The Liberator (A short story)

There was one thing about the liberation that fucked with my head for a long time. ‘cause you see all those emaciated bodies, all those hollowed out eyes who don’t even have the energy to smile at the sight of us. You see all that, and your first thought is:

“Well thank God we made it here in time. Crisis averted.”

But then you remember. It’s only crisis averted for the people standing in front of us. The tragedy that we’re stopping on this particular day has been going on for years. That awful “could-have-been,” has been. It played out over and over again, until we finally turned up.
And yes, we did some good by being there. But if you think this is the end of it. That this was some anomaly inside some otherwise peachy world, then you don’t know human beings my friend.

I was there at Monte Cassino. Two thousand friendly civilians, burnt alive or crushed under collapsing buildings, at the hands of the “good guys.” How many buildings that had stood for centuries, were disintegrated in a few hours by bombs built by conscripted men?

The Allies. Allies against what? In the name of what?

That’s humanity for you. We are your Liberators.