Raising the Vimy Phoenix
I tried to keep an eye out for Vimy Ridge celebrations in the media (internet, TV and newspapers). Most of the mentions have really been footnotes, hardly commemorating the significance, both nationally and internationally, of the Canadian WWI contribution.
I finally found an April 5th editorial article in the National Post which expressed the same conclusions that I came up with.
Rudyard Griffiths writes:
| Vimy is well on its way to becoming a piece of trivia; a textbook factoid that inspires little respect for the half a million Canadians who fought the Great War, and the 3,500 who gave their lives at Vimy. |
Of course, I think he goes over the board when he describes Vimy as
| …a moment in our past that is just as important to the sweep of Canadian history as Gettysburg is for Americans, or the Battle of Britain for the British. |
After all, both the British and American moments of glory were battles fought on their own soil, to save their own countries.
What the Canadians did was to stand united for the first time during a period of literal life or death to save the world and themselves from extinction. Perhaps this is a grander feat. But then, all the allied countries were doing the same.
At least, the Vimy Ridge victory put Canadians on the same level as their allied patriots.
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