‘Warrior nation’
Noah Richler argues that the Harperites have changed how we think of ourselves
By Paul Gessell, The Ottawa Citizen
April 20, 2012
What We Talk About When We Talk About War
By Noah Richler
Goose Lane, $24.95
Noah Richler presumably does not vote Conservative.
Nevertheless, the Toronto-based author from, yes, that famous literary family, has just written a book that credits Stephen Harper’s government for a truly miraculous — or, should we say, diabolical? — feat.
In just a few short years, the Harperites have manoeuvred Canadians into seeing themselves as a “warrior nation” instead of the “peacekeeping nation” so many of us previously thought we inhabited, Richler says in his new book What We Talk About When We Talk About War.
“Such a change would demand a ruthless and deliberate razing of a whole packet of myths and stories that were being narrated through the end of the last century,” claims Richler, also author of the 2007 book, This is My Country, What’s Yours? A Literary Atlas of Canada.
Essentially, according to Richler’s thinking, the Conservatives disliked the sentiment that Canada was a product of “discussion, negotiation and compromise.” Such a “founding myth” apparently led people to believe that Canada was a peacekeeping country that should be a big player at the United Nations and should roll out the welcome mat for immigrants and refugees.
All that has changed, according to Richler, and now we see ourselves a “warrior nation,” with notches in our belt for Afghanistan and Libya and an itch to fight yet more wars, possibly next with Iran. That sense of being a warrior nation, the author contends, has affected all political discourse in Canada.
“The attitude of the Canadian government after 2006 even towards its own citizens is one that reflexively relies on enmities and the cultivation of disputes resolved through the vilification of dissenters, the circumvention of Parliament and an imposition of solutions rather than any reconciliation achieved through ‘discussion, negotiation and compromise.’ ”
So, have Canadians really changed their view of their own country? Or was that notion, dating back to the 1950s, of being a “peacekeeping country” really an aberration? Did the Conservatives merely put us back on the war-like path we normally pursue?
A look at our history dating back to the War of 1812, through the Northwest Rebellion, the Boer War, the two world wars and Korea reveals that our soldiers were kept very busy for centuries killing people long before they started to wear Lester Pearson’s UN peacekeeping blue helmets. Yet, we were never an aggressive imperialist power, although Louis Riel and South Africa’s Boers might argue that point.
Clearly, there is considerable room for argument in debating our warrior versus peacekeeper status. And Richler understood that while he was writing this provocative and well-researched book about the shifts he perceives in Canadians’ self-image.
We see that shift orchestrated by the Conservatives in the current 200th anniversary celebrations of the War of 1812 — a founding myth the Tories have basically created — American-style attitudes towards the war in Afghanistan and the attempt to turn John Babcock, the last surviving First World War soldier, into a national hero by offering him a state funeral.
Babcock declined all attempts, in both his life and death, to glorify his exceedingly minimal role as a soldier. Richler has great fun discussing how the 109-year-old Babcock outsmarts the Harperites.
The book offers considerable meat to chew on but it also has faults. Richler spends way too much ink trying to discredit the supposedly jingoistic writings of Postmedia News columnist Christie Blatchford about the military. Does she really matter? As well, Richler is far too touchy-feely and imprecise in stating his own opinions on some of the burning questions he raises. (An interview with Richler did not add much precision).
Does Richler, for example, believe that Canada ever should have gone to war in Afghanistan? Does he believe that Canadian soldiers died in vain in Afghanistan? These are questions raised in this book but not really answered.
In the interview, Richler said he cannot peer into Afghanistan’s future and thus determine whether Canada’s military intervention and the sacrifice of Canadian lives really made a difference.
Richler may find himself increasingly forced to clarify his position as he criss-crosses the country this spring publicizing his book. He will, for example, be a guest of the Ottawa International Writers Festival April 29 and then on May 23 will be in Vancouver sharing a stage with Trevor Greene, a Canadian soldier who sustained a horrific head injury while in Afghanistan and has since, with his wife Debbie, written a book, March Forth, about his experience. Does Greene think his injury was for nothing?
Press material for Richler’s book arrived with several endorsements by high-profile Canadians, including former diplomat and NDP politico Stephen Lewis. There was also more qualified support from others, including one of Canada’s top historians, Margaret MacMillan, author of Paris, 1919.
“Well written and passionate,” says MacMillan, “this is a fine polemic about important issues. You don’t have to agree with everything Noah Richler says — I don’t — but you must take him seriously.”
I’m with MacMillan. I can’t agree with all of Richler’s analysis but I am grateful he has raised some important issues that have not been, but should have been, fully debated in Parliament and in the rest of the country this past decade.
In Town
Noah Richler appears at the Ottawa International Writers Festival on April 29 at 2 p.m. at Knox Presbyterian Church, 120 Lisgar St. Info: writersfestival.org
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enough already...
