J. Aleksandr Wootton

“The more stories I study, the more I begin to suspect that there is only one story, and that we are, all of us, engaged in telling it.”

“So, then...” Petra interjected, caught up for the moment in the story, “nobody knows who was right?“Who was right?” Growland repeated slowly. “How do you mean?”“In the war.” As she tried to articulate her question, she became less sure of it. “You don't know which side was... right?”“Cub,” the big bear explained patiently, “nobody has ever gone to war believing their cause to be wrong!”“Well, sure, I get that. But afterwards... don't people usually... figure out... who was really right?” she finished lamely.“What people?”“I don't know!” Petra said, flinging her arms wide. “Historians, maybe?”Jumphrey snorted and removed his pipe from between his teeth. “Historians are people, and people have opinions and sympathies. I think if you pay attention, you'll find that histories usually demonstrate that the winning side was in the right all along; or else, occasionally, they demonstrate that those who won are despots and tyrants who deserved to be fought against, and still should be. You see? Everyone has a perspective. If you convened a representative post-war council to discuss what started the conflict and who ought to have given way to whom, a new war would break out from their arguments.”Petra felt her spirits slump a little. “But then... how–”“As everyone has always done,” the rabbit answered. “You pray that war does not come. But if it does come, you fight in accordance with your own convictions, or to defend the home or people you love; or you take a vow of pacifism, and follow your conscience some other way, if you are allowed. Whatever the political justification for war is said to be, armies are invariably made up of ordinary people fighting for the most basic of ideas, the simplest of reasons. 'Sides' are largely determined by the happenstance of birth, nothing more.”“That's... tragic,” Petra said, realizing a truth she'd heard before but never really processed.Jumphrey shrugged, and said simply, “All war is.”