My impression is many foolish people like the idea of war in prospect -- they like war movies [1] -- but hate it when confronted with its horrible reality. * F

My impression is many foolish people like the idea of war in prospect -- they like war movies [1] -- but hate it when confronted with its horrible reality. * First, anyone who applies the slightest intellectual effort will see war is a catastrophe, though occasionally better than its alternative. * If I remember my history, for both the American Civil War and WWI, people were excited by their beginnings. People picnicked beside the first Civil War battles. Needless to say, they soon learned of their mistakes. Similarly many Americans were excited for the second Iraq war. (And those examples hardly are unusual.) * Civilians and soldiers who die, are maimed, are raped, are tortured, who see those things happen to family members, or lose their homes, jobs, assets, or see their nations and communities reduced to chaos and poverty, -- they do not love war. * Those who kill and see others kill usually do not love war. What we compel soldiers to do is horrible, killing is unnatural and damaging to the killer too. We've made others into torturers [2] -- what if you were made to torture or kill someone? War costs many survivors their souls and peace of mind. Read any history of any war's aftermath, including our recent conflicts: Those who return often are not the same. PTSD is widespread, and note the very high number of suicides currently among our soldiers, despite the recent conflicts being among the safest, lowest-intensity wars in American history. * Those who have experienced prior wars came out of them seeking to end war for ever, for example after WWI (the League of Nations) and WWII (the United Nations and the predecessors to the European Union). Some today mock these people as idealistic, but these were the people who led us to victory in existential wars -- they knew far more of war's reality than we ever will. The glorification of war, military, and soldiers is highly irresponsible and dangerous. We consign soldiers, affected civilians, and whole nations to nightmarish horrors, and then glorify it so we don't have to think about what we have done. [3] [1] http://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2015/01/if-only-america-cared-about-actual-wars-much-war-movies/102288 http://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2015/01/if-only-america-care... [2] Not just CIA prisons and Abu Ghraib, but of others too; for example: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/24/politics/24abuse.html http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/24/politics/24abuse.html [3] http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/12/the-tragedy-of-the-american-military/383516/ http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/12/the-trag...