For Educational Purposes
Buffy Sainte-Marie is Cree. She was born on the Piapot Reserve in 1941 and has re-established connections with her Cree family in the Qu’Appelle Valley.
Buffy overcame adversity. She became a teacher, a philosopher; an Oscar winning songwriter, world traveller and world-class entertainer.
Buffy wrote the most significant protest song of the Twentieth Century, “Universal Soldier”. The song is the quintessential anti-Vietnam War song. Written in 1964, it is, in my opinion, the best anti-war song ever written, and my favourite from the Hippy Days.
“Universal Soldier” has no ‘hook’. It is simple and to the point. Buffy completed the song while entertaining at the Purple Onion in Toronto. The song was ‘black-listed’ and not played on radio stations until Donovan recorded it and made Universal Soldier a hit.
The Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was not a war against a tyrannical leader like Hitler. It was a war over different political philosophies – at a horrendous cost.
Free Countries Still Need a Modern Military
I write about World War Two Veterans and ‘The Fallen’ – the men and women from Saskatchewan and Canada who fought the tyranny of the Nazis and the Axis Powers and who died in the process. WW 2 was a ‘just’ war. Hitler had to be stopped! The price was huge.
I am pro-military. Canada needs an Army. It needs a modern Air Force and a modern Navy. Canada needs a military to protect and to contribute to fights against tyrannical villains like Hitler and his NAZI ‘Henchmen’.
Tyrannical villains and their ‘Henchmen’ exist around the world today. History shows these types never go away. Each generation, somewhere, produces their own power hungry version of “Hitler”. Nations need to guard against such aggressors.
Buffy’s point, people should not follow, elect or support Tyrannical Leaders.
Universal Soldier – Written by Buffy Sainte-Marie
He's five foot-two and he's six feet-four
He fights with missiles and with spears
He's all of 31 and he's only 17
Been a soldier for a thousand year
He's a Catholic, a Hindu, an Atheist, a Jain
A Buddhist, and a Baptist, and a Jew
And he knows he shouldn't kill
And he knows he always will
Kill you for me, my friend, and me for you
And he's fighting for Canada
He's fighting for France
He's fighting for the U.S.A.
And he's fighting for the Russians
And he's fighting for Japan
And he thinks we'll put an end to war this way
And he's fighting for Democracy
He's fighting for the Reds
He says it's for peace for all
He's the one who must decide
Who's to live and who's to die
And he never sees the writing on the wall
But without him
How would Hitler have condemned them at Dachau?
Without him Caesar would have stood alone
He's the one who gives his body as a weapon of the war
And without him all this killing can't go on
He's the Universal Soldier and he really is to blame
His orders come from far away no more
They come from here and there and you and me
And brothers, can't you see?
This is not the way we put the end to war
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect the position of this publication.
