Confusion in War

Generals Die in Bed certainly demonstrates that war is futile and the soldiers suffer both emotionally and physically. Charles Yale Harrison presents a distressing account of the soldiers fighting in the Western front, constantly suffering and eventually abandoning hope for an end to the horrors that they experience daily. The ‘boys’ who went to war became ‘sunk in misery’. We view the war from the perspective of a young soldier who remains nameless. The narrator’s experience displays the futility and horror of war and the despair the soldiers suffered. There is no glory in

It’s no surprise that soldiers will more-than-likely never come home the same. Those who have not served do not often think of the torment and negative consequences that the soldiers who make it out of war face. Erich Remarque was someone who was able to take the torment that he faced after his experience in World War I and shed light on the brutality of war. Remarque was able to illustrate the psychological problems that was experienced by men in battle with his best-selling novel All Quiet on the Western Front (Hunt). The symbolism used in the classic anti-war novel All Quiet on the Western Front is significant not only for showing citizens the negative attributes of war, but also the mental, physical, and emotional impact that the vicious war had on the soldiers.

Penned during two distinctly disparate eras in American military history, both Erich Maria Remarque's bleak account of trench warfare during World War I, All Quiet on the Western Front, and Tim O'Brien's haunting elegy for a generation lost in the jungles of Vietnam, The Man I Killed, present readers with a stark reminder that beneath the veneer of glorious battle lies only suffering and death. Both authors imbue their work with a grim severity, presenting the reality of war as it truly exists. Men inflict grievous injuries on one another, breaking bodies and shattering lives, without ever truly knowing for what or whom they are fighting for. With their contributions to the genre of war literature, both Remarque and O'Brien have sought to lift the veil of vanity which, for so many wartime writers, perverts reality with patriotic fervor. In doing so, the authors manage to convey the true sacrifice of the conscripted soldier, the broken innocence which clouds a man's first kill, and the abandonment of one's identity which becomes necessary in order to kill again.

In the incredible book, All Quiet on the Western Front written by Erich Maria Remarque, the reader follows Paul Baumer, a young man who enlisted in the war. The reader goes on a journey and watches Paul and his comrades face the sheer brutality of war. In this novel, the author tries to convey the fact that war should not be glorified. Through bombardment, gunfire, and the gruesome images painted by the author, one can really understand what it would have been like to serve on the front lines in the Great War. The sheer brutality of the war can be portrayed through literary devices such as personification, similes, and metaphors.

Bao Ninh’s The Sorrow of War is a novel that is a personal view of the Vietnam War from the perspective of a Vietnamese soldier. Like the American novel “The things they carried”, this novel brings about the effects of war on people, and especially how it defeats the human capacity for things such as love and hope. Bao Ninh offers this realistic picture of the Vietnam War’s impact on the individual Vietnamese soldier through use of a series of reminiscences or flashbacks, jumping backwards and forwards in time between the events most salient in memory, events which take on a different theme each time they are examined. His main protagonist Kien, who is basically Bao himself, looks back not just at his ten years at

The Viet Nam War has been the most reviled conflict in United States history for many reasons, but it has produced some great literature. For some reason the emotion and depredation of war kindle in some people the ability to express themselves in a way that they may not have been able to do otherwise. Movies of the time period are great, but they are not able to elicit, seeing the extremely limited time crunch, the same images and charge that a well-written book can. In writing of this war, Tim O'Brien put himself and his memories in the forefront of the experiences his characters go through, and his writing is better for it. He produced a great work of art not only because he experienced the war first hand, but because he is able to convey the lives around him in such vivid detail. He writes a group of fictional works that have a great deal of truth mixed in with them. This style of writing and certain aspects of the book are the topics of this reflective paper.

A Rumor of War by Philip Caputo, is an exceptional autobiography on a man's first-hand experiences during the Vietnam War. Philip Caputo is a Lieutenant during the Vietnam War and illustrates the harsh reality of what war really is. Caputo's in-depth details of his experience during the war are enough to make one cringe, and the eventual mental despair often experienced by soldiers (including Caputo) really makes you feel for participants taking part in this dreadful war atmosphere. Giving way to the parties and the common fun associated with college kids, Caputo failed out of college and realized what he really wanted to be was a Marine. He joined the Marines and went through a

Where is the good? In the observation post, Paul Berlin "remembered what his father had said on their last night along the Des Moines River. 'You'll see some terrible stuff, I guess. That's how it goes. But try to look for the good things, too. They'll be there if you look. So watch for them'" (O'Brien 58). So he does look for the good things. That's beauty being born out of despair, if you will. He enjoys watching the sunrise. And Bates refers to Paul Berlin helping treat a young Vietnamese girl and having sensitive feelings towards her (270). This is almost as if to say that war brings out the best as well as the worst in us. Some may argue that it's almost worth it. ("Almost" being the key word-- for clearly the good in a war does not outweigh or even equal the bad.)

The Vietnam War was a psychological and physical battle for all the young men who were drafted or volunteered. Caputo's own reasons for volunteering illustrate the mentality for some of the men entering into this journey. Those who are inducted into Vietnam face disturbing moral dilemmas that can be expected in an "ethical wilderness." The draft introduced a myriad of young men to the once forgotten moral ambiguity of war. Average American citizens must balance right from wrong in a world without morals or meaning. Caputo himself struggles with the idea that killing in combat is morally justified.

In this essay, I will discuss how Tim O’Brien’s works “The Things They Carried” and “If I Die in a Combat Zone” reveal the individual human stories that are lost in war. In “The Things They Carried” O’Brien reveals the war stories of Alpha Company and shows how human each soldier is. In “If I Die in a Combat Zone” O’Brien tells his story with clarity, little of the dreamlike quality of “Things They Carried” is in this earlier work, which uses more blunt language that doesn’t hold back. In “If I Die” O’Brien reveals his own personal journey through war and what he experienced. O’Brien’s works prove a point that men, humans fight wars, not ideas. Phil Klay’s novel “Redeployment” is another novel that attempts to humanize soldiers in war. “Redeployment” is an anthology series, each chapter attempts to let us in the head of a new character – set in Afghanistan or in the United States – that is struggling with the current troubles of war. With the help of Phil Klay’s novel I will show how O’Brien’s works illustrate and highlight each story that make a war.

In the words of Otto Von Bismarck, “Anyone who has ever looked into the glazed eyes of a soldier dying on the battlefield will think hard before starting a war.” Many of the preceding war novels to All Quiet on the Western Front, misrepresented or overlooked the anguish of war, in favor of more resplendent ideals such as glory, honor, or nationalism. The predominant issue of All Quiet on the Western Front is the terrible atrocities of war. The reality that is portrayed in the novel is that there was no glory or honor in this war, only a fierce barbarity that actually transformed the nature of human existence into irreparable, endless affliction, destroying the soldiers long before their deaths.

If Philip Caputo’s memoir is meant to be the story of an American soldier, Trâm’s diary becomes the story of the Vietnamese people and their struggle. On May 7th 1970 Trâm recounts her feelings on the history of war in Vietnam, and how the people still remain undeterred. “Twenty-five years immersed in fire and bullets, we are still strong.” Not only after all this fighting and after all that Trâm herself has witnessed and endured she is still confident in her country. “We will persevere and be courageous and hold our heads high and take the offensive.” Trâm’s diary makes it clear that there was never any doubt in

Doc Peret proclaims “The point is that war is war no matter how it is perceived. War has its own reality. War kills and maims and rips up the land and makes orphans and widows. These are the things of wars. ( O’Brien, 197 ) Doc Peret delivers a viewpoint from the idea that war serves no other purpose than to kill and cause destruction, that war exists solely to eradicate other people, a much closed minded suggestion. Paul Berlin is thusly channeling his very own personal opinions of the war through his fantasy story after witnessing the many atrocities within his own reality. For example, Paul Berlin states in his reality

Stockdale begins his tale by foretelling a stress-free mission depicted as a “milk run” with little worries, apprehensions, or fears until the moment he is captured in which time seems to discontinue. “ For the first time I was on my own, without the veneer. I was to spend years searching through and refining my bag of memories, looking for useful tools, things of value”(10). At this precise moment Stockdale realizes his situation may not be justified, and yet he did not place undue blame onto America, Vietnam, or anything else. Stockdale fully recognizes his need to cognitively adapt in order to survive and protect his fellow companions and comrades. Epictetus’s Stoic philosophy pertaining to control vs. influence assisted Stockdale’s journey

One other juxtaposition of this film is war. In this scene, It detonates the firebombing of civilians which is an act of 'war crime' and the colour red connotatively being the sign of danger. Therefore by reading this scene, it is a reflection of Miyazaki's anti-war pacifism and disapproval to war. It also signifies civilians being victimised in this film while the palace is protected by magic. Suggesting that politicians are allowed to stay in a safer place, while civilians are victimised despite the fact that they are not directly responsible for pursuing the war.