Vern Humphrey
Member
Yes, I have killed men in combat.
I've been a soldier all my life and a serious student of military history. You can read the literature, from Thucididies ("The Pelloponesian War") to Xenophon ("The Anabasis") to Caesar ("Gallic Wars.") All three of these men saw the elephant. All of them fought in the front line and killed men face to face, in hand-to-hand combat.
You can read memoirs of later soldiers -- from MacArthur to McBride, to John B. George.
And while you will find them describing killing, and discussing the tactics, weapons and so on, to my knowledge not one of them attempts to answer that deep, introspective question, "What does it feel like to kill a man."
They couldn't do it, and I can't either.
I've been a soldier all my life and a serious student of military history. You can read the literature, from Thucididies ("The Pelloponesian War") to Xenophon ("The Anabasis") to Caesar ("Gallic Wars.") All three of these men saw the elephant. All of them fought in the front line and killed men face to face, in hand-to-hand combat.
You can read memoirs of later soldiers -- from MacArthur to McBride, to John B. George.
And while you will find them describing killing, and discussing the tactics, weapons and so on, to my knowledge not one of them attempts to answer that deep, introspective question, "What does it feel like to kill a man."
They couldn't do it, and I can't either.