As a kid I remember talking to my great uncles about their part in it. If there was one thing that struck me about their response it was their unwillingness to go into detail, or really discuss it at all. And I always took that to mean something, as if a silent warning about the terrible reality of a world gone mad.
During the Second World War some 49 million people were lost. And if you were to ask those that fought what they hoped the legacy of such sacrifice, carnage, and sadness would be, I am sure the majority would reply that they wished it would never happen again, not that it would split the world and lead to decades of struggle between two global super powers who would use others as puppets in a deadly game of chicken.
If anything dishonors the memories of those that died in the last great world war, it is the deaths produced by its aftershocks. The greed and ambition of the wars victorious powers have, since this day 60 years ago, made a mockery of those that selflessly gave their lives.