Politicians can’t help themselves. Nothing, it seems, beats a photo opportunity with a baby or a soldier.

But while babies are sometimes brought to tears and tantrums at their media molestation by our national leaders, peace may be restored with a quick return to mum.

Soldiers though are another story.

It should never be forgotten that it is a politician’s will that sends soldiers to war.

And returning them to their mothers is no certain thing.

Last weekend’s welcome home parade for Australian soldiers who served in Iraq marked a return to mothers and loved ones that took an election and change of government to achieve.

Those that would howl in indignation at that statement, arguing that the Coalition had a similar timetable, expect the rest of us to forget more than anyone opposed from the start to the invasion of Iraq would find tolerable.

Soldiers who fight in the service of this country in effect do the bidding of the government our democracy elects.

It was fitting therefore to recognise that service with a street parade.

More perplexing though was the choice of words used by both prime minister Kevin Rudd and opposition leader Brendan Nelson to mark the occasion.

“Freedom is not for free. Freedom comes at a price. And you are our frontline in the defence of our freedom. And for that, I thank you,’’ was Mr Rudd’s odd explanation of why our troops were in Iraq in the first place.

Former defence minister Brendan Nelson was worse.

He spoke of the "freedom Australians cherish".

"The uniform of the Australian Army reminds us that there are some truths by which we live as Australians which are worth fighting to defend," he said.

"These troops have fought to support the Iraqis and give them freedom, the opportunity to educate their children and go about their lives in peace and many of the things we take for granted in Australia."

To accept the words of both these men at face value and to absorb them into our consciousnesses is to re-write history while it is still evolving.

To do so absolves politicians from the mess they have created and sets in chain the opportunity for words to again manipulate our nation to war.

People are still dying daily in the anarchic state left by the Coalition of the Willing’s invasion, which was first said to be aimed at halting Saddam Hussein’s non-existent weapons of mass destruction.

We were sold the need to go to war with a nation living fundamentally at peace and in a society far more functioning than that now in Zimbabwe on the basis of a “mushroom cloud”, not freedom.

“Freedom comes at a price”, but what price we will never fully understand.

Australia’s partners in this exercise chose not to count any casualty other than their own.

Whatever evolves as society from the killing fields of Iraq will not have been built on any sacrifice by Australian troops. They were there to serve the agendas of politicians.

No, the so-called freedom Iraqis may or may not eventually achieve will emerge from the rotting carcasses of women and children, old men and grandmothers who on March 19, 2003 were getting on with their lot and the next day were thrown into hell.

History will eventually see the Iraq War of 2003-ad infinitum as either the first or the last of the big 21st century battles for control of global resources.

It will either become a footnote in the emergence of a more enlightened world or a glimpse into the horror of the legacy we are building for our sons and daughters and our grandchildren.

Professor Ross Garnaut on Friday releases the draft of his panel’s Climate Change Review with the final document due in September.

It will hopefully put forward the argument that the time has come for fundamental change in the way we function here.

Any sacrifice needed to shift from the wasteful way we consume as both a society and individually, will be nothing compared to the sacrifice we will have made if we do nothing but wait.

Because if we don’t change our reliance on diminishing non-renewable energy sources and don’t quickly begin to alter the structure of our society to one of far greater sustainability into the future, we will be hearing much more from politicians about freedom and welcoming home fewer and fewer of our mothers’ sons.