All Quiet On The Western FrOnt

The book All Quiet on the Western Front is narrated by the character named, Paul Baumer, a nineteen-year old, who fights in the German army against the French in World War I. He decides he wants to join the military with his friends after listening to their very patriotic teacher, Kantorek. What little he knows of the terror and brutality his life will become emblazed in, once he steps foot on the forefront of battle.
The problem that lies ahead is the very real and very violent nature of war and all the soldiers who endure it and the people who are touched by it. After experiencing ten weeks of brutal training under the petty and cruel Corporal Himmelstoss and the unimaginable brutality on the front, Paul and his friends realize that their ideas of patriotism and nationalism are merely empty banalities. They no longer believe in a glorious or honorable war. A former classmate of Paul’s, Kemmerich, is hurt and had to have his leg amputated, but is still slowly dying. One of Paul’s other friends wants his boots, and no one blames him, not even Kemmerich. This is expected of soldiers in war, they are forced to learn to disconnect themselves from any emotion such as grief, sympathy or fear to survive the agony that is war.
The solution to the problem is knowledge. To know what war truly means and what both the pros and cons are in war and which weighs out the other. This will allow one who may seek to fight, know the whole story, the entire truth. When new recruits for the company come to fight, they find themselves caught in a bloody battle with a group of Allies charging in. Men are blown apart, limbs are severed from their torsos and huge rats feed off the dead and wounded. Part of this truth is to always know who you’re fighting and what you’re fighting for. Paul spends some time near a training camp that is near a group of Russian prisoners-of-war. Paul feels that these people are just like him, not some sub-human evil and wonders how war makes enemies of...