HISTORY REPEATS

Turning swords into ploughshares is never easy but the task facing the world in November 1918 appeared insurmountable. After four long years of warfare, much of Europe lay in ruins, with many of its citizens dispossessed. Australia had also suffered greatly and was eager to bring its sons and daughters home. Ahead lay a long, painful rehabilitation to civilian life that would also take its toll. The victorious allies were keen to exact revenge, which would inadvertently sow the seeds of an even more destructive conflict just 20 years later.Who could have known that the phrase “the war to end all wars”, so full of promise at the time, would ring hollow after just a generation?