it's the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month! please remember all our veterans and active service persons for keeping our freedom! their sacrifices allow us this which we enjoy!  THANK-YOU!

Thank you, Noel. Is Veteran's Day celebrated on this day in Canada too?
 
Paul

It's certainly celebrated in Oz.
On the 11 hour of the 11 month yesterday we had a moments silence here at the school I teach at.
It wasn't completely silent, being in the middle of the morning recess, but most kids stopped for the minute.

To those who served, my thanks. To those who are serving and especially SPC "Doc" RJ Jr. my thanks and may you all come home safe.

RJ

I'm surprised it's celebrated on the same day in places other than the US.
 
Paul

Well, the date of the Armistice was the same no matter where the soldiers came from.
Besides, Remembrance Day, as we call it, was a British Empire thing.
And as everyone here has said, it's just as relavant now as it was in 1918.
But we also have ANZAC Day on the 25th April.
ANZAC stands for Australian & New Zealand Army Corps and on 25th April, 1915, the troops from our 2 nations had their first taste of battle in WW1 in the Gallipoli Campaign in Turkey.
We'd already fought with great success in the Boer Wars and earlier the colony of NSW had sent a contingent to the Soudan Campaign but Australian troops from all states fought under the same flag at Gallipoli.
You're probably familiar with the whole Gallipoli campaign business already but for those who aren't it was masterminded by Winston Churchill in his early political career.
It was an attempt to take the peninsula of land behind the heavily fortified Dardanelles so the British could take Constantinople and in the same move Turkey out of the war.
But it was stupid.
The Turks were ready, the Brits landed miles off course on beaches lined with cliffs which could not be taken and all in all it was a complete failure and an appalling waste of human life.
But the Diggers, as we call our soldiers, showed courage, persistance and bravery and came out of it with a reputation for punching well above their weight.
That reputation they held throughout WW1 and continue to hold to this day.
Ironically, even if the Brits had taken Turkey out of the war it would've been a relief for the Germans.
The Turks were a huge drain on resources and a poor choice of ally.

Kombi me ol' bean - I've heard murmurings about the Anzac landing being orchestrated to give the Pommies a break and use someone else (us folk) as cannon fodder for a bit.  True or just an unfounded conspiracy theory?  I'm not too clued up on WW1.

Mate, they often took our troops and stuck them in bad spots but no worse than the poor old British Tommies.
The difference was that our fellas knew one end of a gun from the other and most had done some sort of outdoor living.
Even the lads from the cities in Oz had roughed it at some time or another.
By the time the Brits had used up their regulars and their initial volunteers they were using really young lads from the inner cities.
By the end of the war the British troops had well and truly had their spirits crushed.
All the murderously ignorant strategy that got colonial troops killed from late 1915 onward had killed off 2 FULL armies of good British soldiers.
I'm not going to say we had better leadership before late 1916 but they'd already lost so many husbands and brothers and fathers and cousins.
Plus the class system did the British Army NO favours.
The average Tommy never felt worth enough to say anything to an officer and if they did it was insubordination.
Australians and Kiwis and Canadians had a firm grip on reality and wish to preserve the own skins if possible.
They also believed respect was earned, not automatic, and their officers learned soon enough to work with those traits.
But all of the colonial troops had courage and inventiveness in bucketfuls bourne of living in less civilised environments.
I'm not criticising the British.
Their regulars were SUPERB.....they'd learnt a lot of the Boer Wars.
But their commanders were attrocious and in spite of direction that would break a compass the colonial lads shone.

In war,  no one wins.

That's right....to a point.
At times we have to step up and stop brutality and bloodletting on a grand scale.
Sadly that usually means more blood shed.
The old "Live by the sword, die by the sword" is true in more than one way.
Those people who choose to live by the sword rarely change their choice.
And that's what the "11th of the 11th" is all about; honouring those willing to make that step and surrender themselves to that task, be it at the cost of their lives or their innocence.

to answer your question,Paul we do call it rememberance day here.the royal canadian legion distributes donation boxes with poppies and nearly everyone wears them.no matter what yiou call it the allied countries fought for the same cause and all paid a price for or way of life.with regard to JG's comment the canadian troops were used much like the anzacs when the brits high command was worried about high losses.our troops got their reputation at vimy ridge.the french and british failed to take it so they sent our lads in,with high losses the first time.the second time the boys were a little angry and put it to them.that's sorta how it went according to my grandfather.he was there-not pretty!

Thanks, Noel.
 
"Armistice Day" - what the US Veteran's Day started out as - is certainly celebrated by all the allies of WWI on the same day. However, as has been pointed out here, it is called something else, and IS something else, elsewhere. "Armistice Day" was established in the US in 1919 by president Woodrow Wilson. The US Congress "ratified" it in 1925. The US "Veteran's Day", on the other hand, - also celebrated on Nov 11 - was signed into law in 1954 by president Eisenhower.
 
The difference in the US being, "Armistice Day" was/is a WWI memorial. "Veteran's Day", (of 1954 origin), was initially called "All Veteran's Day" to signify that the WWI vet wasn't the only veteran being acknowledged. Later, the "All" was dropped, and connection solely to the armistice of WWI was dropped in favor of recognizing all veterans. In the US, there's a difference between "Armistice Day" and "Veteran's Day" even though they were once celebrated on the same date.
 
Hence my question.
 
Paul

Interesting note, the German General Officer here on Ft Knox placed a wreath in a ceremony Wednesday.  I didn't attend but was under the impression it was to celebrate and remember the American GIs that fought against and liberated Nazi Germany.