Who makes war?

[leogecko]

There is a lot of stress on war and soldiers and prisoners of war in this book, but who really does the fighting? What social class makes up the army? Do party members who join their youth organizations join the military after they graduate their group? Is their really war, or is it something more made up to give their hatred a target?
Please give thoughts.

[The Atheist]

There is a lot of stress on war and soldiers and prisoners of war in this book, but who really does the fighting? What social class makes up the army? Do party members who join their youth organizations join the military after they graduate their group? Is their really war, or is it something more made up to give their hatred a target?
Please give thoughts.

I don't think there is any fighting; although there might be the odd skirmish in Africa, there was no ongoing inter-superpower war as believed by Party members. The "enemy" is completely fabricated, as you say, to give hate a target.

What army existed would be outer Party - a whole lot of Winston Smiths. Parsons would have been a latrine orderly, for sure!

:D

[Teacher]

One could make the argument that a fabricated enemy is more dangerous. Without sounding too political, a good example would be the rhetoric that comes from extremists throughout the world - eg. Al Qaida.

Autocratic regimes are built in large part on producing a common enemy - in this case the West.

The revolution that took place in Iran in the late '70's is a perfect example. Religious extremists passed out American pornography to Iranian men showing them what Iranian women would become.