"Anyone who has not seen these fields of carnage will never be able to imagine it. When one arrives here, the shells are raining down everywhere with each step one takes, but in spite of this, it is necessary for everyone to go forward.
One has to go out of one's way not to pass over a corpse lying at the bottom of the communication trench. Farther on, there are many wounded to tend, others who are carried back on stretchers to the rear. Some are screaming, others are pleading. One sees some who don't have legs, others without any heads, who have been left for several weeks on the ground.
I stayed ten days next to a man who was chopped in two; there was no way to move him; he had one leg on the parapet and the rest of this body in the trench. It stank and I had to chew tobacco the whole time in order to endure this torment... One has to have a strong heart to endure such a martyrdom. This is not war, it's a massacre." - Letter from unknown French soldier, 311th Infantry Regiment, Verdun, France, June 1916 #ww1 #reality #stayzero #zerofoxtrot #nocomplaints #hardfuck