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May. 30th, 2011 07:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gwydionI wrote this in response to Greenwick's comments, but it was too big to fit unedited:
WWI vets had something of the same rep as Vietnam vets have now. So many of them came back with what we'd call PTSD, only there was no sympathy at all. People were tortured and executed for mental illnesses they acquired in the trenches. The come home to unsympathetic communities where the culture had changed so dramatically, that it wasn't all that much like coming home at all, which made readjustment even harder. I've heard Vietnam vets talking about something similar, an intense sort of culture shock on being shipped home.
When i was a kid, I had a knack for silence. They'd take me to grown up parties, and I'd fill a plate at the buffet and grab something safe to drink (usually lemonade, punch, or tea), and look for a corner where the old men were parked. The adults my parents age were boring to me, talking of jobs, home improvements, children, illnesses, pregnancies, planning for things like church or block parties or trips. I noticed that the old women would circulate, but you could generally find a group of tired old men sitting in a quiet corner somewhere out of the way. I knew old people generally had interesting stories about their lives, as I had plenty of interesting elderly relatives, who's company enjoyed unironically. I'd go find a place to sit with the old men, give them my best smile and politest greeting. the old guys were generally charmed to have an attentive young person to talk to, and with surprisingly little prompting, I could get them talking about what it was like when they were young, or what they did during the Great Depression, or what jobs they had between the Wars. This was the 1970's and early '80's, so for them the wars were WWII and Korea. The trick was not to ask directly about the wars. I'd instead get them going on safe topics and reminiscing. I'd lean forward, genuinely interested, and make appropriate sounds or ask an occasional leading question, but mostly I nibbled my food and sipped my drink, and listened. They loved having someone young who really listened.
If I had enough time and was the right kind of patient, they'd tell me what they did in the War, whichever war it was for them, and if my fishing was very good, they would tell me true things, they probably never meant to, given my age. If they talked long enough, they'd forget exactly who their audience was. I got Okinawa, or Korea in Winter.
I go not glorify war. I understand the necessity sometimes. I certainly agree that WWII was necessary. I just think that the poor bastards who fought Korea or Vietnam or WWI went through their one individual hells too, and got none of the respect or the gratitude. I've seen footage the Germans took of the first live field tests of flame throwers. Bad enough to know such things can happen, but imagine the poor bastards in those first trenches when inexplicable fire rained down on them from above. This is also why I write sometimes about the foot soldiers in valley forge standing sentry in the snow with the icy wind blowing hard across those hills where they stood sentry, with nothing to eat but flour and water pancakes, with weevils for protein if they were lucky, to return to those tiny little barracks cabins packed with other coughing freezing men into tiny bunks. It's easy to wave t5he flag and pound the chest about founding fathers, but I've stood on those hills in Winter, in freezing rain and snow, in my intact boots, and a proper coat and mittens and thought about the kind of bravery and will power to stick through a winter of starvation and dysentery, and I think there isn't gratitude or reward enough in the world really.
I moved West just before Gulf war I, and a bunch of my friends in Corvallis afterward had been in it. There's a lot of overlap between strat gaming, military history, and veterans of one type or another. One of our friends had been in bomb disposal. he had a lot of amusing "dumb grunts" blowing themselves and occasionally others up stories he could tell at parties, but I'd read enough about the stress and danger those guys went through and I knew gallows humor when I saw it. stepping through the remains of six privates looking for more unexploded ordinance, I'm betting you either laugh or you go crazy. Private contractors offered him big bucks to com help clear booby traps, mines, etc. out of Kuwait, but he said there wasn't enough money in the world. I didn't blame him. An ex-marine friend of mine once said Jarhead was a little too true about suicide over there. I think about that a lot as the rates keep climbing for Iraq and Afghanistan both in the field and back home.
When soldiers got home from WWII and Korea, the good middle class manufacturing jobs were waiting for them. When folks came back from Vietnam and after there was mostly homelessness and crap minimum wage jobs waiting for them. This doesn't feel much like gratitude to me either.
WWI vets had something of the same rep as Vietnam vets have now. So many of them came back with what we'd call PTSD, only there was no sympathy at all. People were tortured and executed for mental illnesses they acquired in the trenches. The come home to unsympathetic communities where the culture had changed so dramatically, that it wasn't all that much like coming home at all, which made readjustment even harder. I've heard Vietnam vets talking about something similar, an intense sort of culture shock on being shipped home.
When i was a kid, I had a knack for silence. They'd take me to grown up parties, and I'd fill a plate at the buffet and grab something safe to drink (usually lemonade, punch, or tea), and look for a corner where the old men were parked. The adults my parents age were boring to me, talking of jobs, home improvements, children, illnesses, pregnancies, planning for things like church or block parties or trips. I noticed that the old women would circulate, but you could generally find a group of tired old men sitting in a quiet corner somewhere out of the way. I knew old people generally had interesting stories about their lives, as I had plenty of interesting elderly relatives, who's company enjoyed unironically. I'd go find a place to sit with the old men, give them my best smile and politest greeting. the old guys were generally charmed to have an attentive young person to talk to, and with surprisingly little prompting, I could get them talking about what it was like when they were young, or what they did during the Great Depression, or what jobs they had between the Wars. This was the 1970's and early '80's, so for them the wars were WWII and Korea. The trick was not to ask directly about the wars. I'd instead get them going on safe topics and reminiscing. I'd lean forward, genuinely interested, and make appropriate sounds or ask an occasional leading question, but mostly I nibbled my food and sipped my drink, and listened. They loved having someone young who really listened.
If I had enough time and was the right kind of patient, they'd tell me what they did in the War, whichever war it was for them, and if my fishing was very good, they would tell me true things, they probably never meant to, given my age. If they talked long enough, they'd forget exactly who their audience was. I got Okinawa, or Korea in Winter.
I go not glorify war. I understand the necessity sometimes. I certainly agree that WWII was necessary. I just think that the poor bastards who fought Korea or Vietnam or WWI went through their one individual hells too, and got none of the respect or the gratitude. I've seen footage the Germans took of the first live field tests of flame throwers. Bad enough to know such things can happen, but imagine the poor bastards in those first trenches when inexplicable fire rained down on them from above. This is also why I write sometimes about the foot soldiers in valley forge standing sentry in the snow with the icy wind blowing hard across those hills where they stood sentry, with nothing to eat but flour and water pancakes, with weevils for protein if they were lucky, to return to those tiny little barracks cabins packed with other coughing freezing men into tiny bunks. It's easy to wave t5he flag and pound the chest about founding fathers, but I've stood on those hills in Winter, in freezing rain and snow, in my intact boots, and a proper coat and mittens and thought about the kind of bravery and will power to stick through a winter of starvation and dysentery, and I think there isn't gratitude or reward enough in the world really.
I moved West just before Gulf war I, and a bunch of my friends in Corvallis afterward had been in it. There's a lot of overlap between strat gaming, military history, and veterans of one type or another. One of our friends had been in bomb disposal. he had a lot of amusing "dumb grunts" blowing themselves and occasionally others up stories he could tell at parties, but I'd read enough about the stress and danger those guys went through and I knew gallows humor when I saw it. stepping through the remains of six privates looking for more unexploded ordinance, I'm betting you either laugh or you go crazy. Private contractors offered him big bucks to com help clear booby traps, mines, etc. out of Kuwait, but he said there wasn't enough money in the world. I didn't blame him. An ex-marine friend of mine once said Jarhead was a little too true about suicide over there. I think about that a lot as the rates keep climbing for Iraq and Afghanistan both in the field and back home.
When soldiers got home from WWII and Korea, the good middle class manufacturing jobs were waiting for them. When folks came back from Vietnam and after there was mostly homelessness and crap minimum wage jobs waiting for them. This doesn't feel much like gratitude to me either.