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War
Some pessimistic historians think the whole society of man runs in cycles
and that one of the phases is war.
The optimists, on the other hand, think war is not like a flood or a spell
of bad weather.
They believe that it is more like a disease for which a cure could be found
if the cause were known.
Because war is the ultimate drama of life and death, stories and pictures
of it are more interesting than those about peace.
This is so true that all of us, and perhaps those of us on television more
than most, are often caught up in the action of war to the exclusion of the
ideas of it.
If it is true, as we would like to think it is, that our age is more
civilized than age past, we must all agree that it’s very strange that in the
twentieth century, we have killed more than 70 millions of our fellowmen on
purpose, at war.
Probably the reason we are able to do both — that is, believe on the one
hand that we are more civilized and on the other hand wage war to kill — is that
killing is not so personal an affair in war as it once was.
The enemy is invisible.
One man doesn’t look another in the eye and kill him with a sword.
The enemy, dead or alive, is largely unseen.
He is killed by remote control: a loud noise, a distant puff of smoke and
then...silence.
The pictures of the victim’s wife and children, which he carries in his
breast pocket, are destroyed with him.
He is not heard to cry out.
The question of compassion or pity or remorse does not enter into it.
The enemy is not a man, he is a statistic.
It is true, too, that more people are being killed at war now than
previously because we’re better at doing it than we used to be.
One man with one modern weapon can kill thousands. |
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发表于 2018-6-2 19:54:02