What military holidays does your country have?

14 comments

1. No proper military holidays, but we have two that are slightly related:
   – 25th of April we celebrate the liberation of Milan from nazifascism, which symbolise the fall of the last remnants of fascism during WWII
   – 2nd of June is the “Festa della Repubblica” where we celebrate the institution of the Republic and the fall of the monarchy. The highlight is a big military parade in the center of Rome

   We also have some days for Armed forces but they are not holidays and nobody gives a shit about them

2. Somebody please correct me if I am wrong but closest to something like that would be Sovereignty Day or Day of Uprising Against Occupation and first one is a working one while second one is a holiday.

3. No military holidays. (Well, independence day is a national holiday, but I wouldn’t call it a military holiday)

   We have few days when the flag is raised:

   The defence forces flag celebration

   Veterans day. (Not official, but recommended to raise the flag)

4. The 8th of May is both Liberation Day and Veteran’s Day, originally celebrating the booting of the Germans in 1945 and the people who fought for it, but now celebrating veterans more broadly. The veteran’s day part was tacked on relatively recently (2011), though, and it’s still primarily just Liberation Day.

5. The UK has Remembrance Sunday, held on the closest Sunday to the anniversary of the end of the First World War. Almost every city, town, village etc in the country will have a war memorial in it somewhere, commemorating soldiers who have died in that war and others, and there will usually be some kind of ceremony at the memorial. The biggest ceremony is in London, at the Cenotaph.

   Usually these ceremonies will involve playing The Last Post, which can be a very emotional event. It’s one of those bits of music which makes the hairs on your arms stand up.

   However, away from that event, celebrating the military is very rare. There’s nothing like the American levels of veneration for the army or thanking veterans for their service etc. It’s as if all those feeling get compressed in to a single once a year event.

6. Not a single on. There’s things like the victory day or remembrance day for the battle of the bulge but they aren’t national holidays nor are they only about soldiers. There’s more recognition for resistance fighters but still not a holiday.

7. We don’t have that kind of thing here. We are not a military society in that sense. We have Remembrance Day on the 4th of may where we remember all victims of war (second world war but also other wars). On the 5th of may we have liberation day to celebrate our freedom.

   We have Veterans Day to honour the veterans. However, it’s not a public holiday. I don’t think most people know when this is exactly.

8. As such, none. Closest we have is a “day of national commemoration”, but that’s not a public holiday as such, it’s held on a Sunday each year (the Sunday nearest to 10th October). It’s meant to commemorate “the struggle between 1940 and 1945”.

9. We don’t do any of that. Being neutral for 70 years, we don’t have veterans. A handful of people did UN peacekeeping, that’s it.

   Having served in the military isn’t considered special in any way, most males served for 6 months, we have conscription. Just means you did a month basic training, and are able to deal with boredom.

10. Apart from a “flag day” on Sep. 5th, where government buildings hoist the flag for service members deployed in foreign countries, we don’t have any military holidays.

11. > [Volkstrauertag](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkstrauertag) (German for “people’s day of mourning”) is a commemoration day in Germany two Sundays before the first day of Advent. It commemorates members of the armed forces of all nations and civilians who died in armed conflicts, to include victims of violent oppression.

    Closest we have. It is fairly irrelevant and not observerd by the general public.

12. In France there’s :
    Victory day (8 may) : end of ww2 hostilities.
    Bastille day (14 july) : beginning of our first revolution, also our national day.
    Armistice day : end of ww1

    In Switzerland there is :
    Our national day on august 1st. We commemorate the day when Schwytz, Uri and Unterwald (some holy Roman empire states) decided to join their forces to create the swiss confederacy and kick out the Habsburgers, the House of Savoy and Burgundy.

    Some cantons have their own military holidays like :

    Geneva with “L’Escalade” (the climbing) on December 12th.
    They commemorate the night when the house of Savoy, ruined after its war against France attempted to conquer the principality of Geneva. They began to climb the defensive walls while the city was asleep. I don’t remember the whole history, but the citizens woke up with a start, and grabbed everything they could to fight back. They ran and screamed after the savoyards. A woman is pretty famous for having thrown its soup on the attackers. During that day, they eat a chocolate cooking pot with marzipan vegetables and they have a running competition.

    In Glarus, they commemorate the Näfels ride, an independence war against the Habsburgers. (first Thursday of April)

    Now here’s the holidays which I don’t know wether they are military or not.

    Knabenschiessen in Zürich (second weekend of September), a traditional shooting competition.

    Republic’s day in Neuchâtel (March 1st), the day when Neuenburg citizens (their old name) decided by themselves to join the swiss confederacy while being in Prussia.

13. I Guess the closest thing that comes to mind (mind you there might be better examples) is Madrid’s **regional** holiday which technically celebrates the popular uprising against the napoleonic troops (though you’d be hard pressed to notice today). Anyway, the uprising was violently crushed in a massacre so It’s not exactly a glorious military holiday.

    Spain’s National day conmemorates the arrival to America, so technically non military, though sometimes It feels like It, with the King discourses and the army marching. It’s riddled with controversy, especially among left leaning folk (aka the spaniards you’ll find in reddit). None the less because: colon was probably a certified bastard (even by contemporary standards), Spain massacred the Caribbean population, It kickstarted colonialism in America (with all Its unsavory practices), etc.

    One thing that might be useful to keep in mind is that there’s a strong correlation between war and horror in the spanish conscience. It honestly makes sense given our catastrophic 19th and 20th centuries.

    In artistic terms, Talk about war and a spaniard Will picture [this](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fd/El_Tres_de_Mayo%2C_by_Francisco_de_Goya%2C_from_Prado_thin_black_margin.jpg/700px-El_Tres_de_Mayo%2C_by_Francisco_de_Goya%2C_from_Prado_thin_black_margin.jpg) or [this](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guernica_(Picasso)) rather than [this](https://es.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_cruzando_el_Delaware#/media/Archivo%3AWashington_Crossing_the_Delaware_by_Emanuel_Leutze%2C_MMA-NYC%2C_1851.jpg).

    About the current military. We were in a military dictatorship 50 years ago. Some of the serving officers are still from that time. Let’s just say many spaniards are not exactly feeling like to congratulate the army for their service…

14. They are big commemorations the 11th of november for WW1 and 8th of may for WW2. Their is also a big military parade the 14th of july. Those have a military aspect but aren’t exclusively linked to military.

    When we lost soldiers in anti terrorist operations in Africa we also had an optional minute of silence. While its close to mandatory after terrorist attacks in France.

    Rememberance of veteran and people killed fighting for France isn’t really something we put in calendars,we would rather build monuments.