lts mobilized by the Central Powers. Some of
the wounded were crippled for life. Some were less severely injured, but
all 22.2 million were more or less severely handicapped when they stood
up to face the rigors of civilian life at war's end. All were denied the
possibility of living normal, productive, creative, satisfying lives.

Wars are fought on battlefields. In the war of 1914-18 many of the
battlefields included villages, towns, cities. These complex
institutions, occupied by men, women and children were smashed and
burned wholesale.

The figures which I have used in listing the 1914-18 war losses were
compiled by the United States War Department. They are more or less
accurate, but they underline the fact that for years on end the centers
of western civilization concentrated their energies and devoted every
means at their disposal to cripple or destroy fellow human beings and
their habitations.

When we read of the destruction of the Roman Empire we console and
perhaps try to fool ourselves by saying that the immense network of
civilization which the Romans and their Greek associates spread across
Eurasia and Africa during the historical period that began about 700
B.C. was destroyed by hordes of migrating "barbarians." When we turn to
our own civilization, however, there are no barbarian hordes to take the
blame. The wholesale destruction which took place in Europe from 1914 to
1918 and which was repeated and multiplied during the wars of 1936-1945
was carried on officially by spokesmen for the most advanced, most
highly developed, most civilized countries of the western world.

We have been using the word "murder" to describe the wholesale slaughter
of Europeans by Europeans that took place from 1914 to 1918 and from
1936 to 1945. The word "murder" is inaccurate. The Europeans who carried
on the wholesale destruction and mass murder during the two most general
wars of modern times were committing murder in one sense. In quite
another sense they were engaged in collective suicide. Europeans were
blotting out the life and well-being of fellow Europeans. When the
process came to a temporary halt in 1945 every European participant in
the struggle was weaker in human potential and poorer in economic means
than they were when the war began.

Arnold Toynbee describes the entire episode as the "down grading" of
Europe. He might have added two words and reported "the down grading of
Europe by Europeans", as a glar