London: Britain’s Labour party has accused the government of using the centenary of the start of the first world war to “sow political division” after the Minister for Education, Michael Gove, tore into “leftwing academics” for peddling unpatriotic “myths” about the role of British soldiers and generals in the conflict.
Tristram Hunt, Labour’s education spokesman and a historian, accuses Gove of a “shocking” attempt to score political points ahead of the events to mark the war, which began in August 1914 and led to the deaths of 16 million.
Responding to an article in which the minister for education attacked what he sees as an unpatriotic, leftwing version of history that portrays 1914-18 as “a series of catastrophic mistakes perpetrated by an out-of-touch elite” Hunt says such “ugly” and politically motivated interventions diminish what should be a time of reflection.
“There was always a fear that the timing of the first world war anniversary alongside the May 2014 European parliament elections and the rise of Ukip [The UK Independence Party — a Eurosceptic right-wing populist political party] could undermine a dignified response to the events of 1914-18,” he writes. “Yet few imagined the Conservatives would be this crass.”
In his article, Gove said dramas such as Oh! What a Lovely War and satirical programmes such as Blackadder, combined with leftwing interpretations of the war, had allowed deeply unpatriotic myths to take hold, and had led some to denigrate the “patriotism, honour and courage” of those who served and died.
Departing from the government’s line that the commemorations should not seek to attribute blame, Gove argued that the “pitiless” and “aggressive expansionism” of the German leaders should not be forgotten as it “more than justified” the British military response.
Even the Battle of the Somme, in which 20,000 British soldiers died on the first day in 1916, Gove said, had been reassessed by good historians and “recast as a precursor of allied victory”, challenging the traditional views that it was one of the biggest military catastrophes of modern times.
In a poll conducted by the British Future thinktank, to be published in full next week, 62 percent of respondents said the centenary should be an occasion for “remembrance of loss of life and national reflection”, while 23 percent preferred a commemoration of victory over
Germany.
The Guardian
