What Evil Can Men Do?


 When the question is raised, What Evil Men Can Do? The answer is not down in some dusty book. It is directly in the scenes where the trained armies crack and pursues people who are not able to fight. At this point the uniform ceases to mean anything and the gun becomes an instrument of absolute destruction.


Consider My Lai Massacre in Vietnam, March 16, 1968. One of the U.S. units was marching in anticipation of a fight. They did not meet any enemy soldiers. Not a single one. Rather, they discovered villagers, women with babies, children new enough to walk, elderly people so decrepit that they could not even run. And somehow the mission turned into a killing. No battle. Just killing.


The entire affair would have remained covered with earth had the photographer, Ron Haeberle, of the Army not taken snapshots as the nightmare unfolded. His color photographs put the cover on everything. In one of the images, there is a group of women and children who were terrified and cornered, just before they were shot. There is another one which depicts a ditch with bodies piled up, as if someone had made the decision that life was rubbish to discard.


That is the true answer of the question. Evil appears in cases where soldiers lose control and discipline fails and people who trusted to defend life kill in their turn, slowly, coldly and right in broad daylight... Continue reading 

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