Armageddon in Retrospect

Armageddon in Retrospect
By Kurt Vonnegut


This is a posthumous collection of twelve new and unpublished writings on war and peace that range from a visceral nonfiction recollection of the destruction of Dresden during World War II — an essay that is as timely today as it was then — to a painfully funny short story about three Army privates and their fantasies of the perfect first meal upon returning home from war, to a darker, more poignant story about the impossibility of shielding our children from the temptations of violence.

1. Vonnegut's Speech at Clowes Hall, Indianapolis, April 2007
2. Wailing Shall Be in All Streets
3. Great Day
4. Guns Before Butter
5. Happy Birthday, 1951
6. Brighten Up
7. The Unicorn Trip
8. Unknown Soldier
9. Spoils
10. Just You and Me, Sammy
11. The Commandant's Desk
12. Armageddon in Retrospect

Vonnegut writes each story with extraordinary insight and a lively style that forces you to reassess your view on war. His own experience as a prisoner of war in Dresden during WWII brings each story to life with realistic descriptions of conditions, characters and dialog. Each story reveals the foolishness of war, the brutality of all sides, and the total waste of life and property that war brings.

In “Spoils,” the main character goes out with his buddies to pillage a village for war souvenirs and to find food for supper. While in a barn looking for food, he finds a rabbit in a cage and kills it, hoping to make a delicious stew with it. Suddenly, the inhabitants return to their farm, so he hides in the shadows of the barn. As he waits, a small boy comes in and finds his pet rabbit dead. The soldier watches in horror as the little boy carries his beloved pet outside and falls down weeping and wailing. As a result, the soldier refuses to collect souvenirs and returns back to the United States ridden with guilt.

In “Just You and Me, Sammy,” the main character is a German-American who served in the American Army and was captured by the Germans. While in a prison camp, he observes George, another German-American soldier in the U.S. Army who was also captured. George gains the German guards’ confidence and becomes the camp entrepreneur, trading cigarettes and other goods for food and favors. Now that the Russians are coming, he is worried and talks Sammy into going into town with him. George tries to “buy” Sammy’s dog tags so he can assume his identity to escape a court martial for collaborating with the enemy. George doesn’t have the nerve to kill Sammy and misses his chance when the Russians come. After the Russians leave them alone, Sammy kills George with a pistol he found in the house and then lies to Army Intelligence, saying he accidentally shot himself after falling into a ditch. After investigating the incident, they discover that George had fake ID tags because he was a German spy sent to the camp to gain intelligence for the Nazis.

In “The Commander’s Desk” an American Major sets up a headquarters in a Czech town and forces a carpenter to make him a desk. The carpenter was eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Americans after suffering both under the Russians and the Nazis, but becomes quickly disenchanted with the gruff major. The only American who has any sensitivity is a captain assigned as the major’s aide, so the carpenter builds a relationship with him. The major puts a lot of pressure on the carpenter to finish the desk, so the carpenter makes a secret drawer and places a bomb in it. However, as soon as the desk is delivered, the major is transferred and the captain takes his place. The carpenter informs the captain of the secret drawer and deactivates the bomb before it can go off.

In “Armageddon in Retrospect” scientists are searching for ways to prove that the Devil exists and find a way to trap him. In one last attempt, the lead scientist talks his assistant into performing one last attempt to trap the Devil in a special copper barrel wired with electricity to keep him from escaping. After performing a special ceremony at midnight, the scientist begins to go mad and falls into the copper barrel. The assistant locks him inside and turns on the electricity, claiming that the scientist had become possessed by the Devil.

Flags of Our Fathers

While I liked the premise of the movie Flags of Our Fathers, I thought it was a little convoluted, taking away from the overall impact of the movie. The movie focuses mainly on John Bradley, a Navy medic and two of his comrades, Marines Rene Gagnon and Ira Hayes, three of the six men in the famous photograph of the lifting of the flag on Iwo Jima. The movie focuses on how the U.S. Government used these men to sell war bonds to fund the war effort, despite the facts that the photo was of the second flag going up and one of the original flag-raisers wasn’t mentioned.

Several themes predominate in the movie, one being that heroes are made by those at home and not by those on the battlefield. The men on the battlefield are too conscious of their own shortcomings and lack of courage, and many felt that they were just doing what anyone else would have done in their place. Most “heroes” feel awkward at being singled out and labeled for special treatment. The movie shows how the image of the heroes was created by the press and the government and then manipulated and used for the war effort. While the movie tended to be cynical and judgmental, it also tried to show how such hero worship is essential in times of war.

Flags of Our Fathers also demonstrates how powerful the media is in shaping our perceptions of war. One photograph changed the mood of the nation and rallied support for the war. In a similar way, though with an opposite effect, one picture of a South Vietnamese officer shooting a prisoner in the head turned American sentiment against the war in Vietnam. Recently, the photos from Abu Ghraib prison turned American sentiment sour on the war in Iraq. In addition, the constant reporting of suicide bombings in Iraq has caused the approval rating for the war in Iraq to plummet. What is happening in the media today is very similar to what happened 35 years ago. Even though we were winning the war in Vietnam, public perception was radically shaped by the media and political leadership, causing many to see the war as hopeless and meaningless. This is happening today as well, as the media and certain political leaders are turning victory into defeat.

Much of what is said in the media is either misleading or incomplete. Americans live on sound bites, making a coherent explanation and understanding of a complex military operation impossible. We don’t have the patience to dig in and find out what is really going on, so we just blindly believe what the news media and politicians tell us. Much of the rhetoric being thrown around today is pathetic and ultimately harmful to the United States. Wars today are lost, not because our military is weak, but because our media and political leaders are morally weak and misguided.

I am not writing this to defend the war in Iraq but merely to point out that the current mood and public discourse is clouded and misguided. My challenge is not to support the war or call for withdrawal but to stop listening only to the media and allowing your perceptions to be shaped by the news and political sound bites.

Guadalcnal

Donald Yerxa has written an excellent summary of the battle that changed the tide of the war in the Pacific against the Japanese in World War II. (“Guadalcanal” in Books & Culture, January/February 2007, pages 44-46). If you have any interest in military history in general or World War II in particular, you should read this article. Yerxa covers all of the major events in the war in a brief but comprehensive survey that explains the tactical decisions of both sides.

In his conclusion, Yerxa discusses the brutality of the war and looks for an adequate explanation for why American Marines hated the Japanese so much. The most likely explanation, he says, is not racism but the savagery and fanatical disregard for life of the Japanese soldiers who butchered injured Marines, attacked with unprecedented ferocity, and committed suicide rather than be captured. Here is the concluding paragraph from the article:

According to Bergerud, the only explanation for this visceral hatred and lack of restraint on the battlefield is fear mingled with a lust for revenge. Early on, the Marines perceived that the Japanese were uniquely cruel fighters who preferred death to surrender, even when there was no clear military purpose involved. The fate of Goettge's patrol and Ichiki's suicidal attack at the Tenaru confirmed this. Every encounter with the Japanese generated an intense sense of danger and fear. Since the Japanese would do anything to kill Americans, the Marines took no chances. The "savage physical environment" of Guadalcanal only intensified the fear. Visibility was often limited to a few yards in a jungle filled with strange and threatening sounds. Without dismissing the ferocity of American combat practices, Bergerud points the finger at the Japanese military government for indoctrinating soldiers "to find meaning in oblivion, and to accept the frightening idea that spiritual purification comes through purposeful death."


You can read the article at: http://www.ctlibrary.com/40832