“The main difference between our wars is the absence of a draft. Your generation of combat soldiers is a generation of volunteers. That difference is a huge one, because your generation of soldiers is bearing a much heavier burden than mine did. Anyone who doesn’t want to fight and kill people, or get killed — they don’t have to. That’s a strange predicament for a republic like ours to be in….”
New documentary shows
“Filmed and directed by combat cameraman Miles Lagoze, ‘Obscura’ provides a true illustration of the primal aspects of war. Due to that honest approach, few of the film’s scenes will endear its participants to a public that consumes much of its war information through crisply-edited propaganda emerging from the Pentagon.
‘I think we’re at a point as veterans that we want to show war as it is,’ Lagoze told Military Times.
‘We’re kind of sick of the hero-worshipping.'”
Some friends in Denver have put together this video about Ben Salmon. Give it a listen and learn about an American Catholic family man and conscientious objector who lived during World War I.