As The Soldier Dies, So Does The Nation Come Alive: The Sacrificial Meaning of Warfare

By: Richard Koenigsberg

 

Posted by author’s permission. © Richard Koenigsberg. Page was originally posted at http://home.earthlink.net/~libraryofsocialscience/as_the_soldier.htm

Many of the major political events of the Twentieth Century have been characterized by massive killing, dying and destruction. I refer to World War I, the Russian revolution and Soviet genocides, the rise of the Nazis and genocide of the Jews, and World War II. These events–preserved in our collective consciousness by a relentless stream of books and television documentaries–lie at the core of the “history” of the Twentieth Century. We know that these events happened, but do we really know why? Do we understand the causes and meaning of such massive destruction?

Historians conceive their fundamental task as describing or documenting what occurred. Although the events that they depict may appear from a human perspective to be irrational or bizarre, rarely do historians describe events as irrational or bizarre. Rather, they focus upon the details: for example, the political machinations and economic situations leading to war; strategies of battles and descriptions of battles. The underlying assumption is that events are governed by logic.

Given the rational bias of Western culture, it is difficult to imagine that significant events could be the consequence of obscure, irrational forces. Once written up in “history books,” the reality of what occurred becomes part of our world-taken-for-granted. However grotesque an event may have been, historical documentation “normalizes” it, confers dignity upon the event. Soon, given the weighty accounts that appear in so many books, one comes to assume that there was a reason for what occurred; that we understand what was going on.

The assumption that we know what was going on is in my view unfounded. Reconceptualization of the historical process begins when we acknowledge that we don’t really know what was going on. The destruction of life and property that occurred on such a vast scale during the Twentieth Century cannot be explained in conventional economic and political terms. To understand these events, we begin by acknowledging that the historical process is governed by profoundly irrational forces.

 

OBFUSCATION IN THE DEPICTION OF WARFARE

My objective in this paper is to interrogate the ideology that supports a willingness of soldiers to “die for their country,” that is, to enter battle knowing that he might be killed or wounded. The ideology of nationalism links the death of the soldier to the survival of one’s country, a connection that has been put forth throughout history in statements such as “the individual must die so that the nation might live.” What is the meaning of this idea of “dying for one’s country?”

Inherent within the institution of warfare is a tendency toward obfuscation: a desire not to look too closely at what actually happens in battle. This wish to avoid the encounter with reality is supported by profound conventionality in the way people think and speak about war. Our refusal to look closely at or to think clearly about war permits us not only to hide the horror and destructiveness of warfare, but also to overlook war’s strangeness.

By focusing on the First World War—the subject of this paper—we are able to perceive the weirdness of war and also to observe how historical accounts of this war function to enable us to avoid perceiving that weirdness. Looking through nearly one hundred books as I began my research, I was astonished by the monumental and inexplicable destructiveness of this war. This initial reaction was followed by another round of astonishment: I was struck by the blandness or nonchalant tone of descriptions of the carnage; and by how infrequently historians made an effort to step back to question what was going on–to interrogate the meaning of the slaughter.

The First World War was a horrendous, chaotic, brutal, and often surrealistically absurd war. Yet it is portrayed as a more-or-less natural or normal event, despite the suggestions in the historical accounts that something very unnatural and abnormal was occurring. Historians describe the quantity and persistence of the killing and dying, as well as the suicidal nature of the battle strategies, but rarely step back and ask: What was going on? What was all the death and maiming about?

One of the ways we avoid encountering the horror of war is by filtering our perceptions through the concept of “culture.” We shield ourselves from anguish by telling ourselves that warfare is a firmly established social institution that has existed since the beginning of civilization. Therefore it is not necessary for anyone to become disturbed by what happened in the First World War or in any other war for that matter. When we witness the killing, dying and maiming, we simply are observing the normal behavior of soldiers. Why become upset? Why act as if something unusual or extraordinary is occurring?

Denial of reality is reflected in the way warfare has been portrayed in documentaries and movies. Recently we have witnessed a significant change in this regard, but when I think of the World War II documentaries that I have witnessed throughout my life, I’m amazed at how infrequently I saw soldiers dying or being maimed. On the basis of these documentaries, one might conclude that war is a glorious Fourth of July celebration: The rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air.

These World War II documentaries depict war as an exciting event that one very much would like to be part of: soldiers marching off to a foreign land with crowds cheering, bands playing and women providing support and encouragement; heroic landings on beaches; planes soaring through the air and dropping bombs; massive, magnificent ships. Occasionally one notices someone falling to the ground. However, such a detail pales in comparison to the overall splendor of the event. All in all, based on newsreel portrayals of World War II, one comes away with the impression that war is a wonderful display of energy and efficiency that makes one proud to be part of such a determined and well-organized nation.

I suggest that conventional representations of war in documentary and feature films function as a distancing mechanism required by the institution of warfare. These portrayals act to shield us from the reality of death and body mutilation, even as they allow us to “get off” by depicting war as exciting and heroic. We enjoy the idea of our nation’s power, but would prefer not to look too closely at what happens to soldiers’ bodies on the battlefield.

As I describe the details of the First World War, please try to recover a sense of innocence. If what I describe does not seem to make sense, don’t assume that it does make sense. Do not assume that historians or any one else knew or knows what was going on. If what I describe sounds bizarre, strange and abnormal, do not assume that what occurred was not bizarre, strange and abnormal simply because it is written up in history books.

 

THE MAGNITUDE OF DESTRUCTION AND FUTILITY OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR

To convey a sense of the magnitude of the destructiveness of World War I, I provide the following statistics from a U. S. War Department table entitled “Casualties of All Belligerent in World War I.” Data is provided for the Allied nations, which included Russia, France, the British Commonwealth, Italy and the United States, and for the Central Powers, namely Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria. According to the U. S. War Department, there were a total of 65,038,315 forces—people that is—mobilized to fight in this war.

Of the forces mobilized (civilians excluded), 8,538,315 were killed or died, 21,219,452 were wounded, and 7,750,919 were taken prisoner or reported missing. Total casualties, in other words, were 37,508,686, or 57.9% of all forces mobilized. For some nations, the percentage of casualties reached astonishing proportions. For Austria-Hungary, for example, of 7,800,000 forces mobilized, 7,020,000 or 90% were casualties; for Russia, 76.3% of 12 million forces were casualties; for France, 73.3% of 8,410,000 forces were casualties.

The magnitude of the destruction is matched by the extraordinary manner in which many of the battles of the First World War were fought. On the Western front much of the fighting was done out of trenches, with one enemy line facing the other. “Attack” occurred when long rows of soldiers got out of a trench and advanced toward the enemy line, where there was a substantial probability that they would be hit by an artillery shell or mowed down by machine-gun fire. Here is the way historian Modris Eksteins describes the pattern:

The following is an account of the British attack at Loos in September 1915 that appeared in the German 15th Reserve Regiment’s diary:

The enormous number of troops killed and vast proportion of casualties was a logical consequence of the method of fighting. Eksteins describes the results of some of the early (1914) battles:

Eksteins concludes that during the first two years of war, the belligerents on the Western Front “hammered at each other in battles that cost millions of men their lives but moved the front line at most a mile or so in either direction” (1989, p. 144). The war that began in August 1914 finally ended in November 1918. If one substitutes “four years” for “two years” in the sentence above, Eksteins’ conclusion is one with which most historians would concur. In short, after hundreds of battles in which millions of soldiers were killed or maimed, little had changed from a military or political standpoint, apart from the fact that now millions of young men were dead or maimed.

 

WHAT WAS GOING ON?

As I’ve noted, historians until recently have been complacent in their analysis of this war. Somehow it is assumed that soldiers will “do their duty,” even to the extent of forfeiting their lives. Yet, what a radical form of behavior this was—getting out of a trench and running into machine-gun fire. The behavior of soldiers in the First World War contradicts what biologists and psychologists tell us about the “instinct for survival.” This pattern of behavior needs to be explained rather than assumed.

It is only in the last fifteen years that historians have begun to interrogate the behavior of soldiers in the First World War. Eksteins poses the question succinctly:

He observes further that:

Political scientist Jean Elshtain is another scholar who has drawn our attention to the baffling battle strategies employed in the war, and the magnitude of the killing and dying. The First World War, she notes, was the “nadir of nineteenth-century nationalism” (1987, p. 107). Mounds of bodies were sacrificed in a prolonged, dreadful orgy of destruction. “Trench warfare” it was called and it meant “mass, anonymous death.” In the first day of the Battle of the Somme, July 1, 1916, “60,000 men were killed of the 110,000 on the British side who got out of the trenches and began to walk forward along a thirteen-mile front.”

Elshtain observes that “we still have trouble accounting for modern state worship” (1987, p. 87), the “mounds of combatants and noncombatants alike sacrificed to the conflicts of nation states.” Ronald Aronson poses the question of mass death in war in broader terms:

In these passages, we begin to glimpse explanatory concepts. Eksteins discusses the soldiers’ behavior from the perspective of a “sense of duty” and “devotion to the cause of civilization.” Elshtain proposes that what we were witnessing in the First World War was “modern state worship,” with combatants being “sacrificed to the conflicts of nation-states.” While Aronson suggests that history itself constitutes a “slaughter bench” requiring “monstrous sacrifices.”

 

REIFICATION OF THE NATION-STATE

In phrases like “the individual must die so that the nation might live” the nation-state is reified, treated not as an idea or social construction, but as if an object that substantially exists. According to the ideology contained within this phrase, countries exist as entities in their own right, separate and distinct from individuals residing within them. So pervasive is the ideology of nationalism that one must remind oneself when speaking of “France,” “Germany” or “America” that these words refer to ideas or concepts created by human beings rather than to concrete objects that actually exist. To make a statement like “The individual must die so that the nation might live” is to suggest that countries are living creatures, the preservation of which is more significant or valuable than the preservation of actual human lives.

In war, actual human bodies are sacrificed in the name of perpetuating a magical entity, the body politic. Sacrificial acts function to affirm the reality or existence of this sacred object, the nation. Entering into battle may be characterized as a devotional act, with death in war constituting the supreme act of devotion.

Maurice Barres, a prominent French nationalist, published several books during the First World War containing letters written by French soldiers prior to entering battle. Most of the soldiers who wrote these letters subsequently were killed. The following typical excerpt was written by George Morillot–who died on December 11, 1914—to his parents:

The phrase “What matters the life of individuals if France is saved” contains the essence of the ideology that was the source of the First World War. The French soldier writes about the French nation as if it were a tangible entity whose “life” is more valuable than his own. The soldier asserts that he wishes to be remembered as one who has “given their blood that France might live,” an image evoking a blood transfusion where the life-sustaining substance of an individual body passes into the collective body, functioning to keep it alive. It is the soldier’s commitment to the idea of perpetuating the life of the collective body that is the source of his willingness to enter battle knowing he might be killed or wounded.

 

WILLINGNESS TO DIE AS A DECLARATION OF DEVOTION

As soldiers may be willing to die for their countries, so do national leaders and non-combatants applaud and extol the virtue of young citizens who demonstrate a willingness to sacrifice their lives for their nation. Here is what Maurice Barres had to say about French soldiers dying on a daily basis:

And here are the words of P. H. Pearse, founder of the Irish revolutionary movement, upon observing the daily carnage in France:

How extraordinary to hear prominent political figures of the Twentieth Century proclaiming that “the heart of the earth needed to be warmed with the red wine of the battlefield” and that soldiers “joyously” rushed to meet their deaths. These images reflect the thought process that brought into being and sustained four years of slaughter. Perhaps the words of P. H. Pearse provide the basis of a theory that will unlock the meaning of this war. Perhaps the First World War might best be understood as a sacrificial offering of “millions of lives given gladly for love of country.”

For the soldier, willingness to enter battle—and if necessary to die—expresses the depth of his devotion to his nation. One may characterize entering battle as a “pledge of allegiance” in its most radical form. A reporter during the First World War recalled meeting a wounded Canadian soldier:

The wounds function as a testimonial, allowing the soldier to prove to non-combatants at home his sincerity and the depth of his love for his country.

 

AS THE SOLDIER DIES, SO DOES THE NATION COME ALIVE

“War” provides the opportunity for human beings to prove that they are devoted to their countries. “Battles” represent devotional acts, occasions for sacrifice. “Nations” are the entities for which sacrificial acts are performed. Barres stated that the French “make war as a religious duty” (1917, p. 47). French soldiers, he said, “die for France. They wage war in the spirit of martyrs.” He provided the following accounts of their thoughts in the process of dying:

Roland murmurs with dying breath: “O Land of France, Most sweet are thou, my country.” It is with similar expressions and the same love that our soldiers of today are dying. “Au revoir,” writes Jean Cherlomey to his wife, “Promise to bear no grudge against France if she requires all of me.” “Au revoir, it is for the sake of France,” were the dying words of Captain Hersart de La Villemarque. “Vive la France, I am well content, I am dying for her sake,” said Corporal Voituret. “Vive la France, I die, but I am well content,” cry in turn, one after another, thousands of dying men. (1917, pp. 52-3)

“Vive la France:” As the soldier dies, so does the nation come alive. Most soldiers of course do not articulate this relationship between devotion to their country and a willingness to die in battle in such explicit terms. Yet their own statements illustrate the intimate link between attachment to the idea of one’s nation and willingness to enter battle. The First World War was possible only because young men had internalized the ideology of nationalism so deeply.

In her study of the image of the Western soldier, Elshtain (1987) found that the warrior or combatant has presented himself in his most prototypical guise, “not as a bloodthirsty militant.” Rather, by his own account of wartime experience, he constructs himself as one who places the highest value not on killing but on dying –dying for others” (1987, p. 206). Elshtain cites the writings of J. Glenn Gray who examined the impulse to self-sacrifice characteristic of warriors who, “from compassion, would rather die than kill.” Gray called the freedom of wartime: “a communal freedom as the ‘I’ passes into a ‘we,’ and human longing for community with others finds a field for realization” (1987, p. 206). Communal ecstasy explains “a willingness to sacrifice and gives dying for others a mystical quality.”

We’ve observed that the central battle strategy of World War I consisted of unrelenting attacks upon the enemy front that almost always were futile and resulted in an astonishingly high rate of casualties. The Australian Official History, discussing one such battle that resulted in 23,000 casualties, angrily condemned the battle strategy of “throwing several parts of an army corps, brigade after brigade, twenty times in succession against one of the strongest points in the enemy’s defense” (in Eksteins, 1989, p. 189).

The problem, however, Eksteins observes, was that “The determination and grit of a unit had come to be measured by the number of casualties. Officers whose companies incurred light casualties were suspect, so they pressed their attacks with appropriate vigor” (1989, p. 189). In short, officers felt compelled to send their soldiers into futile battles because sincerity and commitment to the cause were measured in terms of casualties. According to this logic, the success of a battle was proportionate to the number of one’s own dead soldiers.

REFERENCES

Aronson, R. (1983). The Dialectics of Disaster: A Preface to Hope. London: Verso.

Barres, M. (1918). The Faith of France: Studies in Spiritual Differences and Unity. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company.

Barres, M. (1917). The Undying Spirit of France.

Eksteins, M. (1989). Rites of Spring: The Great War and the Birth of the Modern Age. New York: Anchor Books.

Elshtain, J. B. (1987). Women and War. New York: Basic Books.

Genthe, C. V. (1969). American War Narratives 1917-1918: A Study and Bibliography. New York: David Lewis.

Martin, F. N. (1973). “The Evolution of a Myth–The Easter Rising, Dublin 1916,” in E. Kamenka, Ed., Nationalism: The Nature and Evolution of an Idea. Canberra: Australian National University Press.