War is not heroic

Do you ever get the feeling that war has somehow become acceptable part of western life? This got me thinking the other day, dangerous as that might be, about where the horrific violence of war gained itself such a good reputation. Maybe it was World War 2, the clean cut epic struggle of good against evil.

It is difficult to argue against war as a means to overthrow such ideals, and I don’t think I’d hesitate in using violence myself if the situation arose again. The trouble is that WW2 is the most celebrated event in the last century, it even falls half way through to produce a handy pivotal point. What has happened is that the winning of good over evil (Fascism) in WW2 has found itself tagged onto further conflicts that politicians need to cast in a good light. This could simply be the use of romantic imagery, or the use of the word ‘Freedom’, or ‘History’ or the childlike George Bush aligning himself with Churchill.

Worse still is the idea that opposing war somehow denigrates the memory of all those that fell defending our freedom, which I always find a little ironic considering that peace protesters are using that freedom to try and prevent a third world war.

Conservatives continue to queue up and defend the good name of war as if a peaceful solution is somehow an admission of weakness.

The war years may have been great, but war as we have come to know it is utterly grotesque.

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