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A review by caprica
War by Sebastian Junger
3.0
This is not a pleasant read, but it does, I think paint a striking portrait of the experience of war (or at least of an experience of war). It consistently reminded me of, and gave context to, the famous maxim, "It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it." (3.5/5 stars.)
The most impactful sections of this text are the ones in which Junger is describing life in the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan- what it is like for the men he is there with, how they behave, what they talk about. Similarly impactful (and, perhaps, more important) are Junger's explanations and explorations of what it means to be on the front lines in this way- how it affects men, what courage means, and how the lived experience of these men shapes them.
The descriptions are frequently harrowing. I cannot think of a similar text that has described violence in a manner at once so terrible and clear. I think it is (perhaps unsurprisingly) impossible for civilians like me to truly understand the experience of war (even if we work for the Department of Defense, or see the consequences of it after-the-fact), but this text does, at least, draw us a little closer to that experience.
I did not walk away from this text with the impression that the goal here was to valorize or glamorize these men or what they did. It would've been a shame to do that, I think, and significantly weakened the text and the text's purpose. I think the journalistic style of the prose does well by the topic and its subjects, and I think it does a good job of answering a question along the lines of, "What does it mean to send people off to war?"
The text is not without its flaws. Although Junger's discussions of the psychological consequences of what goes on are generally insightful, they sometimes feel as though they stray a bit too far into armchair psychologist territory, and those sections feel like the weakest of the book. Additionally, though he was certainly discussing a very specific place and time, some of his own particular biases seem implicitly quite clear. Things such as masculinity and masculine virtue, as well as the heteronormativity of the text are perhaps understandable in the context, but they are never really acknowledged and certainly never examined.
On the whole, though, this book is an effective- albeit disturbing- read. It is not, I think, a bad thing to complicate peoples' ideas of war and to invite further discussions on how we ought to conduct it (as Americans, as a society, as humans), and an emotional text such as this one (rather than, for example, a dry academic discourse) is not a bad place to start.
The most impactful sections of this text are the ones in which Junger is describing life in the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan- what it is like for the men he is there with, how they behave, what they talk about. Similarly impactful (and, perhaps, more important) are Junger's explanations and explorations of what it means to be on the front lines in this way- how it affects men, what courage means, and how the lived experience of these men shapes them.
The descriptions are frequently harrowing. I cannot think of a similar text that has described violence in a manner at once so terrible and clear. I think it is (perhaps unsurprisingly) impossible for civilians like me to truly understand the experience of war (even if we work for the Department of Defense, or see the consequences of it after-the-fact), but this text does, at least, draw us a little closer to that experience.
I did not walk away from this text with the impression that the goal here was to valorize or glamorize these men or what they did. It would've been a shame to do that, I think, and significantly weakened the text and the text's purpose. I think the journalistic style of the prose does well by the topic and its subjects, and I think it does a good job of answering a question along the lines of, "What does it mean to send people off to war?"
The text is not without its flaws. Although Junger's discussions of the psychological consequences of what goes on are generally insightful, they sometimes feel as though they stray a bit too far into armchair psychologist territory, and those sections feel like the weakest of the book. Additionally, though he was certainly discussing a very specific place and time, some of his own particular biases seem implicitly quite clear. Things such as masculinity and masculine virtue, as well as the heteronormativity of the text are perhaps understandable in the context, but they are never really acknowledged and certainly never examined.
On the whole, though, this book is an effective- albeit disturbing- read. It is not, I think, a bad thing to complicate peoples' ideas of war and to invite further discussions on how we ought to conduct it (as Americans, as a society, as humans), and an emotional text such as this one (rather than, for example, a dry academic discourse) is not a bad place to start.