In the poem “ The Man He Killed”, and the passage of “ The History of a Campaign That Failed”, the speakers expressed their feelings about war after killing a stranger. The sadness and guilt of killing a potential friend made me feel the cruelty and
Nonsense of war.

The themes of both selections are the same. The speakers were soldiers who killed strangers at the battlefield without knowing why. In the poem, the speaker did not enjoy the “victory”. In the passage, the speaker was cheered up at first, but he felt sorry for what he did later, and then relieved a little bit. In general, we can see they were anti-war.

In the poem, the speaker imaged that if “he” and the strange man met at an inn, they could be friends. “But put as infantry, and staring face to face, I shot him as he at me.” This fully explained how cruel war is, soldiers are trained to see-and-kill, no time to think of who that was. The speaker repeated “my foe” twice in the third stanza. He could not find a reason why he called “him” a “foe”. In the last stanza, “ quaint and curious” are the two words describing war. These easy to remember words emphasized the nonsense of war.

In the passage, the speakers used the mood and the condition of the battlefield to foreshadow the tragedy. The soldiers were “silent and nervous and worried”. The dim moonlight only “strong enough to enable to mark the general shape of objects”. The speaker shot the man as he approached. He felt “surprised gratification” at the first. When he found out that he was an ordinary man, he felt sad and guilty. “That was the coldest sensation ever went through the marrow.” The ironic part of the story is that “he was killed in a fair and legistimate war,”, but “he was as sincerely mourned by the opposing force as if he had been their brother”. The speaker felt people had no reason for war, but just “killing of strangers against whom you feel no personal animosity”.

The speakers of both passages expressed their guilty and sadness. They knew how cruel war is, and are oppose wars.