¶ … war and reading the quotes from several thinkers in "On War," make your own statement on the subject
War: The illegitimacy of warfare
According to the philosopher Voltaire on the subject of warfare: "It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." Novels such as Stephen Crane's The Red Badge of Courage and Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms suggest that war is fundamentally anathema to the human character. Simply because there are trumpets and an endorsement of the murder of the 'enemy' the leaders of the land, suggests Voltaire, does not make war any less scarring to human nature and dignity. Although the wars chronicled in the novels may be presented as glorious enterprises at first, the characters are initially repelled by the experience of war, and only after growing coarsened does the experience become more bearable. But perhaps the most apocalyptic rendition of war is found in novels of the Vietnam Era, like The Things They Carried, in which the characters of...
Set during the
Civil War, the protagonist Henry Fleming is initially terrified by battle and flees, but decides he must subject himself again once to war to prove his manhood. "Once he thought he had concluded that it would be better to get killed directly and end his troubles... He must look to the grave for comprehension" (Crane 25). Fighting is awful and the men do not even talk about the cause they are fighting for when they are away from the frontlines because all they can think about is their survival. In the moment of battle, Fleming is able to work himself up into a frenzy: "He himself felt the daring spirit of a savage religion mad. He was capable of profound sacrifices, a tremendous death" (Crane 113). However, Fleming's inner struggles have nothing to do with
justice and everything to do with his own
personal fears and need for
masculine self-justification. Fleming is not a natural-born killer, but the situations into which he is placed change his
character because they turn morality upside-down. Wanting to live is seen is bad. Not wanting to kill is seen as good, in the inverted…
