Portugal na Grande Guerra - Corpo Expedicionário Português (CEP) - Parte V

A Guerra Para acabar com todas as Guerras

«A guerra europeia (com ramificações para as colónias) que, no Verão de 1914, eclodiu entre os Aliados e os Impérios Centrais foi de inicio saudada como o derradeiro dos conflitos, destinado a configurar o mundo do futuro. Julgava-se tambem que terminaria antes do Natal.
Puras ilusoes. A "galante" guerra do movimento herdada do passado em breve se transformaria numa hecatombe de desgaste que só terminaria em 1918. Se as novas fronteiras europeias da decada de 20, saidas da contenda, estavam mais de acordo com as realidades nacionais, esse reajustamento do mapa custara cerca de 20 milhoes de vidas. E tudo passaria de uma transitoria ilusao: em 1939, os canhoes voltariam a rugir num continente suicida, abrindo o passo ás superpotencias emergentes - EUA e URSS.» Visão História nº4

mapa da Europa antes da Grande Guerra

mapa da Europa depois da Grande Guerra

Algumas Frases sobre a Grande Guerra:


The First World War killed fewer victims than the Second World War, destroyed fewer buildings, and uprooted millions instead of tens of millions - but in many ways it left even deeper scars both on the mind and on the map of Europe. The old world never recovered from the shock.

* Edmond Taylor, in The Fossil Monarchies


What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.

* Wilfred Owen, from Anthem for Doomed Youth


The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime.

* Sir Edward Grey, British Foreign Secretary, at the beginning of the war.



Yesterday I visited the battlefield of last year. The place was scarcely recognisable. Instead of a wilderness of ground torn up by shell, the ground was a garden of wild flowers and tall grasses. Most remarkable of all was the appearance of many thousands of white butterflies which fluttered around. It was as if the souls of the dead soldiers had come to haunt the spot where so many fell. It was eerie to see them. And the silence! It was so still that I could almost hear the beat of the butterflies' wings.

* A British officer, 1919.



In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

* Canadian lieutenant colonel John McCrae, from the poem “In Flanders Fields”

em Wikiquote.org