When I still had very limited vocabulary and comprehension skills, I took up the daunting challenge of reading Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace. I ended up with egg on my face! I could finish only a few first pages, without comprehending anything.
However, one impression that was registered on my tender mind was how somebody could write such a great tome on the subject of war and peace.
As I was growing, there were some Hollywood war flicks that I watched, prominent being Rambo, of course. It was edge of the seat entertainment for an adolescent. But I could not relate to the events in distant USA or Vietnam or figure out why a single man needed to combat so much on his own.
In between there were true recollections of bravery displayed by my grandfather or uncles or neighbours. Some told me how they beat the hell out of the Chinese or Pakistanis or how some had marched into the heart of Bangladesh to liberate it. They were amusing stories to listen to and delightful especially when everybody gathered around fire on cold evenings. Furthermore, I was filled with a sense of gratitude for they had survived the war. Although they talked of untold sufferings and misery of war I thought there was an air of invincibility around them.
Then came my college days when I was exposed to literatures where war was vilified. Prominently, Farewell to Arms and Arms and the Man had a great impact on me. This coupled with two unforgettable events – the Iraq invasion and the Kargil War. War was real this time – not the legend of retired soldiers or stuff of the movies. Moreover, I saw war in its ugliest avatars. Iraq war was being fought according to dictates of a bully and Kargil war had been launched by stateless actors and regular soldiers hiding behind the persona of a terrorist. I was greatly disgusted and penned an article Shock and Awe about Iraq for a magazine I’d started with some friends. I fervently pleaded for peace in that piece.
So, from being an incomprehensible event to being a stuff of stories and movies, war was a reality that I confronted and loathed. I’m no different from others in this sense. I have also wrestled to find an answer to the question that has been perhaps being asked since time out of mind – Are wars avoidable?
There have been unjust wars and blood has been shed in vain on numerous occasions. However, lasting peace is a myth. Competition is man’s nature. On being challenged, he never backs down. He may understand his limitation, but still forges ahead in sheer folly!
And man, like any other animal, is fiercely territorial. He guards his territory with perhaps more cunning and intensity than most other animals. And man is a victim of his own avarice. No amount of territory can satiate this. War is also good business. Most skirmishes around the world are a consequence of simple business arithmetic. So, conflicts are inevitable.
Peace will forever remain a fragile entity, unless man’s nature changes. That is dubious, of course, as we talk of peoples across the world expanding vast territories and cultures. It would be naïve to dream of peace and one world. It is best to savour peace when one can and be at the ready when war bugles are blown. What is frightening in the modern times is though one may not get an opportunity to lace one’s boots and carry a gun. World may be reduced to rubbles by nukes before that!
I wonder what Tolstoy has written about war and peace. I must read the book some day!
