Death From Above
The art of war. It brings no happiness, no love, and it never forgives. When the thought of war comes to mind, most people think of weapons of mass destruction, terrorism, and financial gain. But this was not always how wars were fought. One war in specific, World War I, was the start of a new generation of warfare; with weapons like machine guns and poisonous gas being introduced to the battlefield. It was a step up from how wars were originally fought, with each side taking turns shooting at each other from afar, ultimately ending with both sides charging at each other to engage in close-quarters combat. The haunting stories of soldiers fighting in these graveyard-like battlegrounds make you wonder; what is the point of it all?
Several soldiers have recounted their tales of the horrors of war. One in particular, Wilfred Owen, has put some of the grittiest ink on paper. In his 1920 poem, “Dulce et Decorum Est,” he details a horrific scene, his squadron is attacked by poisonous gas while camping in a trench—and one of them is caught in it. “But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,” Owen writes, “and flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.” (Lines 12-13). Upon analyzing this, and understanding the picture Owen is attempting to portray, it helps to understand the seriousness of the situation. He adds, “Dim through the misty panes and thick green light / as under a green sea I saw him drowning.” The soldier, whose identity is unknown, seems to have failed to grab his gas mask in time, and in turn, begins to choke and gasp for air. According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, chlorine gas, which was one of the 3 most popular chemicals introduced in WWI, takes about 10-30 minutes to become fatal, depending on the levels of exposure. A long period of suffering, which does not seem fun, ultimately resulting in death. Owen’s use of descriptive words, such as floundering and drowning, highlights how frantic the exposed soldier had become.
It seems that while this poem is not directly about the situation at hand, it is the only thing Owen can write about. This moment specifically continues to replay in his mind as he is able to recount it so vividly. A theme, if you will, that recurs over and over. Owen states, “In all my dreams before my helpless sight / he plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.” It is with these two lines alone that he is able to inform the reader of the nightmares he has about this exact moment. He tells about how an event so shocking, happening in the blink of an eye, is able to loop in his mind over and over and become the sole topic of this poem. Why did this soldier choose to lunge at Owen specifically? The theme of cruelty returns, as with each new line, an even grittier aspect of the scene is revealed.
At one point, though, Owen attempts to almost shift the responsibility of this event onto the reader, as he does with the use of the singular word “you.” He notes, “If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace / behind the wagon that we flung him in, [...]” With this one singular pronoun, the reader is suddenly pulled into the situation and becomes a part of it. Envisioning yourself as just another soldier carrying the wagon the dying gunner was thrown on. It’s quite a scary image, but it adds to the cruel theme Owen portrays. Picture yourself being trapped in a long hole dug in the ground, with nowhere to go besides left or right, and one of your squad mates forgets to put his gas mask on and begins to fall victim to the cloud of green death. Owen writes, “And watch the white eyes writhing in his face / his hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin; if you could hear, at every jolt, the blood / come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, [...]” Words like writhing and gargling help to establish how quickly the soldier goes from choking to now practically dying, in the most gruesome of depictions.
Thinking back, nothing good has come out of war. Surely some countries and nations used it to establish their freedom, but when thinking about the number of lives lost to a cause that could have been resolved with a simple handshake, it makes you wonder; what is all really worth? WWI, being one of the deadliest wars in global history, saw a whopping 19 million deaths, and yet this was not the last time almost every nation on the planet waged war against each other. For 4 years, major countries and militaries fought for practically nothing; glory and honor, as some of the soldiers would put it. Glory and honor? You would think after all this, they would be logical enough to not want to return. But some wanted to keep fighting—they had something to prove. A country to defend, a home to guard, and a life to give. But the sheer cruelty of war will never be worth throwing yourself into the flames. Dulce et Decorum Est, as one would say. But something about becoming another statistic for a country that could care less about you just seems rather sour, than sweet.
References
Owen, Wilfred. “Dulce Et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen.” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation, www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46560/dulce-et-decorum-est.
White, Carl W, and James G Martin. “Chlorine Gas Inhalation: Human Clinical Evidence of Toxicity and Experience in Animal Models.” Proceedings of the American Thoracic Society, U.S. National Library of Medicine, July 2010, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3136961/.
