Armed forces day

Saturday 26 June is Armed Forces Day and whatever your political views on wars old and new, these guys deserve our support for the work they do; we elect the suits who tell them what to do and we have a legal system that (theoretically) allows us to challenge them - that's more than most of the world's population can say.




The picture is of what remains of RAF Alton Barnes, used as a flying school in WWII. I pass it often, with its poignant memorial to the lives lost in accidents; students and instructors alike died. The village I grew up in is a few miles away and has a fake airfield, that was lit up at night to distract Nazi bombers from the real deal. As a child I heard tales of airmen's bodied being found in gruesome states, but it seems a lifetime ago. These days the deaths are half a world away, but it's the stories of heartbroken families and young men in wheelchairs we will have to pass on to future generations. These people deserve our support, and armed forces day is one way to do it.