Catch 22 Essay, Research Paper

War, regardless of its noble justifications and the good intentions of soldiers, dehumanizes men and feeds their self interest, making it difficult to remain moral. The novel “Catch 22″ by Joseph Heller illustrates the emotional consequences of war. “Catch 22″ is a perfect example of demonstrating how soldiers change or morph from when they enter the war, until they leave if fortunate enough.

Soldiers enter war with good intentions. They enter figuring they will not see any combat and the thought of death does not cross most minds. They figure they will be stationed in the rear or the war, in some foreign country for a short period of time, for the war will not last that long. In the beginning they all entered hospitals faking injuries, and mental illnesses just so they would not be on the battlefield. None of the soldiers expected to be spending over five years fighting in combat daily, and ironically having to actually enter the hospitals injured with limbs missing, or with insanity from the horrific sights they witnessed. The main character Yossarian for instance started his military career as a bomber with no fear. He was one of the best and surely the bravest, but was the war professed he began to realize that death could occur to him during any mission and that he was not immortal. The visions caught up with him and he became paranoid of flying and developed an acrophobia and refused to fly any more missions, either emitting himself into the hospital with kidney problems, or canceling missions because of a “broken” intercom. Most bomber experienced this fear of fighting after they witnessed someone they known die right in front of them.

War dehumanizes men and feeds their self interest, they begin to become anti social with people from home. When soldiers returned home on leave or break they did not get along with their home environment, including their parents, siblings, neighbors, and sometimes wives or girlfriends. They wished to be left alone and disliked talking about the war. They felt out of place and were unsure how to act back at home. After being away for so many years, and witnessing all these horrific events occur, they could not react anymore and became more of machine type with some loss of emotions. They only knew how to act around their soldier pals. Many soldiers just wanted to full fill their self interests which was to have sex, smoke cigarettes, and consume a lot of alcohol. An example of this is how Yassorian wants to sleep with Nurse Duckett again, and is not bothered by the fact that she may be engaged or even married. There were also the businessmen who just wanted to make money while in Europe. Milo for instance started his own black market trade which he called the “syndicate.” He traded all types of goods, but mostly food. His trade grew so large that he was flying illegally to almost every country even behind the German enemy lines to trade items. He always found the best deals, made money, and supplied the soldiers with the finest foods available on the earth. He became so valuable that he was not aloud to fly any more missions for no one in the army could run his complicated syndicate.

Many soldiers all experienced the same changes and desires for self satisfaction, often without the consideration for others. War makes it difficult for men to remain moral because they were dehumanized, and in order to survive with sanity they had to fend for themselves. War alone is not morally correct so how can anyone expect a soldier who is fighting in it day in and day out to be morally correct also. To survive you have to adapt to your environment by whatever means possible even if it is immorally correct. Survival is first.