s

The True
Victims of
War
All Quiet on the Western Front
Kenny Xu
Mr. Lunn

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Kenny Xu
Mr. Lunn
Honors English 9
10 March 2013
The True Victims of War
The Central Powers and the Allied Powers. These two recognizable names were the two
alliances in the large-scale war called World War I. The war was the first of its kind to reveal the
true consequences of all-out total war. The Allies won in the end, of course, but at what cost?
What must a side pay to win a war? The answer to that is the death of millions of soldiers.
Nevertheless, each side suffered millions of human casualties. These numbers shocked the world.
No one could imagine a war could bring about death at this magnitude. Who is the true victim of
these wars? The victim is not the country that loses. It is each individual soldier of their countries
that has to face the horrors of war because of the countries leaders. In Erich Maria Remarques
All Quiet on the Western Front, the book escapes from the romanticized, heroic, and majestic
perspective of war that was commonly used in literature and reveals the reality of war. Through
employing motifs such as nationality, the effects on war on a soldier, and the horrors of war,
Remarque develops the theme that the individual soldiers suffer through the hardships during a
war, instead of the political leaders.
Utilizing the motif of nationality helped Remarque develop the main theme of All Quiet
on the Western Front. Nationalism is defined as, deep pride, love, and devotion to ones own
country. Nationalism has toppled nations, united countries, and has triggered wars. But, it is

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also used as a tool by nations. Leaders indoctrinate young men to fight for their country in the
name deep patriotism to their homeland. In the book, Remarque uses the teacher Kantorek to
represent the propaganda used in warring nations. Kantoreks inspiring speeches about the Iron
Youth, which were the boys generation, cause the boys to enlist for World War I. Paul and his
classmates trusted him because of his authority as a teacher, but, they soon learned they were
wrong. No ideal large enough could have possibly protected them in the ongoing onslaught of
the war, The idea of authority, which they represented, was associated in our minds with a
greater insight and a more humane wisdom. But the first death we saw shattered this belief (12).
The Iron Youth dove into the war with pride, but then the real horrors of war revealed the truth.
Remarque shows that nationality, as a tool of propaganda, causes soldiers to enlist with a positive
outlook, but then it is shattered when they see the reality of war. To Remarque, nationality is seen
as a tool used to throw more human lives away on the frontlines. In conclusion, the motif of
nationality causes soldiers to enlist in horrifying war, developing the main theme.
Furthermore, soldiers experience many effects from war, which is a motif that again
shows that soldiers that fight the wars themselves are the ones who suffer the most. Paul and his
friends have to undergo seemingly never-ending physical and psychological dangers. They lived
through instinctive fear at every moment. That was the living conditions of the trenches during
World War I. Kill or be killed; that was the maxim they lived by in the trenches. Moreover, the
young soldiers had nothing to return to at home. World War puts their life on pause during the
period that the young men should be growing up and settling down. In All Quiet on the Western
Front, Mller asks everyone what they would do if the war were to end suddenly. Unlike the
older soldiers such as Katczinsky who have already settled down with a family, the younger
soldiers answer Mller question with uncertainty. They have nothing to go back to. It is as if the

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war simply interrupted their lives. According to Remarque, there is no skill or job they can return
to, all they know is war. Additionally to these effects of war, when the soldiers do return home, it
is hard for them to express themselves. Paul states, I realize he does not know that a man cannot
talk of such things; I would do it willingly, but it is too dangerous for me to put these things into
words (163). Paul himself and other soldiers cannot talk about their traumatic war experiences.
They cannot talk about how they see skulls blown open, soldiers fighting with amputated legs,
soldiers crawling with blown-out body parts, soldiers with horrifying injuries, they cannot
express it into words. The individual soldiers themselves all have to go through these painful
effects of war. They carry these hardships in the name of their country, in the name of their
political leaders, developing the original theme.
Throughout All Quiet on the Western Front, there are many incidents that occur to the
soldiers that illustrate the horrors of war, which is a motif. Replacing the romantic view of war,
Remarque portrays war realistically through his vivid descriptions of fear, meaningless, and
bloodshed. By the end of novel, all the main characters are dead, emphasizing the horror of war
and its effect on the young men who are forced to fight it. New weapons and technological
advancements during World War I caused battles to last for months at a time. Inventions such as
the machine gun, tank, poison gas, and simply trenches furthered the horror of war. Life as a
soldier was nowhere near as heroic as society portrayed it. The war was a test of survival. Which
country could survive the longest? That was the goal. With all these aspects of the war,
Remarque could write gruesome, realistic depictions of the battles to help develop the theme that
soldiers are the true victims of war. Remarque wrote through Paul Bumer, We see men living
with their skulls blown open; we see soldiers run with their two feet cut off, they stagger on their
splintered stumps into the next shell-hole; a lance-corporal crawls a mile and a half on his hands

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dragging his smashed knee after him; another goes to the dressing station (134). The imagery
the author uses conveys the horrors of war to the reader easily, which in turn contribute to the
main theme itself. Remarque uses this motif to show that in the end, the soldiers themselves
receive the terrible consequences because the politicians waged war with each other. No matter
what side a soldier is on, each one of them still bears the hardships that result from war.
With All Quiet on the Western Front, Remarque revealed what war truly is. Remarque,
being a veteran of World War I, did not follow the trend of romanticizing war. Instead, he told the
truth. Nationalism caused soldiers to enlist, beginning the nightmare of war. The horrors of war
caused the life on the frontline to become a living hell. The effects of war were the final
consequences that war will do to a young man, whether it is at home, on the front, or in the body
and mind. All these motifs contributed to the main theme of the book. Through different motifs,
Remarque develops the theme that the individual soldiers suffer through the hardships during a
war, instead of the political leaders. Erich Maria Remarques All Quiet on the Western Front
revealed the true nature of wars, and who the victim of a war truly is.