A Book Review of Chris Hedges’—War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning

by Hari Seldon

One immediately knows where Chris Hedges’ stands on the view of war. One does not have to guess. Unlike some writers, who obscure their views in fluff and circumstance, Hedges’ treatise on war is cathartic as well as a “real life” experiential perspective and rational survey view of war.

Nonetheless, Chris emotes passionately in his discourse of war. He presupposes three points:

· The “culture of war” is a living organism unto itself that propagates and consumes.

· There is “addiction of war” once it begins, it is like a “drug addict trying to chase after a bigger high.”

· The “myths of war” is a narrative that is full of heroic epics, which hypnotizes the masses in popularizing unforgivable acts against another human being.

These are some of the organism’s parts that bring about the “fate” of the culture in order to secure the continuation of hostile acts. The twin sisters, if you will, are really subsets of the umbrella of the actual “culture of war” and they deepen and ingrain the institutions of wars, in which, it makes it easier to commit heinous crimes over and over.

For instance, the processing the extermination of a “prisoner” in a concentration camp, or the act of “ethnic cleansing” such as that in Bosnia, Serbia, and Croatia relies on the surreal perspective of the “myths of war.”

The distinction is, in which, “the myths of war” relies on the “culture of war,” to impart the “lies of heroicisms” and therefore must be separated from those who have actually participated in a war, in order for the state, the government, to be given the ability to recruit and pander to the public and the creation of the “addiction of war.”

Of course, “the myths of war” lets those in charge change the language itself. Instead of gray broad strokes is the refinement of colors. Correction! Not colors, but are separated in two colors that of black and white. In that, in the terms of simplicity for the audience, their can be only two alternatives.

Essentially, it is not the party of “Left,” nor the party of “Right are most politically correct, but is right and wrong for the drug stupor mind of the addicted.

The argument, of course, for what is right and wrong shifts the entire argument of war into the realm of simple logic, morality, and ethics. The difference of the latter two; ethics is a representation of one’s personal code. The rules, in which, one aspires to live out their daily lives by an orderly construction of the self.

On the other hand, these moralites, if you allow, are those standards, in which, “we as a culture,” apply to the individuals, groups, or citizenry values in order to construct a more “orderly” civilization. However, these individualistic codes are consolidated into a social contract of behavior, of sorts, which seems to come to the people—divinely.

In Chris Hedges book, he speaks of a code that demands us coming to terms with the “sins,” some out of necessity admittedly, of war—but the ones that were not necessary during the commission of the war, their acknowledgment and the reconciliation thereof.

Furthermore, Hedge’s book is a revealing autobiography of his raw emotion; strike that, a cold analysis of his “sensory” perception of the events of El Salvador, Angola, Sudan, and Balkan Wars. Sensory is to mean in “real time,” watching events as they happen.

One would presume his passivism. Moreover, after his strident testimonials of the horrors of war that he, would, Hedges’, be yelling from the rafters for immediate—peace. Not so! His thesis, or treatise, in regards to how we hold dear those principles, moralities, and ethics, in which “we as a culture,” as a “nation” prosecute the war; in that, we remain principled in the discipline, in the remembering and reconciling our humanity, when the time to cease, or at least transform the “culture of war” into cessation of hostilities.

Hedges’ clarion call is foreboding, to foretell the possibility of darkness if we fail to do so, yet at the same time communicate about the “addiction” and “myths” in the culture of war. He wishes to remind of our own humanity, which in turn, will lead us “home,” and through to the eventual loving of ourselves and of the “other.”

I highly recommend this book to everyone, even for those who are the hardliner war types. It is a thought provoking book, which challenges ones perspectives, values, beliefs, and ideals. To me this is what a book is suppose to do, no?