"The Thing That Helps Most Is Cognac"

Ruining an entire generation of Russian men on the battlefields of Ukraine

War makes for an interesting abstract discussion. Amateur military historians such as myself can discuss troop movements, tactics, and strategic decisions with the cold calculation of chess players. In doing so, however, it’s easy to lose sight of the fact that war is a brutally inhuman undertaking- one that, at its most basic, involves one person separating another from their mortal coil.

While war has become increasingly wholesale- dealt from a distance by artillery and long-range missile fire, much of it is still retail. That means- as it has for thousands of years- looking into your enemy’s eyes as you kill them or (even worse) as they kill you.