A personal hero of mine, but whom I never had the chance to meet, was Jeanette Rankin:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeannette_Rankin

She voted against US entry into both World War I (not then known by that name), and World War II. (She also, disappointingly, supported the draft in WWI...)

She was the only member of Congress who possessed the courage to oppose the madness of the second war, and as with her vote against the first war, she was attacked at every turn.

She would go on to oppose US involvement in Vietnam.

I'd love to share more personal memories as some have done here (and may do so, depending on the civil progression of this thread), but I'm frankly troubled by the (perhaps unintentional) romanticizing of war here, and the characterization of those men forced in various ways into military service as "the Greatest Generation."

To me, the Greatest Generation consisted of the men and women of the 60s who - like Jeanette Rankin before them - risked everything to oppose the racist slaughter in Southeast Asia.

Daniel Berrigan is one such hero:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Berrigan

But to return to the "Greatest Generation" as the term is most commonly used, I find myself again asking many questions.

How many of the men who served did so of their own free will?

How many gladly left secure, well-paying jobs to enlist?

How many were immune to the enormous social pressure and propaganda which defined manhood as giving yourself up as raw material for war?

How many were drafted against their will?

And I ask this not only about those men of the United States who served, but the men of ALL the nations who were parties to the conflict; men who often had more in common with the soldiers they were asked to maim and kill than the warlords who placed them in harm's way by the tens of millions.

What real choice did a young man have during the war years?

Even if he wasn't drafted, he'd face the disapproving glances and gossip of his community, perhaps being "lucky" enough to be snickered at behind his back as 4-F, called "unfit."

After nearly 15 years of worldwide depression, how beaten down were the hopes and souls of the men who sought enlistment?

Other than Jeanette Rankin and a few courageous others, who was there in the US to speak up against the constant, pounding drumbeat of war, and the glamorization of deadly conflict?

Those men who - perhaps only by chance - freely chose to fight knowing all there was to know about the origin and nature of this and all such unholy maelstroms? Who were not pressured by lack of work, or anticipated loss of respect by the community if they did not serve?

Surely a tiny minority.

Those men forced by economic necessity, social pressure, ignorance of the true nature of war, or the draft?

Surely the vast majority.

But I don't seek to praise the few who went into the furnace of war with their eyes open, nor condemn the many who had no choice, or who simply did not understand what was happening.

I seek only to remember the true cost of war, to remind others of it's torn madness, and of the terrible price paid by those so often unwitting.

Wars are not won or lost; wars are simply disasters which one prays will end.

And while there ARE causes worth fighting and dying for, to take away a man's right to choose whether he will live or die?

To subject him to the wickedness of conscription, bind him in the chains of ignorance, seduce him with the siren song of propaganda?

This is evil, whomever perpetrates it, and for whatever cause.

Let those who propose wars fight them.

Let them fight on the front lines alongside their children, their mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters; their friends and lovers.

And let them do so knowing a bullet waits for them if they turn back from the fray.

Then will war surely end.