Teaching Lessons to the World

I just watched the tail end of an excellent story about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder called "Wartorn" on HBO. There were many stories, but perhaps the last was most articulate. The soldier in question was a platoon leader who, in his words, "Brought all his soldiers home, and 'Did a good job' supposedly because of it." He asked, "What did I do that was good? Was my job to kill people?" There were pictures of him holding a wounded little boy's nose, the boy was laid out in the back of a pickup truck, bleeding profusely from his torso and head. If I were guessing (and I am), I'd be guessing that he was holding his nose because the boy's face had been so mangled that they had to do a tracheotomy to allow him to breath, and attempting to breath through his nose was comprimising his breathing with blood. It's a horrid, haunting image. The pain that man experienced at dealing with that, whether fighting he was involved in caused it or not, I'm sure is excruciating.

After World War II, many soldiers returned home with undoubtedly similar, difficult, haunting images. We hold them in esteem (or certanly some do) because they "toughed it out" and recognized it's just part of war. They "didn't talk about it" and they held it in. While I admire the men for their selflessness, I question whether we admire them or whether instead we are taking shelter for our psyches by feeling that their toughness is right, and that the cost of war is what "tough men" bear. We build up images of supermen who are strong enough to bear up under this "inhumanity", which implies those who do not or cannot, are (as George C. Scott's character claimed in "Patton") "cowards" and/or lacking in "intestinal fortitude" (e.g. 'guts').

Contrasting with this are analyses of members of organized crime, especially those who are engaged as contract killers. There was a particular show on HBO called "Conversations with the Ice Man", which had one of these killers on camera, talking about his actions. He killed without compunction or remorse. He had been terribly scarred by his upbringing, beaten and abused as a child, he relished in torturing animals (a strong predictor of sociopathic behavior fyi). He had no regard for inflicting pain or for his victims. He certainly seemed to have few regrets at the "cost" inflicted on his soul at becoming "comfortable" with killing.

We have learned that those who deal "successfully" with their experiences in war, what they are compelled to do, either finally confront it, which is anguishing in it's own right, or they compartmentalize it, walling it off in a place in their mind where it lurks, causing nightmares, anger and even stress, and even among the strongest of us. Damned few men are born who can watch a young boy die in their arms and not be affected, not have such a memory linger, for the rest of their lives. So, the only thing to do is to "lock it away." This is what many who fought in World War II were told/taught to do. Talking about the ugliness was "needless bringng up the terror", hurtful, stupid.


I never fought in a war. Unlike some of my fellow soldiers of my time, I am not at all saddened by this. I suppose a very small part of me wonders how I might have equitted myself. But the larger, more rational part of me thanks God every day that I did not have to kill someone, or many someone's as my particular military specialty would have given me the power to do. I thank God every day that I didn't have to witness the twisted limbs of some small girl, or beautiful young woman whom I had scattered all over their lawn by mistakenly dropping artillery shells into their yard. Professional soldiers whom I greatly respected said to me that a real solider understand it his his job to prepare his best for war, and to hope like hell he NEVER has to fight in one because war is horrible, brutal, ugly, inhuman, indecent. It is the last act of failed policy, it is the final gasp of a failed diplomacy. We must be prepared to resist those who care little for the human cost they will inflict on their own people when they start a war, but that does not mean we can be so callous. The cost isn't something "tough men" bear while weak ones crumble. They all bear it, it eats and and can destroy their souls. Before we EVER think about starting a war, we must be damned sure we need to do so. Violence isn't the act of proving how tough you are, it is the releasing of an inner evil which we all can exhibit, and regret the rest of our lives.