Real Life Story #3: War and how my grandfather formed my view about that

[English][German]

This weekend I finally managed to visit my 97 year old grandmother. It was time, we as a family tried to find a fitting time since July. During the week it is not possible and the weekends were all booked out, or someone fell ill. Eventually we sat together with coffee and the world´s best apple-pie, indulging in reminiscences. This is something still bringing my grandmother to smile. 

This searching through memories, also for me is something that forces me to think about myself and to look from a different perspective to the events that formed my Self. On this occasion, I remembered a memory that apparently has shaped me in a way, I never before thought about. Understandably we did not talk about it this day, because the memory was about war and the participation of my grandfather in it. 

My grandfather already died about 30 years ago and for me he is merely a pale memory. Only a few pictures in my head remained, but there is one, that is crystal clear, as if happened only yesterday.  I must have been about 5 years old and we were living just across the street of my grandparents, for this, I passed a lot of time there. One of my uncles was living there, too and he just had finished his time in military service. It was usual, that all soldiers had to stay reservists for another two years after military and they had to keep their gear in a duffle bag at home to be prepared for a case of emergency. 

A curious titch of course is fascinated by soldiers and I was on fire, when my uncle showed me his gear. His uniform, his combat boots and his steel helmet. He allowed me to wear his helmet and I happily danced away to show my grandparents my new headpiece.  

At this point I have to add, that my grandfather has been in WW2 and he has been in war captivity in Russia and one of the last ones to return. He saw his first son, when he was already seven years old. The view of his grandson with a steel helmet on his head was not funny for him, as I expected, but a real shock. He asked me to take the helmet back to my uncle and to come back to talk about war. 

So we talked... today I wish I could remember this conversation much better, but there are only fragments left in my memory, which apparently still have a great importance for me. My grandfather stayed very calm and told me about his experiences in the war captivity. He told me, that there were mean people among the Russians, who always were "joshing" him and his friends, but there were also really nice Russians. One of them probably saved his life preventing him of eating venomous mushrooms, another one thought him, how to play the blues harp.  

In my childlike cockiness and fascinated by his stories I asked him, if he shot someone during his time in the war. I still can hear the seconds of total silence after this question. Finally he answered, almost hoarse and as credible as it can be for a five year old boy: 

"I don´t hope so, but one time... one time, I am not sure!" 

While saying this, he made a movement with his two arms, as if to aim with a weapon, pulling the trigger and - in the last moment - steering the barrel into the air, as if to shoot to high and this way not to hurt anyone. Unfortunately I can´t remember much more.  

I still remember that, the very next day, my grandmother talked to me in a severe and serious way, until today I can´t remember that she talked to me like this on any other day. She told me never ever to talk about war with my grandfather. I must have had reopened old sores and caused at least this night the most severe nightmares to my grandfather. 

Only much later, I understood what I had learned this day, when I some years ago started to study anarchy and freedom. 

No human being wants a war. 

There are only two possibilities to bring human beings into joining a war. Either you have to indoctrinate them by using the effects of mass psychology, or you have to force them. Concerning my grandfather, I am convinced that he wished every second to be with his family and his son, and not to fight, bleed and die on a godforsaken battlefield, fighting for an absurd reason of some puppet masters. 

To even increase the absurdity, it is even possible, that my German grandfather was facing my French grandfather on some battlefield in France. It is possible, that my grandfather, by misaiming with his gun, spared the live of my French grandfather and this way making my life possible in the first place. War never is a matter for the simple people, but a game about resources, might, money and territory for the elites.   

Today, I believe that this knowledge is somehow the heritage my grandfather left me.

Thank´s for reading !

Yours pollux.one

 Disclaimer: all pictures are "CCO public domain" and taken from pixabay