Things fall apart
When we began this book club, I started out as a political and cultural conservative who was once in favor of the Iraq war, but who had turned against it as a foolish mistake and a vain cause. One reason I was curious to read about the World War I experience, though, was my abiding interest in the modern world, and how it got that way. I'd also been curious, in kind of a painful way, to learn how it was that I had been so deceived, and allowed myself to be deceived, about the ease and simplicity with which the US could impose its will on Iraq. Would there be any lessons to be learned from reading these two books about World War I?
Yes, there were. From "All Quiet," I gained a new awareness of the desolation war wreaks on individual soldiers. There were many times -- usually the passages describing bombardment -- that I had to put the book down. It was too intense, psychologically. I came to reproach myself for my callow ignorance, which led me to think that war was not as bad as it is. Look, we all know that war is hell, yadda yadda. But I think many of us who have not lived through it, or fought in it, don't know exactly what that special hell is. I guess what I'm struggling to convey is that both these books, especially the Remarque novel, humanized the experience of soldiering for me in ways I hadn't anticipated. I am now significantly less willing to listen to those leaders eager to send soldiers into battle. I'm not a pacifist, but I am far more skeptical of war than I was.
Along similar lines, the Fussell book left me a lot more wary of rushing into war, because of what unpredicatable catastrophes it can occasion. World War I was so civilizationally devastating in part because it came at the apex of Western civilization's material progress and influence in the world. The Great Powers stumbled into this thing, carried along by their own hubris. So many certainties died in the trenches. Reading Fussell's book made me far more aware of the unintended consequences that come from war.
Before this summer, I thought Christ's words in "The Sermon on the Mount" Blessed are the peacemakers... were a pleasant ideal. Now I see them in a different light, and also my own responsibility as a Christian, an American citizen and a father of children who may one day be asked to fight in a war.