The urge to remember

Of course, the fact that this year marks the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War has kept the terrible toll of that conflict at the forefront of our thoughts.

Many of those gathered at remembrance services across the country yesterday, however, will have dwelt on far more recent conflicts, on the losses inflicted in Afghanistan and Iraq and on the terrible legacy of disabled ex-servicemen that those wars have bequeathed to the nation.

Indeed, those dignitaries paying their respects at the Cenotaph in Whitehall will also have been thinking of the latest reports of an Islamist plot to mount a Remembrance Sunday outrage, a reminder that Britain is still in conflict with the foes of freedom, albeit in a way that would have been unimaginable a century ago.

And the fact that British forces have again been called to battle over the skies of the Middle East brings painful questions of its own. To what extent is the rise of the self-styled “Islamic State” and its murderous totalitarian ideology the consequence of the British and American invasion of Iraq a decade ago? And did British forces give their lives in vain in that conflict?

Such questions, however, which are also raised by Britain’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, can only be answered by the unfolding of history. The duty of Remembrancetide is not to count which sacrifices were worthwhile and which were not. It is to mourn them all equally, to honour them and to remember them.

Fall of the Wall: But Russia is still out in the cold

It is a coincidence that this time of Remembrance also marks the end of a conflict remarkable not for its toll of casualties but for the way in which it defined the second half of the 20th century.

The Cold War effectively ended 25 years ago when the Berlin Wall was finally breached, East and West Germans mixed freely for the first time in a generation, the Soviet Union began to unravel and the divide that had scarred Europe since the end of the Second World War started to heal.

However, those who claimed during those remarkable days that the end of history had arrived could not have been more wrong. Far from ending history, the fall of the Wall merely unleashed the tides that had been held back for half-a-century, ushering in an era of conflict and change which continues still.

Indeed, according to Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet leader who crucially ordered his troops to remain in their barracks on that cold November night 25 years ago, the West is on the brink of a new Cold War with Russia.

In saying that the West has brought this upon itself, humiliating Moscow through the eastward expansion of Nato and the European Union, Mr Gorbachev has a point.

The winning of the Cold War was followed by too much triumphalism and not enough recognition of the dangers posed by a

weak and vengeful

Russia.

But this is no reason for the West now to lie supine in the face of Vladimir Putin’s nationalist aggression. Russia still wants to stifle democracy and free speech both inside and outside its borders and it must be resisted. The Cold War may be over but history never ends.

Home truths: Rural communities under threat

According to the Government, a key reason why so little affordable housing is built is that too many proposed developments are too small to make it worth the builder’s while.

So, rather than lose money by including the stipulated quota of cheaper properties, the builder opts to concentrate on larger projects.

How to ensure, then, that in national parks such as the Yorkshire Dales and the North York Moors, where all developments are necessarily small, much-needed social housing gets built?

For national parks, in fact, are often the places where affordable housing is most needed. With property prices spiralling, the younger generation is being forced out and the entire social fabric of rural communities is under threat.

The Government

needs to recognise this urgently and ensure that incentives are on offer to builders in national parks to provide the housing that local families are crying out for.