The memories of what soldiers experience during war lasts a lifetime. Memories can be triggered at any time and retold with precise detail. Events experienced many years earlier can easily be recalled. For a Vietnam veteran it is the Vietnam memorial that brings his experience back into his conscious thought. These memories are painful and full of emotion. Like an addiction they are hard to move past; a scar that never goes away but only fades. War is full of experiences that change the soldiers it affects. It may just be one event in particular that causes a complete change in a soldier.
[...] The events of war can not be recreated in any way other than the actual event. It has an effect on people that is unnatural. With the advancing techniques of modern warfare more people are losing their identity to survive the ever growing chances they will be killed. Foreign wars in distant lands surrounded by death bring about change in even the most mentally strong person. In war the events dictate what changes a person will make rather than them dictating it themselves. [...]
[...] Just as war changes the mind of a person it also changes the population involved. In Chris Hedges' War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning there is a quote by Ivo Andric which points out that wars affect can continually affect an entire population One sometimes wonders whether the spirit of the majority of the Balkan peoples has not been forever poisoned and that, perhaps, they will never again be able to do anything other than suffer violence, or inflict it. [...]
[...] The teeth were broken. There was a swollen black bruise under his left eye. The cheekbone was gone.” (940) this describes the manner in which Ted Lavender was killed. The image that is described is so specific and as clear as if a soldier who witnessed his death told it. Both stories examine the role of memory after the war has ended. In a time of war that can be so hectic yet the details are told with such clarity. [...]
[...] The experiences of people during war scar the mind. The images are left there to fester in the mind long after the experience. They are full of emotion that is rarely expressed. With time memories can become skewed and the experience now takes on a life of its own. The memory becomes the last testament for ones who died. The memory which is so horrible becomes the fuel for an addiction, the addiction being the rush of combat. This addiction can even overcome the brutality and inhumanity that surrounds war. [...]
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