War's turning points

[MASCARO at humnet.ucla.edu]

Xferen. writes:
>I've always wondered about the import of WWI to our lovely century here.  


This desultory thread is quite interesting.  I am sure you know Paul Fussell's 
GREAT WAR AND MODERN MEMORY, where he develops the thesis that WWI 
has had more of an effect on the development of our consciousness in the second 
half of the 20th C than has WWII.  Folks on the list have referred to Fussell's book 
before, usually discussing Fussell's analysis of Brig, Pudding.  Interestingly, I don't 
recall Fussell mentioning V. anywhere in that book, though I may be blanking.  A 
different approach is found in H. Bruce Franklin's WAR STARS (1988 I think; I 
reviewed it for AMERICAN BOOK REVIEW in Sept. '89).  Franklin looks at the 
history of--Superweapons--(Reagan's Star Wars being then the most recent).  He 
argues that breakthrough weapons technology is always presented in the guise of a 
defensive protection against attack (a la SDI) , or with the claim that this weapon is 
SO scary and awful that it will end war forever (didn't some of the Manhattan 
Project people hold that hope as a justification for helping develop the bomb?)
Anyway, history shows neither thing happening.  Super defensive weapons just 
become offensive weapons, and somehow, none of them is ever quite horrific 
enough to sate our Masters' appetites for our destruction. As far as--turning 
points--each category leap in technology and/or tactics seems to be one;  IMHO 
there is no single turning point, but a series of them.

Anyway, doesn't the whole metaphor of a--turning point--imply a linear historical 
development, a type of--progress--measured by body counts and civilian terror?  I 
guess my own feeling is that war is an undividable category.  They're all the same, 
unspeakable and constantly with us.  The V-2 was a turning point in the 
development of our consciousness, but because it was a rocket, not because it was a 
weapon, no? (This last thought comes complete w/ a disavowal clause--I may not 
mean what I am saying here, and may contradict myself at any moment.)


john m