Let them eat gas

[David Morris]

Attribution, please?

On Monday, September 2, 2013, alice wellintown wrote:

> Although we need reinforcement, the recruits give us almost more trouble
> than they are worth. They are helpless in this grim fighting area,
> they fall like flies.
> Modern trench-warfare demands knowledge and experience; a man must have a
> feeling for the contours of the ground, an ear for the sound and
> character of the
> shells, must be able to decide beforehand where they will drop, how
> they will burst,
> and how to shelter from them.
> The young recruits of course know none of these things. They get killed
> simply because they hardly can tell shrapnel from high-explosive, they are
> mown
> down because they are listening anxiously to the roar of the big
> coal-boxes falling
> in the rear, and miss the light, piping whistle of the low spreading
> daisy-cutters.
> They flock together like sheep instead of scattering, and even the wounded
> are
> shot down like hares by the airmen.
> Their pale turnip faces, their pitiful clenched hands, the fine courage of
> these
> poor devils, the desperate charges and attacks made by the poor brave
> wretches,
> who are so terrified that they dare not cry out loudly, but with
> battered chests, with
> torn bellies, arms and legs only whimper softly for their mothers and
> cease as soon
> as one looks at them.
> Their sharp, downy, dead faces have the awful expressionlessness of dead
> children.
> It brings a lump into the throat to see how they go over, and run and
> fall. A
> man would like to spank them, they are so stupid, and to take them by
> the arm and
> lead them away from here where they have no business to be. They wear grey
> coats and trousers and boots, but for most of them the uniform is far
> too big, it
> hangs on their limbs, their shoulders are too narrow, their bodies too
> slight; no
> uniform was ever made to these childish measurements.
> Between five and ten recruits fall to every old hand.
> A surprise gas-attack carries off a lot of them. They have not yet learned
> what
> to do. We found one dug-out full of them, with blue heads and black
> lips. Some of
> them in a shell hole took off their masks too soon; they did not know
> that the gas
> lies longest in the hollows; when they saw others on top without masks
> they pulled
> theirs off too and swallowed enough to scorch their lungs.
> Their condition is hopeless, they choke to death with haemorrhages and
> suffocation.
> In one part of the trench I suddenly run into Himmelstoss. We dive into
> the same
> dug-out. Breathless we are all lying one beside the other waiting for
> the charge.
> When we run out again, although I am very excited, I suddenly think:
> "Where's
> Himmelstoss?" Quickly I jump back into the dug-out and find him with a
> small
> scratch lying in a corner pretending to be wounded. His face looks
> sullen. He is in a
> panic; he is new to it too. But it makes me mad that the young
> recruits should be out
> there and he here.
> "Get out!" I spit.
> He does not stir, his lips quiver, his moustache twitches.
> "Out!" I repeat.
> He draws up his legs, crouches back against the wall, and shows his teeth
> like a cur.
> I seize him by the arm and try to pull him up. He barks.
> That is too much for me. I grab him by the neck and shake him like a sack,
> his
> head jerks from side to side.
> "You lump, will you get out--you hound, you skunk, sneak out of it, would
> you?" His eye becomes glassy, I knock his head against the wall--"You
> cow"--I kick
> him in the ribs--"You swine"--I push him toward the door and shove him out
> head
> first.
> Another wave of our attack has just come up. A lieutenant is with them. He
> sees us and yells: "Forward, forward, join in, follow." And the word of
> command
> does what all my banging could not. Himmelstoss hears the order, looks
> round him
> as if awakened, and follows on.
> I come after and watch him go over. Once more he is the smart Himmelstoss
> of the parade-ground, he has even outstripped the lieutenant and is far
> ahead.
> Bombardment, barrage, curtain-fire, mines, gas, tanks, machine-guns,
> handgrenades--
> words, words, but they hold the horror of the world.
> Our faces are encrusted, our thoughts are devastated, we are weary to
> death;
> when the attack comes we shall have to strike many of the men with our
> fists to
> waken them and make them come with us--our eyes are burnt, our hands are
> torn,
> our knees bleed, our elbows are raw.
> How long has it been? Weeks--months--years? Only days. We see time pass
> in the colourless faces of the dying, we cram food into us, we run, we
> throw, we
> shoot, we kill, we lie about, we are feeble and spent, and nothing
> supports us but
> the knowledge that there are still feebler, still more spent, still
> more helpless ones
> there who, with staring eyes, look upon us as gods that escape death many
> times.
>
> WHAT'S GOING ON FULL LP 36 min.(original motown detroit mix) 1971  MARVIN
> GAYE <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMFlupHV6Rs>
>
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