Angled shadows lurk everywhere.
War can cast many different shadows, and the angle of the shadow will be dependent on who is looking at it.
For example, if you’re a General commanding that war from the War HQ back at home and close to Government, then you’ll see one shadow.
If you’re a young soldier, a “Tom” with no rank, deployed on the ground fighting within an inch of your life, then you’ll see quite another.
Then there’s all who are taking part in between.
The Air Force, fighting the war from the skies, the Navy fighting from the sea, the different elements and support networks keeping the war effort moving forward…all looking from a different angle at the shadows of war.
And of course the enemy, their angles all different too.
What of the people caught in the middle, yet more shadows cast, as they stare at it from their angle.
I write this having been a part of many conflicts over a 40 year span, from the Northern Hemisphere to the South, and from conflicts in the Middle East through to South East Asia and beyond.
A secret war back in the early 70s which everyone now knows about, to conflicts that even today I won’t mention.
But way back then, the only shadows that I ever saw…were my own!
If I sit and spend time going through each war, either back when I was a soldier, or in my new chapter as an observer of war while escorting journalists as a security advisor, I can recollect each shadow, changing at different times through the events, and their differing angles…clarity…I see it now.
So, when there’s a fight to be had in the future, wouldn’t it be beneficial to everyone taking part, if they had just a small understanding of the shadows of war.
Bob Shepherd 