A very crucial element to defining history is truth. How does one obtain the actuality of events rather than some form of actuality? How does one know the rationale behind actions? Answers to these questions can be found in one valuable source… experience.
The story telling of soldiers, through various forms of literature, serves to paint a picture of their experiences. We can see this through the World War One poets who show us the glory and honor of their war and also the hell on earth it created for many of them.
Today, a new history is being written on the world’s battlefields. With the advancements in technology we have been privileged to an instantaneous answering of any questions we may have surrounding a conflict. We experience soldiers blogging from half a world away about their lives and we get an almost bird’s eye view of the truth that their story telling gives.
A blog entitled Embedded in Afghanistan talks about the sway and influence that soldiers can have on the public through their blogs:
I can see where concerns about blogging on the part of the Pentagon would come in, as they have every right to be concerned with the information that comes out of theater, given how important public opinion is in sustaining the war effort. Service members who are bloggers would seem to have a more authoritative voice on the war than an embedded reporter given their status…
After reading this I began to ask, “how different would wars throughout history, especially World War One, have been if the public had access to something like military blogs?”
Americans hardly read military blogs and yet there appears to be a significant affect as a result of them, given the fact that the Pentagon is considering drafting up a policy concerning them. And think of the comparison between now and World War One… Had the millions of men in the trenches of Europe been blogging on their hellish experiences perhaps Rupert Brooke’s poetry would have looked a bit foolish. I believe that the nations at war during the time would have had a hard time keeping up public support for the war effort if the whole truth was as accessible as it is today.
In any case this new found resource is a good one and perhaps can help us all move towards a world in which everyone is aware of what war can do before it happens. The fighting nature of humans is a difficult one to quell but maybe hearing the truth from those who experience war will, at the least, make us more cautious to engage in it.
“In the media 2″
Anonymous
Embedded in Afghanistan… 9/30/2009
I completely agree with you that resources such as the internet are changing our awareness of various aspects of war. I believe that in the past we have been extremely limited when it comes to the documentation of information surrounding war. Your post made me think of the information we could be missing about the Civil War, World War I, World War II, Vietnam, etc. Another big change that we have experienced in our history is the contribution of women, Native American and African American writers. In one of my American Lit. classes we talked about how limited our History books used to be because they were written strictly by white men. I’m sure that once these minority group were able to contribute our nation was exposed to the truth. Today the internet and blogs bring us endless possibilities. I wonder what technilogical advances will bring more information in the future!
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