Rod Serling on War

“Too many wars are fought almost as if by rote. Too many wars are fought out of sloganry, out of battle hymns, out of aged, musty appeals to patriotism that went out with knighthood and moats. Love your country because it is eminently worthy of your affection. Respect it because it deserves your respect. Be loyal to it because it cannot survive without your loyalty. But do not accept the shedding of blood as a natural function or a prescribed way of history, even if history points this up by its repetition. That men die for causes does not necessarily sanctify that cause. And that men are maimed and torn to pieces every fifteen and twenty years does not immortalize or deify the act of war. Are you tough enough, young ladies and gentlemen, to try to build a world in which young men can live out their lives in fruitful pursuit of a decent, enriching consummation of both his talents and his hopes. But if survival calls for the bearing of arms, bear them, you must. As we all have.”

“When you leave here today, if you agree with me, and others, give thought if you will to the inconsistencies of our national morality. That we can punish civil disobedience that finds expression in a revulsion against death – and yet remain strangely unmoved by acts of murder against victims we are supposedly helping, and are ourselves dying for. And even if you don’t agree – give thought to the whole adventure of war. It has been your fathers lot, and mine, and his. There has not been even a spasmodic moment when young men have not fought and died. When the solons, and the aged heads of state have not in their infinite wisdom and consummate judgment, sent the young off to end their lives. An obscure poet named Arthur Daidson Ficke Arthur Daidson Ficke |, wrote this in the 19th century: “Old men in impotence can beget new wars to kill the lusty young; Young men can sing, old men forget…That any song was every sung.” Don’t you forget that song, the words, the music, the symphony to living. Remember that you can’t necessarily sanctify a cause by virtue of the fact that men die for it. A death in a worthless or even questionable cause is a pointless, meaningless, tragically premature death. So when, in future times, men ask you to prove patriotism and loyalty and affection for your native land – remember that these things are not always equated with a willingness to die or to kill.”

“I'm dedicating my little story to you; doubtless you will be among the very few who will ever read it. It seems war stories aren't very well received at this point. I'm told they're out-dated, untimely and as might be expected - make some unpleasant reading. And, as you have no doubt already perceived, human beings don't like to remember unpleasant things. They gird themselves with the armor of wishful thinking, protect themselves with a shield of impenetrable optimism, and, with a few exceptions, seem to accomplish their "forgetting" quite admirably. But you, my children, I don't want you to be among those who choose to forget. I want you to read my stories and a lot of others like them. I want you to fill your heads with Remarque and Tolstoy and Ernie Pyle. I want you to know what shrapnel, and "88's" and mortar shells and mustard gas mean. I want you to feel, no matter how vicariously, a semblance of the feeling of a torn limb, a burnt patch of flesh, the crippling, numbing sensation of fear, the hopeless emptiness of fatigue. All these things are complimentary to the province of war and they should be taught and demonstrated in classrooms along with the more heroic aspects of uniforms, and flags, and honor and patriotism. I have no idea what your generation will be like. In mine we were to enjoy "Peace in our time". A very well meaning gentleman waved his umbrella and shouted those very words...less than a year before the whole world went to war. But this gentleman was suffering the worldly disease of insufferable optimism. He and his fellow humans kept polishing the rose colored glasses when actually they should have taken them off. They were sacrificing reason and reality for a brief and temporal peace of mind, the same peace of mind that many of my contemporaries derive by steadfastly refraining from remembering the war that came before.”