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| Eric Bush Class of 2020 |
Last weekend, I sat at my desk and did something I’m extremely good at: scrolling through my Facebook feed to avoid doing my homework. I came across a video of what is supposedly the world’s largest paintball game with more than 3,000 players. The tournament simulated the Normandy invasion and each team represented one of the nations which participated in the battle. By no means am I an avid paintball player, but I’ve played a few times and enjoyed it. At first glance, I thought this seemed pretty cool and maybe even something I would do.
As I continued to watch the video, I thought back to my trip to Europe last summer. I visited World War II battle sites, including Normandy on June 6th, the anniversary of the Allied Invasion. I imagined 72 years earlier when courageous soldiers, many of whom my own age, stepped off boats into intense gunfire knowing their death was imminent. I will never forget the site of thousands of neatly aligned crosses at the American cemetery just a few miles from the beaches, each representing a lost human being and together symbolizing the horrific cost of the war.
Had I been an 18 year-old in 1944, it’s highly possible I would have been a young soldier on one of those boats. Would I have had the courage to step off into the gunfire? As I thought of this, I realized that running onto a field of flying paintballs is not the same as running into oncoming machine gun fire. While a simulated Normandy Invasion paintball game likely invokes a sense of patriotism and certainly a sense of adventure, it does not invoke a sense of grief or horror. Activities such as this one, despite their best intentions, have led many to view war, in particular World War II, as a game in which our country dominated; they overlook the human cost imposed on all sides.
I decided to leave a comment voicing my view – something I rarely do on social media – and received mixed responses. One person called me a “goofy liberal,” which those who know me realize is a comical mischaracterization. Others more seriously noted that it is intended to honor the invasion of Normandy. I don’t doubt that. Prior to my trip to Normandy, I probably would have viewed this tournament the same way.
However, I find it highly unlikely that this paintball tournament would exist had the Normandy invasion been unsuccessful. Those who organized it and participated in it are not glorifying the sacrifices of those who died but glorifying that fact that America won that battle. Although perhaps not intentionally, they turn one of the most solemn events in human history into a game. I use this paintball game as an example not to vilify its players and organizers, but because it reflects how many of us think of World War II.
Contrast this with a movie like Saving Private Ryan. Steven Spielberg’s masterpiece is entertaining, but also true to history and sensitive to the price so many paid to liberate Europe. The movie begins with an elderly veteran visiting the graves of those who had died to save him. It then flashes back to the Normandy Invasion, sparing the viewer of no gruesome detail. At the conclusion of the movie, in present day at the cemetery, the veteran turns to his wife and asks if he had lived a good life, looking for confirmation that the sacrifice of his fellow soldiers was not in vain.
Many Normandy veterans who saw this movie walked out of the theater because it was so true to what they had actually experienced. For those who did not serve, this movie invokes patriotism, but with grief and horror and reality. Saving Private Ryan is an ideal model for how we should think about and portray World War II.
All wars, even justified wars, are terrible events which lead to unimaginable suffering and death. Looking back on World War II, we have a lot to be proud of in how our military and country rallied to defeat perhaps history’s greatest ever threat to humanity. But in doing so, we must acknowledge the cost paid and the realities of war.
Eric Bush, of Louisville, Ky., is a freshman McConnell Scholar studying political science and finance.