He took a deep breath, then began. "I was a different man when I was younger, though we are all constantly discovering new parts of ourselves. At that time I was a general, I believed in the war, that we were helping the rest of the world by bringing them up to our level. At that time I didn't see the cost of that war. Not truly."
He ran his fingers through his beard, eyes distant.
"I was on the front lines, writing letters home, planning gifts that I would bring to my nephew and niece and sister in law once I took the city we were working to invade. And then the letter came. Not from me, but to me..."
A swallow there, a single tear rolling.
"My son, my Lu Ten. He had been fighting in another battle. Perhaps at the very moment of my greatest victory, he was killed." A deep breath.
"When I learned that, then finally did my eyes open to the harsh realities of the war. Sometimes you have to feel the pain yourself to see it written in the faces of others. And I did. Seeing that pain in my reflection I could then see it in the faces of the people we had come to. No matter how much good we thought we were bringing them... the cost was too high. For them. For us. For everyone. I saw children cowering who should have been playing. I watched my own troops separating families, and now I understood what that meant in a way I had not before."
I hope that you can understand another's pain without having to feel it for yourself first. I lost my son. Others lost far more. For a war I should have stood to stop."
no subject
He ran his fingers through his beard, eyes distant.
"I was on the front lines, writing letters home, planning gifts that I would bring to my nephew and niece and sister in law once I took the city we were working to invade. And then the letter came. Not from me, but to me..."
A swallow there, a single tear rolling.
"My son, my Lu Ten. He had been fighting in another battle. Perhaps at the very moment of my greatest victory, he was killed." A deep breath.
"When I learned that, then finally did my eyes open to the harsh realities of the war. Sometimes you have to feel the pain yourself to see it written in the faces of others. And I did. Seeing that pain in my reflection I could then see it in the faces of the people we had come to. No matter how much good we thought we were bringing them... the cost was too high. For them. For us. For everyone. I saw children cowering who should have been playing. I watched my own troops separating families, and now I understood what that meant in a way I had not before."
I hope that you can understand another's pain without having to feel it for yourself first. I lost my son. Others lost far more. For a war I should have stood to stop."