War...What's your view?

Today everyone has a different opinion about war. Some are in favor of it and some detest it. Still some are indifferent. For example people tend to be in favor of World War Two. In contrast, most hold the opinion that the war in Vietnam was a senseless war. People may think this way because we won World War Two, but we lost the war in Vietnam. It seems to me that people think war is fine as long as America wins.
The truth is that war is not fine. No matter who starts the war there are casualties on both sides. In the novel Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut expresses his opinion on war. Here is a quote from pages 134-135 of the novel. "Billy asked them a little about themselves, learned that the boy's father had been killed in Vietnam--in the famous five-day battle for Hill 875 near Dakto. So it goes." From this passage it is plain to see Vonnegut's point of view. He is opposed to this and every war in general. What he is saying is that the boy's father died in vain. He was fighting for no reason. After all who will remember the battle for Hill 875 when they think of the Vietnam war? Basically the boy's father died in vain.
Also Vonnegut frequently says the phrase "so it goes" when someone dies. Here he tries to point out how people are changed by war. When they have been fighting for so long, they become immune to the pain of war. I mean by this that it no longer becomes hard to kill. After all when people are in war they may kill dozens of people. After that one more person really does not make that much difference. This is what Vonnegut is trying to say about war.

A letter from a marine.

This particular letter entitled, The Secret Letter, is form a Marine officer in Iraq. In the letter there are a few unusual stories to say the least. I really think that the Marine wrote the letter well. It was very interesting reading and I would recommend reading it if you want a good laugh. If you would like to read this letter you can type in the following web address: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1543658-1,00.html to get to the site. I do not know how to create a link for the site. If you copy and paste this addresse into the search engine at the top of your window the site will come up.
I think that the author was able to truly capture the experience of being in Iraq. His writing makes him seem sincere. The letter is pretty blunt. This is what makes this letter so good is that the author tells it like it is. He does not worry about offending anyone. It is often the case that when a story is told certain details are left out that would make the story “presentable” to people. The Secret Letter however seems to be uncut and real. From what he has written it seems that the author is anti-war. At one point in the letter he talks about his happiest experience. It was not in Iraq. Instead, it was of being with his family while on a leave. He says that there are no truly happy times in Iraq. This would lead me to believe that he is indeed anti-war.
This article also has several things in common with the novel Slaughterhouse-Five, which our English Class has been reading. The one that I can think of is the Deja Vu element of both the novel and the letter. In the novel Billy Pilgrim has Deja Vu when he travels back in time. In the letter the officer returns ten months later to an old camp. Here he finds everything exactly as he left it. He finds this quite unnerving. Similarly, Billy Pilgrim from the novel Slaughterhouse-Five felt this way during his time travels. When he arrived to a point in time he did not always know where or when he was. Also, just in general, the authors of both author of the letter and the author of Slaughterhouse-Five have similar styles of writing. Perhaps this is because they both experienced war first hand. Other than that I can not think of anything else that the novel and the letter have in common.