"Yet you can still admire in its horror the courage and patriotism of these men, many of who will die or be maimed for life."

-I don't admire anything of the sort. The whole thing is utterly wasteful folly that ends with piles of bodies of people who would otherwise lead a life with some meaning or purpose in it: that alternative I could admire.

The excuse might be "Patriotism" but that's the "last refuge of a scoundrel..." as Samuel Johnson put it and on "Courage" lets be frank: most of these troops will never have an opportunity to display any, being doomed to injury and death by the distant anonymity of a modern artillery bombardment.

I just feel sorrow: that we educate and cultivate human beings then allow them to be sent to die to extend the hegemony of some billionaire set in Washington or wherever else the greedy and powerful pull the strings.

And of course shame: that people promote this folly all around us and yet there is little we can do about it.