There is a line in the "Godfather Part 3" where Michael Corleone says: “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in!”
With the recent escalation of conflicts in the world like Ukraine and Gaza, there seems to be no one wanting any type of peace. While it may be true Canada is a global citizen which still takes its international citizenship seriously, one of the downsides to this pan-national outlook is that we often get dragged into world conflicts that have little to do with us.
In our domestic affairs, we have been a largely peaceful country throughout most of our history with a few exceptions like the Louis Riel Rebellion and the October Crisis. However, we have fought in two major world wars and numerous other conflicts abroad, sacrificing tens of thousands of Canadian lives in foreign fields. Perhaps the price we pay for our domestic peace is that international violence; however, is it a forlorn wish that other places in the world could just get their acts together?
In the 2012 movie “Lincoln,” Abraham Lincoln states regarding his thoughts on the ongoing U.S. Civil War and his hope to end it: “At all rates, whatever must be proven by blood and sacrifice must have been proved by now.”
Calls for an end to bloodshed continue to fall upon deaf ears, or the efforts of peacemakers get wrecked on the rocks of bad faith.
Something warring peoples and nations should keep in mind: There are no winners or losers in wars or major conflicts, there is only lose-lose.
If these nations wanted a win, they should have avoided getting into wars in the first place.
The time to prove what can be proved by blood is passed. Can we just get on with creating the peace?
