Mr. Speaker, I cannot begin to describe what it is like to stand in the Chamber where the decision to send Canada's young men and women overseas into battle took place.
From the Boer War to World War I to World War II to Korea to peacekeeping conflicts, and to our current mission in Afghanistan, we, the members of Parliament and those in the Senate, get the opportunity because of their sacrifices to debate the future of those conflicts. That is an honour that only soldiers can give us in a democratic society.
This year's campaign poster from veterans affairs is extremely poignant. It asks every Canadian “How will you remember?”
One way that I plan to remember is something that Canada's current Minister of Veterans Affairs said in a speech not too long ago. He said he was looking at some gravesites and the names on those gravesites, and instead of just reading them in his own mind, he said them out loud. In many cases the names that he spoke out loud were probably spoken for the first time in many years.
When my father passed away, a person who was liberated in a war camp by the Canadian military and its Allies in the liberation of the Netherlands in 1944-45, my mother said, “He's up in heaven keeping an eye on me until it is my time to go and join him”.
We have almost 118,000 young men and women who are up there right now looking at all of us and keeping an eye on our current military personnel and their families. I would like to mention out loud some of the names of those who are still with us.
The great John Babcock, 109 years old, Canada's last surviving World War I veteran, and one of the very few left on this planet. May God give him many more years of a healthy lifestyle because he is the last vintage hold onto that World War I battle.
Jack Ford of Newfoundland and Labrador, the world's last surviving prisoner of war during the bombing of Nagasaki. He was in slave labour at the Nagasaki shipyards when the Nagasaki bomb went off. He, by the grace of God, is still with us in the great province of Newfoundland and Labrador. A poignant, humanistic story that the minister and I and others got to share.
On June 6, 1944, five miles off the coast of Juno Beach, a young naval officer by the name of Murray Knowles from Halifax stood there, ready to aim the guns to protect our soldiers as they went into battle on Juno Beach. What was happening at the same time he was on that ship protecting the world, his son was born in the Maritimes on June 6, 1944. And 65 years later, all of us in Canada witnessed Murray Knowles at age 92 and his son at age 65 standing shoulder to shoulder on Juno Beach.
That is the human element of what our men and women went through, and the glory of God to allow them to have shared that moment 65 years later.
I would also like to mention the great Helen Rapp. Those who know Helen know she is a staunch defender of the women who served in our military. She deserves our undying gratitude for the tremendous work that she does.
I just had the distinct pleasure of going to the Amherst Legion Branch 10 recently, and I met three fantastic unbelievable World War II veterans, Harold Ettinger, Lyon Kaufman and Allison Chapman. These three men are working in their legion in their very late stages of their lives to do one thing, to preserve the memory of those who never got a chance to come back, to preserve the memory of the stories, to tell them to future generations, and to show support to those current men and women serving overseas and their families. They deserve our undying gratitude for never allowing the flame of hope to be extinguished.
One of the ways of how we will remember is by asking exactly why did these men and women go overseas in the first place?Well, there was a sign in Ypres that I saw a few years ago, written by a Canadian, I believe a family member of a Canadian who came over. On that sign it said, “We left our country so you could live in yours”.
I think that says it all right there. Why would a 14-year-old kid from the Prairies or from a fish plant or from the woods lie about his age, join the military, and head over to the battlefields of Europe?
It was not just for excitement. It was because of an undying Canadian attitude that when the bell gets rung, we answer the call. To those 133 brave men and women who have paid the ultimate sacrifice in Afghanistan, they did not die in vain. Their families and children, some of whom we have all met, are the heroes of our generation today because they keep their memories alive. They left this country, so that the people of Afghanistan and other conflicts in the world can live peacefully in theirs.
If we keep that memory alive for all future generations, our children and grandchildren will always remember those who paid the ultimate sacrifice. There are those who are part of an aging society right now, where memories come back to haunt them because they are infirm. We need to do all we can to ensure that their memory is never extinguished.
As the Legion says, “At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them”. However, we also ask God to care for them, whether they pay the ultimate sacrifice or whether they come back broken, wounded or psychologically damaged in any way. We know that all 33.5 million Canadians, in their heart of hearts, love our military, love our veterans, and respect and love the family members and friends of those veterans.
Without them, I and the rest of us could not stand in this Chamber and be able to debate the important issues of the day. I stand here proudly to salute the men and women of our armed forces who have served.
May God bless all their memories and may God take care of their families.