Ernest Hemingway: “If everybody would not attack the war would be over”

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Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts

American writers on peace and against war

Ernest Hemingway: Selections on war

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Ernest Hemingway
From A Farewell to Arms (1929)

I went back to the major’s dugout and he said the field kitchen would be along and the drivers could come and get their stew. He would loan them mess tins if they did not have them. I said I thought they had them. I went back and told the drivers I would get them as soon as the food came. Manera said he hoped it would come before the bombardment started. They were silent until I went out. They were all mechanics and hated the war.

I went out to look at the cars and see what was going on and then came back and sat down in the dugout with the four drivers. We sat on the ground with our backs against the wall and smoked. Outside it was nearly dark. The earth of the dugout was warm and dry and I let my shoulders back against the wall, sitting on the small of my back, and relaxed.

“Who goes to the attack?” asked Gavuzzi.

“Bersaglieri.”

“All bersaglieri?”

“I think so.”

“There aren’t enough troops here for a real attack.”

“It is probably to draw attention from where the real attack will be.”

“Do the men know that who attack?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Of course they don’t,” Manera said. “They wouldn’t attack if they did.”

“Yes they would,” Passini said. “Bersaglieri are fools.”

“They are brave and have good discipline,” I said.

“They are big through the chest by measurement, and healthy. But they are still fools.”

“The granatieri are tall,” Manera said. This was a joke. They all laughed.

“Were you there, Tenente, when they wouldn’t attack and they shot every tenth man?”

“No.”

“It is true. They lined them up afterward and took every tenth man. Carabinieri shot them.”

“Carabinieri,” said Passini and spat on the floor.

“But those grenadiers; all over six feet. They wouldn’t attack.”

“If everybody would not attack the war would be over,” Manera said.

“It wasn’t that way with the granatieri. They were afraid. The officers all came from such good families.”

“Some of the officers went alone.”

“A sergeant shot two officers who would not get out.”

“Some troops went out.”

“Those that went out were not lined up when they took the tenth men.”

“One of those shot by the carabinieri is from my town,” Passini said. “He was a big smart tall boy to be in the granatieri. Always in Rome. Always with the girls. Always with the carabinieri.” He laughed. “Now they have a guard outside his house with a bayonet and nobody can come to see his mother and father and sisters and his father loses his civil rights and cannot even vote. They are all without law to protect them. Anybody can take their property.”

“If it wasn’t that that happens to their families nobody would go to the attack.”