Here the collision of forces and opposing wills was so even—-the determination of the Coalition fighters to liberate, avenge and overthrow, the determination of the Belgians and Swiss to survive, and not be enslaved by the Soviets—-that the conviction of the one and the desperation of the other crashed together time and time again without any clear result. And added to the white-hot intensity of their struggle, was the question that for thirty-six hours could not by either side be answered: was victory still possible?
If one is cold and hard enough to perceive it, he will see that in a truly fatalistic world there is a limit to the terror of the wretched souls caught inside it. Always death is there as a final end to all. But where death is not an alternative, because hope remains, where the questions: "Will I survive? Can I still live and find peace? Or is my very struggle in the world of flesh ended forever?" remain unanswered, tipping first one way and then the other on the blind scales of Justice, or Fate, or some damnable, unnamable thing….. Here, there is horror.
The world which the existentialists present to us—-where all is meaningless, nothing is lasting, and death and mutilation of dreams inevitable—-was here, as in countless battles of flesh and blood, rendered empty and false. For where is the terror in such a predetermined world? Let the man who sees the black truth, end his life and have done. As if the multitude of Life and Universe around us could be supported by some trick of cruel gods!
The true intensity of Man's existence—-real, physical, undeniable—-lies in the fact that success and victory are possible, if like everything else in our finite lives and understanding, limited and passing. Health, happiness and love (in varying degrees, and depending largely on outlook) are too many times evident in those around us to merely to say, THERE IS NO HOPE, THERE IS NO CHANCE, THERE IS NO GOD. The man dying of terminal disease, or imprisoned without hope of escape in a living hell not of his own creation, has the right when pain and fear become unbearable, to give in to despair. We have not. Because for the rest of us, the fact remains that victory and success (if the goal is just, and based on reality) ARE possible, however terrible the price, or the roads which lead to it.
A man is forced to ask himself, as he is borne down the swift water-gap of crisis, toward the razor knifing across his path, CAN I SURVIVE THE VERY TIP OF THAT BLADE, AND PASS THROUGH? IS MY RAFT OF FLESH STRONG ENOUGH, MY SHIELD OF WILL AND UNDERSTANDING SUFFICIENT? And while caught on that blade, how multiplied the anguish by the fact that his hope never leaves him. "Hope springs eternal in the human breast."
But even this would not make the struggle so overpowering, if it were a false hope, and we knew it. But all around us there is the rumor of triumph (and tragedy), of those who have survived personal hells, accomplished the impossible, and stand now on a more permanent footing, if only in posterity. How then can we, caught in the midst of the fray, despair, and surrender our dreams? We cannot.
Age approaches us, inevitable death, suffering that cannot be avoided. And yet there is also the eternal Spring of youth inside us, that hope, that yearning, if not for peace in this world, then at least for some last accomplishment before release into the great unknown: some reason for having been here.
For this Battle is not fiction. It is not words, nor one man's opinion. It is life: LIFE, the beautiful and terrible.
How can a man survive?
*