It's all a Lie

We hear of soldiers going to war and when they return home, they are never the same.  The reason for this may be for a variety of reasons; deaths, poverty, and sickness.  War sucks.  These soldiers suffer PTSD when they come home.  Something as simple as a slam of a door or a stack of plates crashing to the floor can on set the disorder and bring these men and women back to feeling the fear and emotions they had during their time overseas.  Sometimes, their experience is so bad, the disorder can be develop while at war and cause soldiers either to not perform or acquire mental toughness to do whatever it takes to get through it. 

Cacciato, the Road to Paris, Sarkin Aung Wan (his female companion).  They all have one thing in common.  Fake.  Non-existent.  Of course Cacciato was a real person, but he never left nor lead a whole squadron on a wild goose chase thousands of miles to Paris.  This fantasy was all generated in Paul Berlin’s head to escape being completely dragged down by horrifying war events.  Clearly, it got him through even the worst of it.  O’Brien really made us as readers feel, well, I don’t know how to describe it.  The whole story was kind of a stretch so you were reluctant to believe it at first and right about the time when you give in and accept its possibility, O’Brien twists it and it’s all a lie.  Makes you feel dumb, like Cacciato.  It especially sucked when the squad had made it to Paris and everyone was happy. Paul Berlin had even bought an apartment with his companion in Paris and it just gave off good, happy vibes. 

Almost out of the blue, like an aside in a play write, Paul Berlin turns to the audience and just talks to them.

"’This is not a plea for placidness of mind or feebleness of spirit.

It is a plea for the opposite: that, like your father, you would build

fine houses; that, like your town, you would endure and grow and produce

good things; that you would live well. For just as happiness is more than

the absence of sadness, so is peace infinitely more than the absence of

war. Even the refugee must do more than flee. He must arrive. He must

return at last to a world as it is, however much in conflict with his

hopes, and he must then do what he can to edge reality toward what he has

dreamed, to change what he can change, to go beyond the wish or the

fantasy. "We had fed the heart on fantasies," says the poet, "the heart's

grown brutal from the fare." Spec Four Paul Berlin, I urge you to act.

Having dreamed a marvelous dream, I urge you to step boldly into it, to

join your dream and to live it. Do not be deceived by false obligation.

You are obliged, by all that is just and good, to pursue only the

felicity that you yourself have imagined. Do not let fear stop you. Do

not be frightened by ridicule or censure or embarrassment, do not fear

name-calling, do not fear the scorn of others. For what is true

obligation? Is it not the obligation to pursue a life at peace with

itself?’”                                                 (p318)

This is the point where the realization that this whole journey was made up.  The meaning of this work as a whole is one, to show how war sucks, and two, one must cope with adversity. One must adapt and overcome that obstacle and do whatever it takes to move on.