Such a
very sombre anniversary. We note the start of a war which cost an estimated 17
million lives, about a third of the dead being non-combatants.
It is a
simple fact that I have been alive for three-quarters of the century in
question. To be precise, at the time of my conception the next war had not
properly commenced, although in April 1939 Adolf Hitler ordered the German
military to start planning for Fall Weiss, the code-name for the
invasion of Poland. World War II was the deadliest military conflict in
history. Over 60 million people were killed, which was over 2.5% of the world
population. Non-combatants amounted to an even greater proportion of the
overall loss of life.
Today a
nation, deploring the death of two civilians at the hands of an enemy, can
reply with military superiority and claim that over a thousand non-combatant
victims on the other side can be deemed 'proportionate response'.
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