[CALIBK12] Richie's Picks: WAR IS...

[BudNotBuddy at aol.com]

Richie's Picks: WAR IS...: SOLDIERS,  SURVIVORS, AND STORYTELLERS TALK ABOUT 
WAR edited by Marc Aronson and Patty  Campbell, Candlewick Press, September 
2008, 200p., ISBN:  978-0-7636-3625-8
 
"Joining the military is a life-altering decision, and one  that the 
government urges -- indeed bullies -- young people to make before  they're deemed 
mature enough even to buy a bottle of beer."
-- from "The Recruitment Minefield" by Bill  Bigelow
 
In their side-by-side introductory essays to WAR  IS..., editor Patty 
Campbell speaks of her "passionate revulsion toward  war," while editor Marc Aronson 
talks of how, "People like war.  There  is only one thing we like better: 
sex."  Together, Campbell and Aronson  have compiled an impressive collection of 
thought-provoking  and sometimes incendiary pieces that alternately extol 
and/or condemn  that behavior which Wikipedia defines as "large scale, violent 
conflict."   The collection is divided into sections on "Deciding About War," 
"Experiencing  War," and "The Aftermath of War."
 
"Mama, just killed a man" 
-- Queen, from "Bohemian Rhapsody"
 
"What does it feel like to kill  someone?
"You will probably go through several emotional reactions when  you kill.  
These are generally sequential, but not necessarily  universal.  The first phase 
is concern that you'll freeze up and won't be  able to pull the trigger.  The 
second is the actual kill, which, because of  your training, will happen 
reflexively.  You may feel  exhilarated.   Killing produces adrenaline; repeated 
killing can lead  to 'killing addiction.'  This feeling can be especially 
intense if you kill  at medium to long-range distances.  The next phase, remorse 
and revulsion,  can render you unable to ever kill again...Only a few people are 
able to kill  and not feel remorse, though many try to deny this feeling to 
make it easier to  continue to kill.  Subsequent killings are often easier to 
handle.   Last is the rationalization and acceptance phase.  This is a lifelong 
 process during which you will try to account for what you did.  Most are  
able to see what they did as the right and necessary thing.  If you cannot  
rationalize your killing it may lead to post-traumatic stress  disorder."
-- Chris Hedges, "The Moment of Combat"
 
How might one get caught up participating in war,  particularly some war 
halfway around the world?  To read, contemplate, and discuss "The Recruitment 
Minefield"  (quoted above) -- which details how military recruiters seeking to  
meet quotas routinely lie and badger young people in our nation's high schools,  
malls, supermarket parking lots, and elsewhere -- is, in itself,  sufficient 
reason to track down a copy of WAR IS...  
 
(It was at this point in reading this book that I stopped long  enough to sit 
down with my seventeen-year-old daughter and find  out about all the places 
where she has encountered  recruiters.)
 
WAR IS... also contains eye-opening, real-life  graphic accounts of war:
 
"As time went by, things got worse.  Your friends were  gone -- dead or 
wounded so bad they were sent home -- and here you sat and  wondered why not me.  
Gary stepped on a Bouncing Betty and was ripped  apart; he lived but was 
severely injured.  My other close friend, Paul, was  gone, transferred to another 
unit.  I was alone, and didn't care  anymore.  Every day people were dying and 
being blown apart by booby traps  and still I lived.  Why?  One sergeant was 
hit in the head with a  rocket-propelled grenade; it took his head off.  When he 
fell, he fell on  his knees.  The blast literally blew his face off.  I 
wanted to say  good-bye.  But I couldn't talk to him -- I didn't know whether to 
hug the  body or speak to the face.  So I turned around and walked away.  That  
is what war is."
-- from "Memories of Vietnam: Vietnam Tunnels" by C.W. Bowman,  Jr.
 
There are just so many individual decisions that one can make  in life 
without significant, lasting consequences, but not so when it comes to  war.  We 
learn from WAR IS... that signing on with the military  is unlike any other job 
one might consider.  The "workplace" can  suddenly change so radically but you 
are never permitted to change your  mind, quit, and go find a different job.  
 
In Helen Benedict's piece, "Women at War: What it is Like to  be a Female 
Soldier at War in Iraq," we read accounts of women who  joined the military prior 
to 9/11 with little thought as to the  potential consequences.  These women 
eventually found themselves in  Iraq facing both lethal enemy fire as well as 
repeated incidents of sexual  harassment and sexual attacks by their coworkers.
 
"You play with my world
Like it's your little toy"
-- from "Masters of War" by Bob Dylan
 
WAR IS...: SOLDIERS, SURVIVORS, AND STORYTELLERS TALK ABOUT  WAR contains 
everything from vintage columns by  legendary WWII reporter Ernie Pyle to a 
one-act play ("Killing Flies")  by YA author (and daughter of a career army 
officer) Rita Williams-Garcia  to the fascinating and harsh "Letter to a Young 
Enlistee" by U.S.  Army vet Christian Bauman.  It is a book that I wish were about 
some  bizarre fictional world somewhere else in the universe.  But as long as  
there are recruiters lurking in front of Safeway and as long as No Child Left  
Behind mandates that recruiters have access to our children while they  are 
at school, this is a book that must absolutely be brought to  the attention of 
today's teens. 
 

Richie  Partington, MLIS
Richie's Picks http://richiespicks.com
Moderator,  http://groups.yahoo.com/group/middle_school_lit/
BudNotBuddy at aol.com
http://www.myspace.com/richiespicks






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