Thirty years

The following may shock you, but before we go on, I want to tell you -

My uncles killed people.

Next month, I have a new book out. It's ARCHIE'S WAR, about a boy and a dog at the beginning of the First World War. Archie has to grow up quickly. Children do, in warm time. The dog in this book is already up there along my special favourites. I'd love a dog like Star. he laughs at you from the cover.

That's set in 1914, when young men left their villages, their work, their families, their sweethearts, the cricket and footie and the pub, to be massacred in the mud and bloodbaths of the front line. When that war had finally slaughtered itself out, the victors got together to sort out the mess it had left behind.

They made a hopeless job of it. It took barely a generation before Europe was at war again and the ripples spread throughout the world.

Thirty years. Thirty years is just about, but not exactly, the life of my LYS. More or less the life of Christ. Thirty years after the swords were first drawn, and seventy years ago today, the next generation of young men piled on to the beaches of Normandy. Young chaps from all over the free world, from professional soldiers to labourers to lawyers, volunteers and call-ups, hurling themselves into appalling danger to make an end of the horror of fascism. Thank God, it worked. It worked at a terrible cost on both sides. These were men who never wanted to kill each other, and the survivors had to live with it afterwards. Men like my uncles. Two weeks after the death of their father, they were on the Normandy beaches.

Those who lived to be old are gathering today on the beaches. Let's honour them. And let's think -

What have we learned?

How can we stop war before it starts?

What can we do to ensure another thirty years of peace?