Part 1: The Main Idea

    Every thing ever written has a main idea. "Whose War?" by John Reed is no exception. There are three main ideas in the text.
      First, that the World War I was not a common man's war. That the ordinary person is disinterested in the war. The ordinary person being an average person, not rich, not poor, in the middle. When it does come up in conversation, people think of it as disturbing and horrifying.  In fact, Reed states that "We are simple folk. Prussian militarism seems to us insufferable..." This supports the statement "The war is not a common man's war." God, I love having support for my arguments. It makes me feel so smart.  Another side of this statement was John Reed's statement "The rich become richer, the poor poorer, and the cost of living higher." This shows that the people that benefited were the rich and not the poor. Proves you got to have money to make money.



      Second (wow, this post is getting long), that we had to suffer due to other countries actions. This is because England took control of the the Atlantic. Of course, when other countries did this it was considered illegal. But no, when England did this it was perfectly okay. Silly, silly, silly. Another part to this is when a country (*cough**cough* ENGLAND *cough**cough*) does not allow you to ship even medical supplies to what is considered the "enemy." This is stated in Reed's speech when he says " what happened to our international honor when England refused to let us ship even non- contraband food and even Red- Cross supplies." Wow! That is good stuff. 

   The final(okay, okay I am wrapping it up) pointe is that the speech makes it sound like all rich people want war. Many of the primary sources I read made it sound this way. Whether it be Helen Keller or William Butler Yeats they all make it sound this way. This is shown in the quote " The rich steadily become richer, the poor poorer, and the cost of living higher." What a timeless quote. In the end the war was to protect the investments of the rich. Fun stuff.




Those are the main points.