Jean Lartéguy: What is a monster? The man who starts a war, whichever side he’s on.

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

French writers on war and peace

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Jean Lartéguy
Black Chimeras
Translated by Xan Fielding

“A pity this Major Volbert left the army when he did. A pity his successor did not see fit to abide by his opinion. No one ever listens to men like Volbert and myself: we are suspected of common sense, and common sense has always appeared undesirable in every army in the world. That’s why soldiers commit such startling blunders.”

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What is a monster? The hangman is a monster, but also the judge and the man above the judge, and the man who starts a war…whichever side he’s on.

When you’re fighting a war, you mustn’t try to understand, you must simply obey. If you try to understand you start reasoning with the enemy and end up by coming round to his point of view. Then you’re done for, for everyone has good reasons for doing what he does.

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Men would go on fighting for years to come, not in the big countries anymore – it was too dangerous, what with the atomic bombs – but in the small ones….