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Deep in December in the midst of the hell World War I had become, German and British infantry huddled in the bone chilling cold of their trenches in a war separated only by yards, barbed wire, and weaponry. It was Christmas Eve. Every soldier of sound mind would rather have been anyplace but there. Trench warfare was something the world had never seen; infantry would hunker down in serpentine below-ground alleyways to hell, waiting for command to blow the charge whistle, at which point scared men rose from their cold muddy encampments and charged headlong into German Spandau machine gun fire.
On this Christmas Eve suddenly British infantrymen heard something quite different. Faintly at first, then a growing chorus; German soldiers were singing...singing Silent Night. Hesitant at first, one by one the Englishmen scaled the trench wall and waved at their enemy. The Germans waved back, holding up cigars or schnapps. More and more infantrymen from both sides walked toward each other; German gray and English khaki milling around on a cold, bomb cratered landscape. They began shaking hands, mingling together on this Christmas Eve, all hatred for now forgotten.
By that Christmas every soldier knew their enemy was sharing the same misery; destined to live their subterranean existence until their cognac-drinking, cigar-smoking generalship billeted in some warm chateau decided too many had been slaughtered, though that would not come for some time beyond this night...not for some time. Both sides also well understood that "consorting with one's enemy" meant sure court marshal and punishment; even execution.
Eventually both sides returned to their positions, fearful of punishment for their Christmas Eve adventure. They also wondered what tomorrow would bring, huddled in their shallow escarpments waiting for orders to go over the top. And how, they wondered, would each side take up their weapons and begin trying to kill their Christmas companions?
The next morning a British officer asked an infantryman, "Is the Christmas fellowship over?" The corporal responded that he supposed it was. The officer calmly picked up his rifle, aimed at an enemy soldier 50 years away and shot him.
There are no rights or wrongs in war; except for the premise that mankind would be better off without them. Of all the global conflict in the 20th Century not even the massive international fighting in the air, at sea and on the ground of WWII could match the needless point-blank massacres of the First World War; "The Great War" they called it back then. The Allies lost around 7 million, the Central Powers (Germany and allies) about 6 million. America became the tipping point when it sent the Doughboys to Europe in 1918, but not before the U.S. suffered 53,000 casualties.
The miracle of the Christmas Trench Truce remains perhaps the most unlikely and incoherent moment seized out of time where time indeed had a "stop" and humanity rose above the carnage and calamity to sing Silent Night.
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The Motivator will return in 2014.
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