One man who followed radical beliefs killed someone. This event started World War I. Our war today started because one man followed his own radical belief system, which led him to kill 6,000 innocent people. Does that sound similar? Yes it is practically the same thing. This is why we study history, so that the same mistakes are not repeated again and again. If people knew this and truly understood it, maybe we could end wars and violence. We are at least making an attempt to prevent violence by repeatedly warning our opponents. We did this during WWI and we still do it today. We’ve been warning Osama bin Laden for 8 years and he still hasn’t heeded us, so he now has to pay for what he’s done. It is sad that radical men who want to make a point started both wars in the same way.
An obvious similarity between these two wars, and every war for that matter, is that our country is united by the tragedies. Before the World Trade Center bombing, our country was divided and spread apart. We did whatever we wanted, and the interests of our country were low on our priority list. Our president didn’t even get the most votes! What does that say for our country’s spirit? Before WWI, similar events were happening. People didn’t really feel like one whole country, they were many people from many countries living in one place. Men and women’s lives were consumed solely with work, they did not have room for patriotism. When the wars started, however, everyone found their sense of nationalism and wore it proudly.
We are obviously not fighting the same war today that we did almost a hundred years ago, regardless of how many similarities there are. One extremely important difference is the enemy. In World War I, things were so much simpler. We had exact countries to send our troops into and we knew who to kill and who was fighting and what to expect. We were able to direct our anger at a certain group of people, and it was easy to know who to ally ourselves with. Today, we don’t even have a country to fight against! We send our troops into land that might be occupied by the government that we are fighting against. Our country is now engaged in what is probably the most confusing and difficult war ever undertaken. We can’t know who are our true allies because even if the government believes in what we want, the people seem to follow our enemies. How could this war be the same as WWI if we don’t even have someone to fight against?
A very evident difference between wars is our technology. It is only to be expected that the technology would increase and develop over almost 100 years. Today, we use stealth bombers that can travel through the air undetected by radar and take our enemies by surprise. We have the capability to infect entire nations with diseases like anthrax and smallpox. People have access to advanced weaponry and stronger guns. Tanks can actually be steered and don’t break down every two seconds. In WWI, the technology is sadly lacking when compared to today. Machine guns were a major advancement. Tanks that broke in the middle of the battlefield were an amazing new idea. Rather than anthrax, poisonous gas was used in the trenches to affect the lungs and eyes of soldiers and force them out. The change in technology is a major variation between 1914 and 2001.
In World War I, people dug elaborate trench systems and then protected those trenches. The soldiers surrounded themselves with barbed wire and sentries. Sometimes, they sent soldiers across the area between the two trenches, but most of them were demolished with machine guns. Tanks were occasionally sent across the battlefield also, except they never managed to stay in working order long enough to make it to the enemy. This style of war is obviously much different than how we fight today. In our war, we bomb the enemy’s towns in the middle of the night. Our government attempts to find the actual enemy, and when we do, we send elite troops in to track them down. Many innocent people are killed along with the guilty ones because we are unable to find our real enemy. These two styles of war are completely different and that is another reason why today and WWI are different.
Many examples prove that while history does seem to inevitably happen again, there are also differences between World War I and today’s War on Terrorism. The fact that both wars were started in almost the same way demonstrates the repetition of history. Because loss of innocent civilians and threats at home caused people to become angry and want to enter a war, we know that all wars are similar in some ways. Another way that all wars are similar is that everyone in the country suddenly has an overwhelming sense of patriotism. However, we haven’t fought the same war twice! We aren’t even fighting even close to the same style of war that we fought in the early 1900’s. Our technology is completely different and so is our enemy. With those differences, how could the wars possibly be completely the same? Since I know that history repeats itself in this instance, I truly understand why we are expected to learn history. I never really believed that there was actually a way to use history in your everyday life until I learned about WWI. I have developed an actual interest in history and I think that it is amazing that we can really use what we learn and apply it to something that affects us. I wish that other people understood what I have come to grips with. If that was so, maybe we could really end wars. All wars are ended with peace agreements. Why can’t we just skip the killing and end all conflicts in the conference room?