And what she understood-what none of the ones who came to touch Simon’s forehead understood-was that the misery of war represented the world’s only truly universal language. Its native speakers occupied different ends of the world, and the prayers they recited were not the same and the empty superstitions to which they clung so dearly were not the same-and yet they were. War broke them the same way, made them scared and angry and vengeful the same way. In times of peace and good fortune they were nothing alike, but stripped of these things they were kin. The universal slogan of war, she’d learned, was simple: If it had been you, you’d have done no different. Omar El Akkad
About This Quote

War is the ultimate test. It is unavoidable. War has no rules, no boundaries, no compromises, no exit strategy. A war begins with a spark that ignites into fire.

It burns through hope until all that remains are ashes in your heart. When you are at war you are nothing but a shell of who you used to be full of rage and pain. War leaves you with nothing but questions in your head and in your heart.

But there is one thing that will never change when you are in war: every person who touches your forehead will understand what it means to be in war. When someone touches your forehead they are touched by the same pain that has consumed you for years.

Source: American War

Some Similar Quotes
  1. War is what happens when language fails. - Margaret Atwood
  2. Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime. - Ernest Hemingway
  3. The world is full enough of hurts and mischances without wars to multiply them. - J.r.r. Tolkien
  4. If everyone fought for their own convictions there would be no war. - Leo Tolstoy
  5. Wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows. - Anonymous
More Quotes By Omar El Akkad
  1. What is the first anesthetic? Wealth. And if I take your wealth? Necessities. And if I demolish your home, burn your fields? Acknowledgement. And if I make it taboo to sympathize with your plight? Family. And if I kill your family? God. And God......Hasn't said...
  2. Sarat smiled at the thought. "You couldn't just let us kill ourselves in peace, could you?"" Come now, " said Yousef. "Everyone fights an American war.
  3. Everyone fights an American war.
  4. It seemed to Karina further proof that wartime was the only time the world became as simple and carnivorously liberating as it must exist at all times in men's minds.
  5. Rage wrapped itself around her like a tourniquet, keeping her alive even as it condemned a part of her to atrophy.
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