This Is What War Is

It isn't some ennobling experience, of heroism and sacrifice. It is ugly violence with no restrictions. The Times has news from the civil war in the Congo:

Every day, 10 new women and girls who have been raped show up at his hospital. Many have been so sadistically attacked from the inside out, butchered by bayonets and assaulted with chunks of wood, that their reproductive and digestive systems are beyond repair.

And let's remember: men did this.

Turn men into killers for some insignificant political gain, and you open a big can of sadism. Not so easy to close again. Rape and torture aren't accidents that happen on the fringes of war; they are the essence of war. This is what happens when men are told to kill.