On Our Not Experiencing Pleasure When Enemies Suffer And Die

Raw, unedited recordings of WW II
combatants who came to relish seeing
their enemies tortured and killed.

During World War II British intelligence agencies secretly recorded conversations of German prisoners of war in order to gather any information they could about enemy war plans and tactics. In the process they learned a lot about how combatants think about the brutal work of killing people.

Here's an example, dated June 20, 1942:

"I heard of a case of two fifteen-year-old boys. They were wearing uniforms and were firing away with the rest. But they were taken prisoners... They were wearing soldiers' uniforms, so what could one do... They were made to dig their own graves, two pits, and then one of them was shot. He didn't fall into the grave, he fell forwards over it. The other was told to push the first one into the pit before he was shot himself. And he did so, smiling--a boy of fifteen! There's fanaticism and idealism for you!"

The authors further comment, "Similar incidents have been documented among U.S. troops in Vietnam, who sometimes claimed babies were members of the Vietcong. This is not a sign of insanity. It marks the shifting of the frame of references so that group membership is more important than all other defining characteristics, including age, in determining who the enemy is. Joanna Bourke, a scholar who has studied soldiers' perceptions of killing in various wars, has argued that such skewed frames of reference do not prove that soldiers personally enjoyed murder. Instead, Bourke suggests, the cold blooded killing of people categorically defined as belonging to the enemy is part of the normal, everyday practice of warfare." 

We all know that regarding enemies as distinctly different from us and other humans is a necessary change of mindset combatants have to experience. But how has labeling whole groups of people as enemies affected the rest of us?

For example, what empathy, if any, do we feel for the estimated 200,000 to 250,000 Russian soldiers killed, wounded and missing in action in their current invasion of Ukraine? Many of these have been guilty of terrible atrocities, which partly explains why their deaths are not regarded in the same way as those of innocent civilians lives and property they are destroying, but the fact remains that all people on both sides are God's children. Each is someone's son or daughter, sister or brother, father or mother, spouse or lover. And many of those who have lost their lives and limbs were not engaging in war by their personal choice, but were conscripted as killers and sacrificed as cannon fodder. 

I'll never forget when I first told our pre-school daughter the story of David slaying Goliath, an archenemy of Israel. I expected her to express some of the usual satisfaction we associate with a bad guy in full armor being defeated by a lad armed only with a sling. But she was visibly distressed, and responded with, "But Goliath was a person, too!"

Out of the mouth of babes.

I recently spoke with a friend who admitted wishing someone would just assassinate Putin as a way of putting an end to his horrific invasion. I understand, as I personally acknowledge feeling tempted to take pleasure in the defeat of Russian troops in battle after battle in the Ukraine, in spite of the loss of so many precious lives in the process.

But shame on me, or any of us followers of Jesus who take even the slightest pleasure in our "enemies" experiencing agonizing deaths. 

In 1871 a local veteran of the Confederate's Stonewall Brigade Band wrote: 

"Christian mother, as you nestle your baby-boy to your breast tonight, pray God that his hands may not learn war. . . Fathers, tell your children of the Horrors of War, in place of recounting the achievements of some General. Discourage all military ambition, and thus help to hasten the time when
'swords shall be beat into ploughshares,' for that time will come, as the Lord liveth."

(On Stone Walls and Broken Histories--Historiographical Reflections on the Stonewall Brigade Band, E. K. Knappenberger, April 2023, unpublished)

During passion week recently I realized anew the importance of emulating Jesus's attitudes and actions toward enemies : “But to you who are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you."  Luke 6:27-28 (NLT)

To love and pray for enemies means never taking pleasure in their suffering or death. They are people, too.