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Friday, December 11, 2009

What Is War?


As I watched the 9Th episode of Band of Brothers today, there came a part where they discovered a concentration camp full of starving Jews. Most of them closer to dead than living, skin and bones, barely walking, barely breathing. Pale, skeletal fragments of what used to be a healthy human being. At one point, the part that struck me the hardest, many of the victims came up and were pulling at the soldiers trying to convey their appreciation in their foreign tongue. One embraced a soldier and began sobbing, the soldier started to tear up and hugged the man in return. I began to cry as well, realizing how much tragedy has gone on in this world even before I was born. Things I was spared from having to go through.

During one portion of the film, a soldier was reading a news article that was entitled, "Why We Fight...," and one answer given in the paper was, "...because the Germans are bad." I thought about that statement for a few minutes and realized that it was not the Germans who were bad. We all have the same make up in our being to be the worst individual possible, most of us just exercise self control and work on being the best person we can be. I then started thinking about the article title, "Why We Fight...." The first thing that came to my mind was "freedom," and then my mind went to that concentration camp and I realized that freedom is the end result, not the main source of war. War starts with power, greed, envy, selfish thoughts, personal gain. Nowadays we just call it money, that's usually how it ends up. Why does everything have to be about "me, my, mine?"

When I think about war and the military, they hold such a high rank in my eyes, for I know that I could never do what they do, see what they have to see and experience the kinds of things they consider normal; Innocent human beings falling victim to power hungry leaders who don't give one thought about who they are, where they came from, what they are about. They're just in the way, an obstacle to get through, so they bully and use undeserving force to keep them out of the way. Those people have names, ages, families, homes, children, grandchildren, memories, hobbies, talents, friends, likes, dislikes, opinions, thoughts, souls, hearts, passions... Who do these "leaders" think they are to take such a life into their own hands and do with it as they will? What gave you the right to treat people so poorly? How do you justify the wrong doings of these creations? How do you sleep at night with pictures of their faces soring through your mind, their screams pouring through your thoughts, their tear stains still on your useless uniform? How do you live with the visions of little children, knowing nothing of what's going on, crying tears of terror and fear, holding their teddy bears so tight for that's the only security they can cling to, watching their parents being taken away not understanding why their big strong daddy can't force these angry men into submission and piece their family back together? What are you really fighting for?

I know why our men fight. Our military fights to clean up the messes that other countries create, they fight to free the places where power hungry men have left their mark, they fight to keep us free, they fight to keep themselves free, not because if they don't fight their leader would kill them and their families and destroy their homes and possessions. They do it for others as well as themselves. They do it to keep our country as honorable as it has always been, to keep our name respected. America is their family, they fight to protect our family name, keep it untarnished. They fight out of necessity, not out of want or need of more power or possessions. Everything should be done for others, not self. There is no satisfaction in selfish living. To see the relief on the face and in the embrace of that victim was so humbling. I know it's a production, but that just means that they couldn't show you the immensity and real tragedy of the events that happened. I would imagine it was 100 times worse for the people who actually went through it and witnessed it.

How selfish, how cruel, how unbelievably wicked the minds of the world have become. How embarrassed I am to be considered the same as you...a "human being." On the other side of cruelty, my human heart wants to show them the same respect they showed the Jews. "This is what you put them through, how do you like it?" What ever happened to "Do unto others...?" Why would we treat someone in a way that we would loath them to treat us? What makes any one person any better than the next? Were you not created from the same pile of dirt as they? It doesn't have to be like this. But someone down the line got it in their mind that it would be easier to ask forgiveness than permission, then accelerated into multiple wars fought, won or lost. Congratulations world, we're now in a life long kindergarten battle of "My truck is cooler than your truck!," and it's costing the lives of countless innocent individuals. You should be so proud!!!

2 comments:

jeaniebug said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
jeaniebug said...

Wow, Beth, you said a mouthful. But very heart felt and earnestly said. You summed it up pretty good. Keep up the good work. You have made us proud, baby sister. I love you.
Love,
Jeanie