Cycle or Circumstance?

After looking at everyone's podcasts, I think it is safe to say that the time period after WWI was definitely a time of growth and change. New technology was being invented, new ways of providing entertainment, new ways of self-expression through the arts, new philosophies on life, new views about women's status, new borders and new economic problems. It seemed as though everything during this time period was revolutionary. I can't help but compare this to today, where whenever we blink it seems as though something new is being invented, thought of, or made. Now maybe because we are a part of this time, but I can't seem to pinpoint a catastrophic event such as WWI to which we can blame this current 'revolution.' So I was wondering what all of you thought: were the supposid effects of WWI really all caused by WWI, or do you think maybe there is a cycle and some generations just bring about change more than others?

Flags of Our Fathers

The book I read was from a very interesting perspective. The man who wrote it was the son of one of the six flag raisers in the famous picture taken on the island of Iwo Jima during the Pacific War in WWII. I thought the book was interesting because I could get the before and after effects of the war. James Bradley (the author) focused not just on the battle of Iwo Jima, but who the six soldiers were before the war, so we could understand what they did during the battle, and then for the survivors, how the war effected the rest of their lives. Before reading this book, I never really understood why veterans remained quiet about a life changing experience. The story revealed specific examples of how painful their experience might've been, like his father found his best friend, dead, tortured by the Japanese. The book really showed how the war effected family and the rest of the soldiers lives.

The Lost Generation

I thought it was really interesting how WWI appears to be the beginning of more humanistic ways of living and thinking. I think this is probably because they lost all faith in the more conservative and religious-based views of the past, like Hemingway said "abstract words such as glory, honor, courage or hallow were obscene." This generation saw so much pain and suffering through the war, they felt shafted by the older generation, whose ideals, they thought, caused the war in general. Their reaction to the pain was change. This time period saw more change than any other previous time. The way people thought, dressed, spoke, and entertained were all being revolutionized. While today we look back and see this as a positive change, many people were still hurting, for example Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and many other great artists of the time. So my question is was all the suffering worth it? Would all the social pay-offs and advancements in society have been possible without the eye-opening effects of the war?

page 80-98 question

To add on to my previous point, I found a statement in the book and I was just curious to see how all of you feel about it.
"Science, which had been enlisted to shorten the war, served only to prolong it."
Do you agree or dissagree?
Personally I agree, technology was brought into the war with good intentions, but ultimately they only worsened the results of the war. They called it the Great War, it was supposed to be the war to end all wars, but in reality it only caused two more massive world-scale wars (World War II and the Cold War). technology gave power hungry leaders the tools to do what no other leader had ever been able to do before. Superior technology gave many nations the upperhand over smaller, weaker countries with less technology. Take Germany for example in the beginning of WWI before many of the other nations caught up with their military technology, they were running through countries like Poland, who had little or no technology, but then other countries caught up and it was mahine gun against machine gun, tank against tank, resulting in a stalemate and high casualties.

Mixing of the Old and New

World War I was the beginning of the modern era, but the transition definitely wasn't an easy one. This combination of old battle tactics and new technology reulted in the most devastating war to date at that time. In the wars before men honorable lined up across from each other and exchanged fire. They kept this strategy with only a minor adjustment- trenches. This new advancement only made it harder to advance on the enemy because they had to dig trenches to hide in first. Another major factor that was over looked in the military battle plans of WWI was that new technlogy added to the war, causing more devastation and casualties, but this didn't matter becasue the population was large enough to replenish the losses. Perhaps if military planners weren't as eager to try out their theoretical battle plans they could've thought of a more effective way to utilize the new technology instead of shooting themselves in the foot, so to speak.