This is another one of those side stories that really makes me love the Valkyria Chronicles series. True, the tone can be really uneven sometimes (see, for example, the contrast between this story and next week’s squad story), but it’s still a series that at least sometimes takes the chance to explore some of the gray areas of war.
“Just because they’re the enemy, doesn’t make them all evil.” I thought about that quite a lot as we were touring the Vickburg Civil War Battlefield last week. One of the many, many monuments on the site memorializes the siege as a place where friend fought against friend, cousin fought against cousin, and brother fought against brother. At the entrance of the park are two stone pillars. One is engraved with the names of the states with units who fought on the Union side, the other with states whose units fought for the Confederacy. Missouri is on both.
Even when the wars are far more global in scope, we do well to remember that many of the men and women who did the actual fighting and dying were doing their best for their country, and many showed heroism and courage in the face of overwhelming odds. Not every German soldier was a Nazi. Not every Japanese warrior was a member of Unit 731.
In a world where voices on both sides seem to be doing their level best to paint their fellow countrymen and women as inhuman monsters, we ought to take every opportunity to remember that the “enemy” is often very much like us, just with a different name and flag.