Johnny Got His Gun.......

Great Debates
1

Originally published in 1939 Trumbo’s “Johnny got his Gun” was yanked off the book shelves and banned from many American schools. I recently had an older gentleman gave me this book and he had a couple words of wisdom for me.
His words were followed by this written on the back of the book.

"…This is no ordinary war. This was a war to make the world safe for democracy. And if Democracy was made safe, then nothing else mattered-not the millions of dead bodies, nor the thousands of ruined lives…This is no ordinary novel. This is a novel that never takes the easy way out: it is shocking, violent, terrifying, horrible, uncompromising, brutal, remorseless and gruesome…but so is war…"

This was chilling and warming at the same time. I wonder in these modern times, does democracy still mean the same things for the world?
Are Americans ready to defend our land for democracy?

The words quoted from the back of the book are chilling, but they reflect a truth that many people beleive. Are we (US) destined to defend democracy for millennia? Are the coalitions that are behind America supporting our same ideals, or are they just fighting a common foe?

The debatable topic here: **What changes do we see in the future of the globe, the world economic system? Are we in for a thousand years of harmony and bliss? After tragedy comes tranquility…

2

Interesting sidebar: Dalton Trumbo TALKED as if he was a pacifist, but first and foremost he was a COmmunist, and he readily changed his tune whenever the Party told him to.

Don’t take my word for it- read Trumbo’s own forewrod to “Johnny Got His Gun.” He said that he wrote the book BEFORE the Second World War. But he didn’t publish it until AFTER the war. Why? Simply because he received word from Moscow that Stalin wanted… no, NEEDED the U.S. to enter the war on his side, and he didn’t want anti-war books on the market, discouraging Americans from sending off their boys to fight Hitler.

In other words, Trumbo thought it was fine and dandy for American boys to lose their arms, legs, sight, hearing, or lives… just so long as they were doing it to save Joseph Stalin’s worthless hide.

Trumbo was no idealist, and he never thought for himself.

3

Funny, everything I find says (like the OP) that it was published in 1939. Seeing as the US didn’t enter the war until 1941 (really '42, but who’s quibbling), I guess Stalin sent his telegram to Trumbo by slow-boat, huh?

But then again, that whole publication-date-thing could just be a pinko-commie plot.

4

Uh, stofsky, WW II began in 1939, even though the US hadn’t yet become a combatant.

5

Actually, there was a time when the Communists were the only idealists. The Communists were very effective in presenting the world as a choice between Nazism/Facism and Communism. The idealists who went off to fight in Spain are but one example. No one who reads Orwells Homage to Catalonia can fail to be moved.

Many, many intelligent and idealistic people gave thier lives for Communism without realizing the true nature of the regime they served, Dalton Trumbo was only one of these.

Indeed, the American Communists were among the few who were willing to work for civil rights for black people in the South. Whatever you think of thier ideology, they fought the good fight for a good cause. If only the Communists were willing to risk their lives for the oppressed, to my way of thinking that makes them more “American” than less. It is only to our shame that they were in such a vanishingly small minority.

6

Damn shame those idealists killed tens of millions in Russia, China and Southeast Asia, ain’t it? Idealism doesn’t count for much. You have to know what the hell you’re doing. The Hitler Youth were idealists, too.

“It was a war so horrible that only an idealist could have thought of it.” Ingmar Bergman, The Seventh Seal

7

I vaguely remember reading Johnny Got His Gun years ago and also seeing a movie of the same title. Wasn’t that story written from a Christian Science perspective of suffering?

If I’ve misremembered, please let me know.

8

LonesomePolecat Well I have to say I do not know where you were going by using Bergman’s"The Seventh Seal" to illustrate idealism then and now. I guess I do understand the fundamentals of this in that Bergman wanted to portray ‘our’ natural tendency to resist the inevitable, but come on…I think the point and the reason behind the seventh sign is to illustrate a faith in the unknown. Which is what ‘we’ the civilzed world need to have right now at this time and in this place. We need to have a faith. Not necessarily in a Christian God or even a Muslim God, but in ourselves who are essentially the future that is not yet written.

My post was about democracy in the US and what 9/11 will do to the futures of our children. My old neighbor gave me a copy of “Johnny got his gun” and we sat and philosophized a while on his front porch. Untill the wife joined us and I had to get going. It was his thoughts and his take on the whole situation that spurred me to write this thread. I am simply wondering what is going to happen next and how is the world going to react to the events of 9/11??? Its so late right now I better pick this up tomorrow, I just wanted to clarify a couple points.

9

Uh, december, stofsky was arguing the point that JGHG was only published after the war. So if it was published the year the war started…that’s not after the war. And the point that publication was delayed specifically to get America into the war. In which case the year America entered the war is also relavent.

So what’s the problem?

10

I can’t belive you would use Orwell to support the Communist Party. He wasn’t a Communist, sure as hell he wasn’t one after Spain.

And Orwell wasn’t. Bless his socialist heart.

11

I misspoke earlier, but my take on Trumbo was, essentially correct.

FOr most of the 1930s, the Communist Party line was that Hitler and the Nazis were evil, and that the U.S. and Britain had a moral obligation to arm up and join the U.S.S.R. in fighting fascism. All that changed in 1939, the year Dalton Trumbo wrote “Johnny Got His Gun.”

In 1939, Trumbo’s hero, Joseph Stalin, became Adolf Hitler’s bosom buddy. As soon as the Von Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact (usually called the Hitler-Stalin Pact) was signed, the Communist Party line changed- suddenly, they were peaceniks! Trumbo published “Johnny Got His Gun” in 1939, to convince the American people not to go to war under any circumstances.

Come 1941, Trumbo sang a VERY different tune. In 1941, Hitler pulled a fast one on Stalin, and invaded Russia. At that point, Stalin had no more use for pacifists- he needed American money and American soldiers. Trumbo immediately put a stop to publication of his anti-war book.

Ironically, after the German invasion of Russia, the only people who STILL championed “Johnny Got His Gun” were right-wingers of the isolationist America First movement! To his chagrin, Trumbo found that pro-Nazi Americans LOVED his book, and used it to argue that America had no business fighting Hitler! In later editions of “Johnny,” Trumbo included a foreword explaining how happy he was that his book was pulled from circulation before it could dampen American enthusiasm for the fight against Hitler.

I repeat, don’t take my word for it- pick up a copy of the book and read Trumbo’s own words. Clearly, this man was no idealist, and was NOT a devoted pacifist. He was opposed to war… EXCEPT when the purpose of the war was to protect Joseph Stalin. Presumably, it’s only bad for young men to lose their limns and senses in “bad” wars.

Only AFTER the Second World War was over, when the U.S. had pulled Joe Stalin’s fat out of the fire, did Trumbo conveniently become a pacifist again, and put “Johnny” back into print.

12

WOW Astorian, I have to agree with you. Granted I am not an autority on Trumbo, I’ve read a couple screenplays and liked most of them. Papillon was great!!

Had this book been published now, what would the views mean for modern war, would they even apply? US is surely the opposite of pacifism…

13

I somewhat retract my earlier statement–based on the information from the OP and my short research on Google, it appeared as though the book were published at the beginning/before (depending on your nationality) WWII. I assumed Trumbo was American, as well, and I may be wrong there too. I was working with the information I had. If it were incomplete, as a later post shows, I apologize.

But…and geez, I really hate to go here…if I were a pacifist (which I am), but not a truly convinced pacifist (which I’m not), and I were to write a “horror of war” novel and then found my nation/cause/political philosophy in a situation in which even I found combat to be suitable, would I not be justified in pulling my novel?

If my “if” isn’t clear enough (which it may not be), I’ll put in personal and contemporary terms: I’m for the most part a pacifist. I don’t like war and I agree with Trumbo that it’s beyond most people’s conception of horrible. I marched against the Gulf action, and still believe it was wrong. But I believe the actions our country is taking now are right. If I had a “Johnny Got His Gun,” I’d probably pull it from the market too.

Why does everybody think that because someone espouses a position, it’s an absolute? Perhaps some of us think that some causes aren’t worth dying and killing for, but some are, and we like to be able to pick and choose.

My rambling 2 1/2 cents.

14

Stofsky

I have to say I agree with you. This is a true statement. ‘We’ so like to pick and choose what causes are worth fighting for and which are not. The current mess here and abroad is, just from pure numbers, a cause that **millions[/]b are willing to die and kill for. On 9/11 the world was changed. Very unlike the times of Trumbo. The united states was not attacked by a visible aggressor. NO, we were attcked by a sighted scourge. They are out there, they are hiding, and they are even here. It was an idea that spurred the happenings of 9/11. An Idea based in scewed facts. If it turns out that OBL was completely behind this, or even if he was working with an organized state, it does not change the fact that thousands of innocent civillions were murdered. This in itself is the reason many other nations are backing us. Or at least not condemning what we are doing about it. I do not think we would be making parts of Afghanistan into a series of parking lots if we had no proof that is where the lion awaits.

My fear is that after Afghanistan, after OBL, we the US will be hunting on other lands to try and rid this world of the ‘ideas’ that caused 9/11. I truly have no doubt we will prevail, but the casualties when is said and done will be vast. More than what modern peoples ever thought could or would ever happen. I am deeply saddened when I see ground zero in NYC. I am saddened and enraged. It is this sentiment that makes me want to stand behind our plight.

When Trumbo wrote JGHG he seemed to be pushing the fact that in its essence in our essence as humans we are wrought with faith in the unknown. We are forced to put things in other peoples hands and we are sought to have the faith that they will be able to deal with it. We are forced in this same predicament now. Faith in an unknown. Human faith for the common good is a huge force that can not be reckoned with, and this I believe, will be what wins the war against terror…

15

The difference between an Idealist and a Zealot is frightenly small.