not know exactly where he will be posted, or exactly when he will leave. Or at least he is not free to say so. This is how security works.
His wife and two kids remain behind, and he will be on leave from his job as director of engineering for a city.
Saturday was a family and community day. I’m guessing there were 50 or more who dropped in during the day. It was a low key gathering.
Afghanistan.
It was the bombing of Afghanistan which began October 7, 2001, which brought me out into the peace movement. Nine years ago. I couldn’t see any good coming out of that action, even though the target was the mystery-to-soon-be-named-al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden, the terrorists who arguably unleashed 9-11; as well as the Taliban, who had harbored them.
I went to a small anti-bombing protest at the State Capitol at the end of that first week, not knowing anyone. My dominant memory of that event was and remains the angry people across the street who were brandishing U.S. flags almost like weapons and were trying to shout down the speakers for peace. That is where it began for me.
I didn’t know much about Afghanistan except it was a huge country, and it had outlasted numerous encroachments by outsiders, most recently the Russians, and earlier the English.
It was one thing to bomb Afghanistan; quite another thing to control it.
Back then, there was overwhelming support of the action to bomb Afghanistan. It was a public relations bonanza for the warriors in the then-administration. I have kept the newspaper clip Bombing of Afghanistan Oct 7 2001 which described the mood in the country at the time. It is a short article, worth re-reading, particularly in context with today.
Fast forward: after a relatively short engagement in Afghanistan, and with Osama bin Laden still at large, the U.S. focus went towards Iraq, a country not involved in 9-11, and not possessing the purported weapons of mass destruction. Millions of Iraqis were at minimum displaced from their homes; immense numbers killed simply for being Iraqis in Iraq. Iraq was declared a victory (it is easy to make such declarations), and in much more recent times the focus has turned back to Afghanistan.
There was virtually no talk about Afghanistan in that nice home last Saturday afternoon. People know that the military going there are at risk. Most likely also know that the conflict is militarily unwinnable but, at the same time, politically impossible to disengage from. It is a bit like being caught in a live trap. You are alive, but you aren’t free.
The “no talk” rule was in full force and effect on Saturday. It didn’t need to be posted at the door.
We wished our soldier well. He will do a great job at whatever he does. I suspect his parents are very worried, but they aren’t about to show that.
Best we can hope for is that the GI will come home safely.
And that some honorable way can be found out of what will most certainly be a quagmire for our country, long term.

#211 – Dick Bernard: Creating History, "Fact" vs "Story"

/in , , , , , , , /by

“History: 1) an account of what has happened; narrative; story; tale.”
Websters New Universal Unabridged Dictionary, 1979 edition
July 8, about 6 p.m., I arrived at Bismarck ND, where I was to attend a French in America conference. My father was 100% French-Canadian, and I’d just completed a 500 page book on his family’s history, so the conference was a great reason for a trip (and an excellent experience, by the way.)
I was tired, but before I checked into my hotel I wanted to find the site where General Henry Hastings Sibley and troops had reached the Missouri River in the summer of 1863. A long-ago relative, Private Samuel Collette, had been one of the 2800 troops under Sibley’s command. I found the site (General Sibley Campground 3 or 4 miles south of downtown Bismarck at the south end of Washington Street). The next day I was at the ND Capitol grounds, and saw a large pie-shaped monument on the grounds. It turned out to be a map of the last part of the Sibley campaign. The Sibley venture had been, apparently, a very important event in the history of North Dakota, which was to become a state 26 years later. His unit had been in what is now Bismarck July 29-August 1, 1863.

Map of the last portion of the Gen. Henry Hastings Sibley Campaign in 1863


There were some likely facts leading to my interest: I had Samuel Collette’s military records from 1862-63; I now had seen the end-point of the campaign he’d been part of, and knew the many stops in between Minnesota and the Missouri River.
Beyond this, everything was story: the varied interpretations of why Sibley went west, and their meaning etc. etc. Such it is with history: as the above definition suggests, history is simply a collection of stories, perhaps illuminating, perhaps confusing or deliberately distorting.
The family history I had written, which was many years in the making, is many things. But a primary celebration of the history was the recording of stories, particularly of my common folk ancestors: a collective story which included their own recollections, or second or third hand recollections, or documents or written records. I was lucky in that I had a cadre of past and present family members who seemed to have an interest in recording people and events, including through photographs. But my reality is similar to most common families: people lacked literacy, or the time, or the interest, to record things that later generations might find interesting or significant. And every family has pieces of their tale that they’d rather not tell – the hidden and untold story is part of every narrative, without exception. So, for me, the task became assembling a puzzle from assorted scraps of evidence. A very significant portion of those 500 pages were stories recorded by various people over many years. I didn’t call these “facts”; rather they were “stories”. I acknowledged the missing pieces in the book….
On the final afternoon of the conference, I “skipped school” for a couple of hours, just to drive around Bismarck, a city I had last visited 25 years earlier.
Driving down the Main Street of the town, towards the Missouri River bridge, I saw a most unusual sign:

My curiosity was peaked, and I set out to find this Memorial. There was a monument (below) and on two plaques at this Memorial were two very carefully written narratives defining the composers view of the “Global War on Terrorism”. The words on the plaques are reprinted below, and speak for themselves. The Memorial was dedicated September 11, 2009.

Global War on Terrorism Memorial


Were these indelible words representations of “facts”, or were they, simply, some unnamed person’s “story” – a carefully written attempt to fashion a heroic one-sided narrative of a troubling and divisive time in United States history? This “War on a Word” (Terrorism) almost ruined us economically, and severely tarnished our reputation as an ethical society through things like sanctioned use of torture. We lost standing as a part of the world community; and reputation lost is difficult to regain.
Did the permanent recording of heroic victorious words in bronze, in a public space, with a sign showing the way to them, elevate them from “story” into “fact”, more significant than other stories? Or were they, rather, simply an attempt to diminish or eliminate other stories, perhaps even more factual, from the community consciousness?
Earlier, in driving around Bismarck, on individual lawns I saw Peace signs on a couple of lawns. I wonder what their opinion of that Terrorism Memorial might be.

Peace sign in Bismarck ND July 9, 2010


Let the conversation continue.
*****
The Story as told by the plaques at the Global War on Terrorism Memorial:
#1
THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERRORISM
Operation Enduring Freedom
Operation Enduring Freedom began October 7, 2001, in Afghanistan following al-Qaeda’s attack on the United State on September 11, 2001, and has also included operations in the Philippines, Horn of Africa, Trans Sahara, and Kyrgyzstan. In October, 2006, NATO forces, led by the United States and United Kingdom, assumed command of Coalition forces. Afghani Presidential elections were held in October, 2004, and parliamentary elections followed in October, 2005. The enemy continues to resist the elected government of Afghanistan and Coalition efforts to secure freedom and democracy for Afghan citizens.
Operation Iraqi Freedom
Operation Iraqi Freedom began on March 20, 2003, with the liberation of Iraq. Coalition forces from 40 nations participated in military action in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. By mid-April, 2003, Coalition forces began restoring civil services, despite violence aimed at the new Iraqi government and Coalition forces. In 2006 the first democratic elections were held. On June 29, 2009, United States forces withdrew from Baghdad and other cities across Iraq.
“We seek peace, knowing that peace is the climate of freedom” Dwight Eisenhower
#2
Memorial to the Fallen
in the Global War on Terrorism
This Memorial is dedicated to the members of the United States military and Department of Defense civilians who lost their lives in the Global War on Terrorism. It is a place where families, friends and fellow citizens can reflect on the lives of the Fallen and remember their service to our country. It was funded through the generosity of businesses, organizations and individuals throughout North Dakota and across the United States. The memorial is a joint venture between the City of Bismarck and the North Dakota National Guard.
The Battlefield Cross
The Battlefield Cross has been used as a visible reminder of a deceased comrade since the Civil War. The helmet and identification tags signify the Fallen. The inverted weapon with bayonet signals a time for prayer, a break in the action to pay tribute to the Fallen. The combat boots represent the final march of the last battle.
“We will always remember. We will always be proud. We will always be prepared, so we we will always be free.” President Ronald Reagan

#207: Johan van Parys: Thoughts on Forgiveness

/in , , , , , /by

Dr. Johan van Parys is Director of Liturgy at Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis, and the lead article in the Sunday June 27 church bulletin was this powerful commentary.
Thoughts on Forgiveness
Paris is one of those magical cities. No matter what time of year one visits, the city has a way of capturing a person’s imagination. I don’t quite remember how many times I have been to Paris. Growing up in neighboring Belgium it made for an easy trip. Surprisingly, there was one monument never visited until my last trip there: the Mémorial des Martyrs de la Déportation, the memorial to those deported from France during World War II.
My grandfather and the other men working in my grandmother’s shoe factory were deported to Nazi camps because she refused to make shoes for the Nazi army. The family home was occupied and my grandmother and great-grandmother were made to work for Nazi officers. When my grandmother died, I inherited her papers including the moving letters my grandfather sent from the camp as well as letters from one of the officers who had occupied my grandmother’s house. The latter include descriptions of the devastation of his village; about the death of his two sons; and about the horrors of the war. Most striking was his plea for forgiveness.
Until I read these letters I had been unable to visit any death camps or memorials for those who died in the Second World War. After getting a glimpse of the power of forgiveness that was revealed to me through these letters, I was moved to learning and visiting. Thus I went to the Mémorial des Martyrs de la Déportation. It was an amazing experience.
At the edge of one of the islands in the river Seine a narrow and steep stairway leads down to the memorial courtyard. A low-level fenced-in window is the only place that allows a glimpse of the outside. A severe sculpture representing imprisonment and torture hangs in front of this window. On the opposite side, a narrow door guarded by two oppressive columns barely allows entrance into the memorial itself.
The main installation, on the far end of the foyer, is a long narrow corridor lined with 200,000 quartz crystals, one for each man, woman, child deported from France by during the Second World War. A rod-iron gate prevents entrance. An eternal flame burns at the very end of the corridor.
This extraordinary building captures those who enter it from the very first moment, guiding them down the narrow steps, through the courtyard, into the foyer, to the wall of remembrance and the eternal flame. This journey takes each person through the reality of the suffering of these particular people and all human suffering, to the light of hope for humanity which too often seems untenable and almost absurd.
My walk back to the hotel took me past Notre Dame Cathedral. I could not but enter and light a candle for all those who are suffering at the hand of other people. I stayed for Vespers and prayed “Thy Kingdom Come” with more fervor than ever before.

#206 – Dick Bernard: Reflecting on the American Flag

/in , , , , /by

Monday of this week I delivered a 500 page family history to the printer. The history is of my Dad’s French-Canadian family, in North America since the early 1600s. That’s a lot of history. The 500 pages can only be a summary.
The last photo I selected and inserted was the one below, the dedication of a flagpole at the Apartment Community of Our Lady of the Snows in Belleville IL. The dedication was Memorial Day, 1998, six months after my Dad died. The flagpole was donated by we siblings to honor the memory of our Dad, Henry L. Bernard, and his brother Frank Bernard, who went down with the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor, Dec. 7, 1941. The first flag hoisted up the flagpole – the flag pictured – had 48 stars. It had draped the casket of Dad’s Dad, another Henry, in 1957. Grandpa had served in the Spanish-American War in the Philippines 1898-99.

At Our Lady of the Snows, Belleville IL, Memorial Day, 1998


I have often seen the flag used as we used it in 1998: to remember somebody’s service to country. Whether the cause served was just or unjust (a very legitimate matter of debate), the question of service is less debatable.
In more recent years, particularly post 9-11-01, there has been (in my opinion) a reprehensible turn in the business of “Flag” as a litmus test of “Patriotism”. The Flag has become a weapon to be brandished against those with a different point of view. In the recent series, the “Story of US” as portrayed on the History Channel, I saw General Tommy Franks talking about the three F’s as basic American values: Family, Faith and Flag. The portrayal, and choice of portrayer – Franks – turned me off. It was definitely an “us vs them” portrayal; the primacy of military might, viewed through the flag.
Like it or not, military is part of every one of our family’s lives. I’ve been military myself. I didn’t go in to set about killing someone from somewhere else, or being killed, but that could have been my fate. I went in because I knew I’d have to go sometime (the Draft), and best to get it over with. Luckily, my decision to join when I did made me a Vietnam era veteran, when service in Vietnam was a coveted assignment…. Not all were so fortunate.
In the previously mentioned history, I noted that all of my male ancestors who came to Nouvelle France (Quebec) were in one way or another military people. They had other skills, yes, but what got them on the boat from France to to-be Canada was mostly related to military – to secure the new territory for France, and then protect it from intruders.
One of my first ancestors in what is now the Twin Cities joined the military unit whose job was to chase the Indians back across the Missouri River in 1863. He was the first ancestor to visit what is now North Dakota. His service record is about the only history I have of him. Luckily his unit was not involved in any massacre of the Indians, but nonetheless, he was part of the force that took the Indians land…and gave my ancestors theirs.
I’m sure the flag was involved there, too.
This little writing won’t dispose of the flag issue, or of the issues relating to War and Peace. At the same time, I think all sides need to think this issue through.
I close with a memory of a photo I took in a farmyard in Finland in June, 2003. We were on a cruise of the Baltic countries, a few days later we were in St. Petersburg, Russia, a month after George W. Bush had been there. This was not long after the war on Iraq commenced. One of the people on the cruise seemed a particularly belligerent America Firster. We were touring a Finnish farm, and the guy was there, wearing his American Flag jacket. The facial expression of the Finnish girl in the background, in context with what I saw before that photo, is priceless.

Finnish Farmyard, June, 2003


Have a good fourth of July

#204 – Dick Bernard: The "War Parties"?

/in , , , /by

A recent e-mail conversation on my own e-list has been focusing on the general question: “poll [the others on the list] and see which branch of the War Party they belong to: the Republicans or Democrats…?”
So, I asked the question, and got a range of responses.
If only things were so simple as labeling a group and then dismissing everyone in the group because of the label stuck to it….
Since I opened shop on this blog in March, 2009, I’ve identified myself as a “moderate pragmatic Democrat”. So, what does this mean in my own real world?
Tuesday night I attended – and volunteered at – a very successful summer picnic for our local Senate legislative district. It was a gathering for Democrats, and there were several hundred of us there. Every major candidate for Minnesota state and local offices showed up at the picnic and spoke. Those who found themselves scheduled in two or three or more places at once (there were a couple) sent others to represent them. These candidates are impressive people, ready to do the adult work that governing our complex society demands.
You would have seen me around the picnic. I stood out for a couple of reasons: I was wearing my DFL Senior Caucus t-shirt (I’m active in that recognized Democratic Party caucus); and I was also wearing my Veterans for Peace cap (I’m a member of that group as well), on which is affixed a button saying I “vote in honor of a veteran“, in my case, “my vote honors” Uncle Frank Bernard, who went down with the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor. At the Secretary of State’s website I have written tributes to two WWII veterans, Marvin Campbell and Lynn Elling.
But in my case, it would be pretty hard to typecast me (and I think I’m a pretty typical person, Democrat, Republican or otherwise.) I’m something of a typical Democrat, I guess.
I would never have learned about Veterans for Peace, had I not been among the 6% of the American public in October, 2001, who challenged our going to war against Afghanistan (I could see no good coming out of the bombing, and I still can’t.) Yes, I was part of only 6%…it was a very, very lonely time.
Yes, most Democratic Representatives in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives supported this War, probably because they were like most people back then. Their decision, while I think it was foolish, was born out of personal conviction that it was the right thing to do at the time. In addition, it was likely a political “death wish” to vote against War then…and even now…people aren’t very well educated for Peace.
Tuesday night, none of the speakers focused on, or even mentioned to my recollection, things like “war”, “terrorists”, the like. Mostly they focused on concerns that ordinary people have today: jobs, education, environment, health care. Things like that horrible catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico tend to divert attention from other issues…and there are a lot of other issues in addition to the War issue.
The next afternoon I visited with a friend who’s been hospitalized a long time, about to be moved to an extended care home for hoped for rehabilitation. While I was there, his sons came in, and talk got around to Peace issues – Verlyn is an old-school peace activist.
One son suggested that the risk of death for American soldiers in Afghanistan is less than getting killed in Washington D.C. and he was probably right. The other said today’s kids don’t have to risk being drafted, and they are constantly entertained, and not easily made to be interested in stuff like killing fields in far away places. Neither son was raising comments to ‘bait’ anyone; they were simply observations, which anti-War folks dismiss at peril. They gave me another insight about justifying war these days. If you can forget about collateral damage: never-ending psychological consequences of being in war, destruction of other peoples, destruction of our own economy, destruction of a sense of global good-will, war can be justified as relatively cheap and even safe. Plus, it is a good source of jobs. The anti-War movements marketing pitch needs to be very seriously looked at. Preaching to the choir is not good enough.
The War issue is, I would suggest, a very, very complicated issue…there are few around now who actively promote War, and similarly very few who think War is a useful way to resolve problems or assure our future.
But that picnic on Tuesday was full of people like myself, who either are veterans themselves, or know people in their own family or other circles who have served in the military.
I reject the notion that the Democratic Party is simply a version of the “War Party”.
The Republicans and everyone else can speak for themselves.
Posts for June 25 and June 27 directly relate to this topic.

#191 – Dick Bernard: A Pleasant Spring Day in the Country May 4, 2000

/in , /by

We had our breakfast in the hotel in Krakow the morning of May 4, 2000. We’d been together, the 40 of us**, since April 26, but this day was even more serious than most earlier days had been, and those days had been serious, too: Tabor, Terezin, Prague…. There was not much small talk this day.
We boarded the bus and travelled west out of Krakow towards the Polish town of Brzezinka, 40 miles away. Near Brzezinka we gathered in a parking lot, and entered a place called Auschwitz, filing under the archway with the infamous words “Arbeit Macht Frei“. For us, roughly half and half Christian and Jew, this was not the first visit to a place of the horrors of the Holocaust – there had been several stops before today – but for most of us it was probably the most powerful single event.
May 4 also happened to be my 60th birthday.
As Spring days go, May 4, 2000, was ideal. The trees had leafed out; it was bright sun. But there is something about spending a pleasant day in a place like Auschwitz….
Brzezinka (Oswiecm to the Germans) was actually home to two of the three places in the Auschwitz group. Auschwitz I, where we went under the arch, was basically for Polish prisoners of the Reich.
We spent some somber time there, then it was time for Auschwitz II, a place called Birkenau, where between 1.1 and 1.5 million Jews perished between 1943 and its liberation January 27, 1945.
It is about 1 1/2 miles between Auschwitz I and Birkenau, and we requested and received permission to walk between the two places, most of the route along the same railroad track which transported the Jews to their death. It was a time of pretty intense introspection, there was no frivolity on that walk. For almost all the Jews who entered Birkenau, there was no exit.

A quiet walk on a beautiful day May 4, 2000


I guess you could say that we “toured” Birkenau, but somehow that word doesn’t fit.
We saw the ruins of the ovens which, they said, could efficiently cremate 4415 bodies a day, but which often incinerated twice as many.
In the afternoon, in a pleasant glade between the ruins of the crematory ovens, there was a memorial service. The youngest of our group, and me, the birthday boy, were chosen to light candles to the memory of those who had died in the holocaust. Two of the photos, here, are at that place.
It was a beautiful afternoon, the birds were chirping in the trees surrounding us. Somehow it didn’t match the black and white images of the camp when its sole function was to kill Jews. May 4, 2000, is one of those days whose memory will never leave me.
A memorial service between the ovens....
We’re now 10 years from that day in 2000. Another ten years have passed.
May 4, 2000, was 16 months before 9-11-01 and all that has transpired since that time.
Our group stayed in touch for awhile, but it has been a long time since there was any real contact. Such is how things go, even when you’re together in intense experiences as we were.
Entering the first museum building at Auschwitz one’s eyes encounter George Santayana’s famous quotation: “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it“.
I would like to propose a corollary to all of us: it is not enough to simply remember the past, unless one learns from it for the future, and diligently applies the learnings.
Remembering is not enough.
At night, back at the hotel, I mentioned to the group that my Uncle Frank Bernard was among the first American casualties of WW II, on the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941. In that awful war, WWII, it is said that at least 50,000,000 ultimately perished because of the war. Six million were Jews*. Another nearly six million were Poles.
The records show that the official beginning of the German surrender to the allies began 65 years ago today, May 4, 1945. It would be early September before the Japanese surrendered. Another uncle, my mother’s brother, Navy officer George Busch, was aboard Destroyer DD460 which docked at Tokyo the evening of September 10, 1945.
Until we become more proficient at making Peace than we are at making War; at being friends than being enemies; all is ultimately lost….
I wish I could be hopeful.

Ben and the Memorial Candles within Birkenau


* One of the prayers at Auschwitz, May 4, 2000:
Reader: Silence. Only silence. Waiting for our reply. All of them, waiting. Three million and three hundred thousand Jews lived in Poland before the war.
Congregation: Three million died.
Reader: Two million eight hundred and fifty thousand Jews lived in Russia.
Congregation: More than a million died.
Reader: One and a half million Jews lived in the Balkans and Slavic countries.
Congregation: More than a million died.
Reader: Germany, Austria, France and Italy had six hundred and fifty thousand Jews.
Congregation: Half of them died.
Reader: Rhodes and Cyprus had happy, thriving congregations.
Congregation: The synagogues stand empty now.
Reader: Our brothers and sisters were murdered everywhere in the days of destruction.
Congregation: They died in cities and towns, in villages and fields.
Reader: They died in the night and the fog, they died between dawn and dusk.
Congregation: They died by fire and water, by poison and gun.
Reader: They died alone; but we will not forget them.
Congregation: They died alone; but we will not forget them.
Reader: We will remember them; in reverence, and in silence.
** – We were a delegation from Temple Israel and Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis MN. To my knowledge (I haven’t checked, lately), Temple and Basilica were the first, and probably remain the only, joint Christian and Jew plaque on the remembrance wall at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. That is a testimony to the friendship of Rabbi Joseph Edelheit and Fr. Michael O’Connell.
Postscript June 30, 2010: Note this link: A powerful photo album from Auschwitz with pictures taken when the death camp at Birkenau was in operation..
Here’s a more recent photo album, including photos taken by our fellow pilgrim on our visit to Auschwitz and other places of the Holocaust in April and May 2000. Note #3.

#190 – Dick Bernard: Four Films

/in , , , , , , /by

Someone looking for me would not start at movie theaters: movies are an infrequent destination.
Still, in the past seven days I viewed four films in four very different venues. Each of the films had (and have) diverse messages…beyond the films themselves.
Last Sunday, the destination was The Minneapolis Film Festival showing of a documentary, “The Unreturned” by a couple of young filmmakers. Nathan Fisher, one of the two who made the film, was in attendance. The film covers a topic essentially untalked about: the fact that 4.7 million Iraqis, largely of the middle class, and representing perhaps a sixth of Iraq’s population, were displaced by the Iraq War, mostly to neighboring Syria and Jordan. (Iraq, before the war, was roughly the population and geographical size of California.)
The Unreturned views the world through the lens of several of these refugees, who didn’t want to leave Iraq, and would have wanted to go home to Iraq, but cannot for circumstances beyond their control. At the end of the film, one person in the audience noted that 4.7 million refugees was essentially equal to the population of Minnesota (5 million). This is a huge number, with equivalent impact: like the entire population of Minnesota uprooted and ending up in Wisconsin….
I think the 200 or so of us in the theater last Sunday would agree with the later assessment of this film, ranked among the best in the entire festival.
Monday night, a friend and I hosted a meeting at a south Minneapolis church for 30 representatives from 22 twin cities groups which have an active interest/involvement in Haiti. We showed the film “Road to Fondwa“, which can be watched on-line for free. Road to Fondwa was filmed a couple of years ago by university students. Its theme is rural life in Haiti. Since it was filmed before the earthquake of January, 2010, it shows how life was before Fondwa was devastated (Fondwa is near the epicenter of the quake). I was particularly taken by the notion of “konbit”, a Kreyol work meaning gathering, cooperation, working together. We could use a lot more of that!
Friday afternoon I attended a showing of another Minneapolis Film Fest entry, Poto Mitan, yet another young film makers entry. The Director of this film, a young professor at New York University, concentrates on five Haitian peasant women struggling to survive Haiti’s harsh economic realities. Each of the five women tell their own stories in their own language. Filming began in 2006, and the film was released in 2009. Like all of the other films, this one is subtitled. At this showing, the Director, Dr. Mark Schuller, was with us, and led a discussion afterwards. He’s a very impressive young man.
Then there is the fourth film, actually a 12 hour documentary over a period of weeks on the History Channel. It is called “America: the story of us“, and I was really looking forward to it when the first episode played a week ago Sunday night. My anticipation turned rapidly to disappointment (though I intend to watch the whole thing) because it became obvious that the intent of the film was to portray America’s history in the image of some old conservative politicians and big business and entertainers. The politicians have, so far, been regular on-screen “experts”, and the production apparently is underwritten by a major U.S. bank. It is too early to judge the entire production, but my guess is that this America will be portrayed as a heroic place with few warts, won by free enterprise, guns and military prowess. So be it. I’m waiting to see how the Iraq War will be spun, and the Obama era. Google America the Story of us and find lots of reviews of this epic….
The first three films do one thing that the fourth film does not: they allow the real people to do the speaking about the reality. In the last one, so far, it is only the experts that have the say.
If the youth of this country are represented by the first three filmmakers, we stand a chance.

#147 – Dick Bernard: Avatar

/in , , , , , , , /by

UPDATE January 12, 2010: I have been most intrigued by the assorted interpretations, on all “sides”, about the real meaning of most everything about Avatar. About all I can say is that it serves a useful function in causing thought and (hopefully) conversation. Now, if the assorted “sides” could dialogue with each other about the diverse meanings of the film, now, that would be something. It is now a blockbuster status film. I think it deserves its status. And it is an opening for serious conversation about, particularly, American society and its relationship to the rest of the planet.
A few day ago I made reference to the new film Avatar in this blog.
At the time, I had not seen the film. I went yesterday. I would highly recommend the film as food for thought and for lots of reflective discussion for anyone with even the slightest interest in or concern about the past, present and future of humanity and the planet in general.
Avatar is a high-tech 3D film set far in the future on a planet populated by humanoids similar, I would say, to the indigenous peoples who populated this country and hemisphere 500 years ago, pre-Columbus.
The planet has been targeted for exploitation of an essential new element by a force from the late, great planet earth (to borrow somebodies phrase from long ago.
The earthlings do not, shall we say, represent us as we would like to be seen…on the other hand, they represent us pretty accurately…at least the exploiters who have moved from one objective to the next over the centuries who, in turn, have enlisted our support for things that lay waste to a decent, balanced relationship between the earth and all of its creatures, only one species of which happens to be human.
As we watch the “transformer generation” in Avatar, we are watching ourselves, today, and in especially the last 150 years or so in the U.S., far longer in exploited places like Haiti, where European exploitation began with Columbus over 500 years ago. It is not a pretty sight.
On the other hand, those who we dismiss as Third World, presumably worth less than ourselves, are portrayed well, particularly as their relationship to the earth and each other is concerned. One is reminded of the intimate relationship between the Native Americans and their environment in the time before the introduction of the things that have brought us domination and prosperity.
One can wonder who will get the last laugh as humanity lurches down the road to some final probably destructive destination, perhaps sooner than we like to imagine. Perhaps Jesus’ Beatitudes, the first of which is “Blessed are the Meek” (defined in my grandmothers Bible as the “poor”) are the ultimate inheritors of heaven, to contrast with the present hell on earth visited on so many of them.
For the rich among us, which is most Americans, even those of us who are fairly poor, perhaps we’ve got it as good as it’s going to get…in the end we may trade places with those we now dominate. Nobody knows, just a thought….
Avatar is a long film, nearly three hours, but it is gripping. I found myself wanting popcorn, but not wanting to leave the theatre should I miss something. Those with me in the theatre were equally glued to their seats. Avatar is certainly not an escapist film.
People watching this film can come to their own conclusions. It will be difficult, however, to come to the conclusion that the reality of our lives will serve future generations well.
I recommend this film.

#130 – Dick Bernard: "the gods must be crazy"

/in , , , , , , /by

December 13, 2003, I arrived back from Haiti, all imbued with idealism, but pretty certain that Haiti’s democratically elected government would be deposed, though not sure how or by whom. I had met a lot of people who were standing by President Aristide, even though it was clear that his government was being starved out of existence, unable to really accomplish any of his goals for lack of resources. He and his government had been marked for extinction.
January 11, 2004, the St. Paul Pioneer Press printed a column of mine, which Common Dreams still archives, and which speaks for itself here.
As time went on, it became more and more clear to me that the United States, in alliance with Canada and France, was out to get rid of Haiti’s elected leader and his entire Lavalas party. This ultimately happened late at night February 29, 2004.
A week before the coup was accomplished in Haiti, distinguished Knight-Ridder senior military correspondent Joseph L. Galloway wrote a column appropriately headlined “If U.S. returns to Haiti, get the job done“. Essentially he endorsed the 1915 U.S. “solution” for Haiti, in which the U.S. Marines began their occupation and control of the country for 19 years “Good men and true, and they took and pacified the entire country with a loss of only three Marines killed and 18 wounded” was the essence of his story. He appeared to support the Bush administrations decision to restore democracy by (effectively) destroying the existing democracy (which he referred to as a dictatorship – interesting how words can ‘sing’.)
Haitians of course have a different spin on the reality of those 19 years from 1915-34, and all the years before and after, including the coup d’etat of February 29, 2004, and its fore- and after-effects. But who cares about that? Old news…. Most recently, Aristide’s Lavalas has been denied standing as a political party in upcoming elections for supposedly technical reasons.
The 2004 coup did not bring peace and prosperity to Haiti. Less than a month after President Aristide was safely out of the country, Haiti disappeared as news in the U.S.
In May, 2006, Mr. Galloway and I had a brief e-mail correspondence about the current situation in Haiti. He had just retired from Knight-Ridder, and said, after defending his earlier comments, that “I’ve been going to America’s wars for 41 years…from Vietnam 1965 to Iraq January, 2006. I am not going to study war anymore. Instead, I shall study peace.”
About Haiti, he said “what I said and meant [in the February 22, 2004, column] was that if we went in again we should be prepared to stay and help rebuild a nation and educate a new generation of Haitians to a different kind of politics and governance than they have endured for centuries now…nobody seems willing to invest what is needed to make Haiti something other than a nation of poor people ruled by a very tiny oligarchy.”
Truth be told, U.S. troops scarcely touched Haitian soil during and after the 2004 coup. Nation-destruction was accomplished by U.S. Aid to anti-government de-stabilization folks, while the legitimate Haitian government was economically starved to death.
After the coup, the United Nations, through “Peace-keeping” forces, became and remains the U.S. surrogate in Haiti. It is far too early to tell what changes in direction will come from the Obama administration after eight years of a Bush foreign policy. I have heard that there is now an immense embassy in Haiti, an enduring symbol of American pre-eminence in that still desperately poor country.
I bring this up, now, since most recently Mr. Galloway has argued against U.S. continuing engagement in Afghanistan (here). He is now extolled as a hero of sorts on the Left.
I would like to believe that his motives are pristine and sincere, that he ‘beat his sword into a plowshare” and “won’t study war no more”, but like the Kalahari Bushman who found an empty Coke bottle in the desert, and couldn’t conceive of what in the world it could mean, I’m not sure where (or if) what he says and what he means intersect. I feel like the Bushman and that Coke bottle on the desert floor: “the gods must be crazy”*.
What I see, now, as the “gods” are the “chattering class” – talking heads of all ideological stripes – who are attempting to establish their own version of reality. Left, Right, makes no difference whatsoever.
For now, Mr. Galloway is my sample worthy of study. And he’s not coming across as very real. He is highly respected, deservedly so. I’m hoping that he truly had a conversion of heart in 2006. (I tried to meet him in person in D.C. in May, 2006, but it was a close call…didn’t happen. I’ll hope to get this writing to him where he now resides.)
Meanwhile, I stand by my comments in my blog post on December 1, 2009. The ice is thickening here….
* – Some video clips from the 1980 film “The gods must be crazy” are available on YouTube, for anyone interested.

#127 – Dick Bernard: Pearl Harbor. Once, we were young

/in , , , /by

Comments at the end of this post. Here is the Minneapolis Star Tribune story of the event. My uncle is mentioned in the story. I happened to be next to the reporter who was covering the story, and luckily had an extra copy of the 9 pages of archival materials I had just given Mr. Wentzlaff.
Sunday, December 7, 1941, my Dad’s brother, my uncle Frank, went down with the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Most every Pearl Harbor Day I witness Frank’s death – the explosion of the Arizona is an iconic photograph. Flags can be and often are flown at half-staff this day.
Today, I took the time to go over to the Veteran’s Service Building to meet one of the Arizona survivors. Ed Wentzlaff of Milaca is now 92, two years younger than my Uncle Frank would have been, and a most engaging man. We visited very briefly – he was in demand – and I gave him a packet of information about my Uncle and his time on the Arizona, including the 1938 Thanksgiving dinner menu for the Arizona, a dinner Ed may have had. He recognized the name of the ship commander, Rear Admiral I. C. Kidd who, he said, saved his life. Kidd perished that day, later awarded the Medal of Honor. Ed was taken to safety in Admiral Kidd’s boat.

Ed Wentzlaff, USS Arizona survivor, December 7, 2009

Ed Wentzlaff, USS Arizona survivor, December 7, 2009


Uncle Frank was 26 years old on that fateful December day in 1941. He had been on the Arizona since January of 1935, and in a letter to my Dad, dated November 7, 1941, he talked about a “little girl up in Washington”, probably Bremerton, who he apparently planned to marry.
Ed was to be discharged from the Navy the next day….
The Navy had been good for Frank. It was a job in the 1930s, and not a bad job at that. Three squares, a bunk, and opportunities to see exotic places, like Honolulu. I doubt that being killed in the line of duty was much on his mind on December 6 or before.
Frank Bernard, at right, and his cousin and buddy, Marvin Campbell, July 14, 1935. Soon thereafter Frank entered the U.S. Navy.

Frank Bernard, at right, and his cousin and buddy, Marvin Campbell, July 14, 1935. Soon thereafter Frank entered the U.S. Navy.


Frank and over a thousand others died December 7, and many, including on the USS Arizona, survived.
Marvin Campbell, who idolized his cousin, Frank, was already in the Army December 7, 1941, ending the war as a Colonel, at least for a short time, in charge of a prefecture of Japan. He came home and was a successful businessman and a respected community leader.
Ed has his own story, as do they all, those who died, and those who didn’t. Ed is the third Arizona survivor I’ve been privileged to meet over the years. They each had their stories.
There is no other moral to this story, only to remember and share the story…. You may interpret as you wish.
Comments:
Florence Hedeen: “…[We] were shopping downtown today [Dec. 7] when we entered a store where the TV showed the bombing of Pearl Harbor. I told the manager that my Uncle Frank went down with the Arizona. He quickly offered to turn off the TV, but I said it’s history and we need to remember it. I never knew Uncle Frank, but I’m quite sure that he, like many others who didn’t face the draft, entered the military for the opportunities it offered, not to fight and die. War never ends because there are no winners, only opponents who want to even the score – now and forever, it seems!”
Mel and Lee Berning: “We seem to forget that day in the mist of time and only bring up the terrible events that ended that terrible war. As a first hand witness to several A-tests I hope that we can put a permanent lid on the use of such devices. I hope that the world will never see those sights again and that some misguided political minded nations do not resort to that force.”