What is war?
The wars Australia have taken part in have had an impact on our culture, history and in shaping todays world. There are many definitions of war as many people have different opinions on the topic depending on their own personal beliefs, philosophy, experiences, location and education.
Moseley summarises war as "...a state of organised, open-ended collective conflict or hostility." The Oxford dictionary defines it as "the state of an armed conflict between different countries or different groups within a country." Wikiquotes expands on this by saying "...war is a conflict involving the organised use of weapons and physical force by states or other large-scale groups...warring parties usually hold territory, which they can win or lose; and each has a leading person or organization which can surrender, or collapse, thus ending the war...wars are usually a series of campaigns between two opposing sides involving a dispute over sovereignty, territory, resources, religion, or ideology..."
Moseley summarises war as "...a state of organised, open-ended collective conflict or hostility." The Oxford dictionary defines it as "the state of an armed conflict between different countries or different groups within a country." Wikiquotes expands on this by saying "...war is a conflict involving the organised use of weapons and physical force by states or other large-scale groups...warring parties usually hold territory, which they can win or lose; and each has a leading person or organization which can surrender, or collapse, thus ending the war...wars are usually a series of campaigns between two opposing sides involving a dispute over sovereignty, territory, resources, religion, or ideology..."
So what is the reality of war? Media, movies, books, our society and government would make us believe that war is where our heroic soldiers gloriously march off, winning battles and bringing peace and democracy to our world. But war is actually very different from this and what the author Harry Browne writes shows this.
What is war?
By Harry Browne
...It is your children or your grandchildren dying before they're even fully adults, or being maimed or mentally scarred for life. It is your brothers and sisters being taught to kill other people - and to hate people who are just like themselves...
It is hundreds of thousands of human beings dying years before their time. It is millions of people separated forever from the ones they loved.
It is the destruction of homes for which people worked for decades. It is the end of careers that meant as much to others as your career means to you.
It (raises taxes for everyone)...taxes that remain long after the war... It is the suppression of free speech and the jailing of people who criticise the government.
It is the imposition of slavery by forcing young men to serve in the military.
It is (bullying) the public to hate foreign people and races...It is numbing our sensibilities to cruelties inflicted on foreigners (and foreign soldiers killed).
...Politicians lie even more than usual. Secrecy and cover-ups become the rule rather than the exception. The press becomes even less reliable.
War is genocide, torture, cruelty, propaganda, dishonesty, and slavery.
War is the worst obscenity government can inflict upon its subjects. It makes every other political crime -- corruption, bribery, favoritism, vote-buying, graft, dishonesty -- seem petty.
By Harry Browne
...It is your children or your grandchildren dying before they're even fully adults, or being maimed or mentally scarred for life. It is your brothers and sisters being taught to kill other people - and to hate people who are just like themselves...
It is hundreds of thousands of human beings dying years before their time. It is millions of people separated forever from the ones they loved.
It is the destruction of homes for which people worked for decades. It is the end of careers that meant as much to others as your career means to you.
It (raises taxes for everyone)...taxes that remain long after the war... It is the suppression of free speech and the jailing of people who criticise the government.
It is the imposition of slavery by forcing young men to serve in the military.
It is (bullying) the public to hate foreign people and races...It is numbing our sensibilities to cruelties inflicted on foreigners (and foreign soldiers killed).
...Politicians lie even more than usual. Secrecy and cover-ups become the rule rather than the exception. The press becomes even less reliable.
War is genocide, torture, cruelty, propaganda, dishonesty, and slavery.
War is the worst obscenity government can inflict upon its subjects. It makes every other political crime -- corruption, bribery, favoritism, vote-buying, graft, dishonesty -- seem petty.
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"If we don't end war, war will end us." - H. G. Wells
"War does not determine who is right - only who is left." - Bertrand Russell "I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity." - Dwight D. Eisenhower "Older men declare war. But it is the youth that must fight and die." - Herbert Hoover "I am sick and tired of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell." - William Tecumseh Sherman |
I see war as an unnecessary part of our world today but I do wonder whether it can ever be avoided. It seems there has always been war and probably always will be, unless we do the near impossible and change our nature. Military power is no deterrent anymore and conflict is readily used as a method for people to get what they want, solve disputes or in supposed defence. Over time the nature, causes, reasons and methods of war have changed but the results have not. Many people still die or are maimed and homes and property destroyed. There always will be a personal loss to war. Whether war is right or wrong it is a waste of human life, a waste of resources and potential that cannot be replaced.
"The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting." - Sun Tzu "Only the dead have seen the end of war." - Plato |
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