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Why does war captivate us?
By every measure, the brutality and bloodshed should disgust us. Yet we devote ourselves to war stories—writing them, filming them, documenting them, even simulating them in games. What drives this fixation?
I've often considered this. I come from a military family and was brought up with the topic of combat and war all around me. I believe the main draw to it for me is that it is the ultimate drama. Life or Death. The majority of us who haven't been in wars ask ourselves...
What would I do? How would I respond? Could I be brave?
We can channel these questions from a distance through the media we consume.
What is your fascination?
It is complex, there is lots of documentation, and analysis (usually BS), and you can simulate it. Intellectual challenge.
Good question, why?
Firstly, I inherited it from my father, specifically his interest in World War II. He was a huge fan; he even had an encyclopedia on the subject.
He hardly ever mentioned it to me or we talked about it since he died when I was nine years.
But I continued his interest; As a child, I always built models related to WW2.
Then came the 1982 war. During that time, I was doing my military service, although I was lucky enough not to be sent to the south. I experienced it from the barracks where I was stationed.
And then 16 years in the police force, so from the moment I graduated from school I always wore a uniform and carried a weapon.
But the passion died with me. My son isn't interested in any of it at all. It's a different culture, more about cell phones, awful music, and girlfriends.
Remember Pearl Harbor 12/07/1941. ❤️
"If brute force doesn't work you aren't using enough brute force." - mTk
War does not determine who is right, but it does determine who is left. - B.Russell
"Turn based games don't need a pause key". - mTk
"Overkill is underrated." - Col John "Hannibal" Smith
Senatus Populusque Romanus- SPQR - The Senate and People of Rome (circa 60 BC)
Good question — and I think a lot of us circle around the same answer without always saying it out loud.
War fascinates us because it strips things down to essentials. Fear, courage, leadership, luck, survival — all the big human questions show up at once, with nothing to hide behind. For those of us who haven’t experienced it directly, history, books, films, and even games are a way of trying to understand how ordinary people behaved in extraordinary circumstances.
I don’t think it’s about glorifying war so much as trying to understand people under pressure. We ask ourselves the same questions across every generation: What would I have done? Would I have held up?
And maybe that’s why we keep coming back to it — not just the tactics or hardware, but the human stories behind them.
"Si vis pacem, para bellum." — Vegetius
"Do not hurry to the sound of the guns without knowing why they are firing." — British maxim
"In war, the simplest things are difficult." — Clausewitz
"No plan survives first contact with the enemy." — Moltke
"The side that can most quickly exploit success is the side that will win." — Guderian
Some days you’re the hammer, some days you’re the nail. 🪖🎲
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