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Generals Die In Bed Analysis

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Between 1914 and 1918, over nine million soldiers and five civilians were killed and seven million men disabled permanently (Mintz). This tragic phenomenon is known as World War I. Leaving the world with $186 billion direct costs and $251 billion indirect costs, this World War is known to be the most expensive war in history (Mintz). These four years also impacted the civilians not involved in the war severely. Women were given a chance to have a job in the workforce, children had to work in order to feed themselves, and an influenza epidemic was brought into communities (Mintz and Wotherspoon). World War I soon turned into a “group effort”; it turned into a Total War. Initially starting off as an encouraging and positive experience, World War I eventually turned into a brutal, selfish, and chaotic battle, and left millions of …show more content…

An American machine gunner, Charles Yale Harrison, says in his novel, Generals Die in Bed: “[War] take[s] everything from us: our lives, our blood, our hearts; even the few lousy hours of rest, they take those, too. Our job is to give, and theirs is to take,” (Harrison, 26). In this example, Harrison explains how war is the most selfish and strongest of all evils; war continues to take everything someone has until they have nothing left to take. The war also created long-term effects for soldiers; one being shell-shock. This term is used to describe the damage of constant loud shelling during war which greatly affected those who were not exposed to shelling frequently (Unnamed). Another term that is still used today is PTSD, (“Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder”), which is used to describe the effect war had on the soldiers afterward (Unnamed). World War I brought major psychological disorders upon the soldiers during and after the war had ended leading to great damage for the rest of the victim’s

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