Monday, November 8, 2010

I'm A War Gamer; Not A War Monger


We grew up playing board games, mainly Monopoly, Risk and Stratego. With six kids in our house, and many kids in the neighborhood our age, there was never a shortage of gaming or gamers.
One day, browsing in a hobby store looking for an updated Monopoly game I came across a game called '1914,' a simulation of the German campaign against France and Britain in the opening months of WWI.
I loved history and bought or read most of the books the game used as sources. Barbara Tuchman's Guns of August was the most memorable one. When I was in high school I complained to history teachers that we never got to WWI by the end of the year, (we were lucky to get to Reconstruction) so one teacher suggested I give a lecture to our class on the opening of WWI.
I put together what I thought was a great lecture. I drew maps in colored chalk all over the chalkboard. For almost a half hour I passionately and enthusiastically went through the opening campaign, from the capture of the Belgian forts at Liege and Namur to the stirring Battle of Marne where France averted defeat.
When I looked at my classmates after the lecture, I noticed most of them were asleep. Those not asleep had a glazed-over look in their eyes. For the not the first time in my life, I felt like an alien, a freak, some one from another planet. Nobody was remotely interested in WWI.
I kept reading military history and buying war games. I'd read the historical analysis and set the game up, sometimes playing it solitaire.
A few years ago, while searching for war games online (hobby stores didn't sell war games anymore) I came across a war gamers convention in metropolitan New York City sponsored by a game company called GMT.
Although based in California, after 9/11 GMT decided to sponsor a convention on the east coast to honor all their customers in the NYC area. I found out about this in 2005 and have gone every year since.
Every year is an incredible experience. War gamers are amazing people. I have never encountered the unabashed egalitarianism there anywhere else.
Nobody asked you about how much money you made, what your religion was, or what your politics were. They only asked "what game do you want to play?"
Over the years, I have discovered that many of the people at the convention are from the upper echelons. That explained their egalitarianism. They were comfortable with who they were and were accepting of other people, despite any perceived differences.
One of the game designers I met writes speeches for world leaders. Another does computer security for global financial concerns. Another is one of the founders of the rock group Three Dog Night. They are doctors, lawyers, accountants, computer programmers, historians, insurance salesmen and retired military officers.
When I shared my story during a break with some friends about my lecture on WWI in high school, one of them said kindly, "At that point did you realize you weren't like everyone else?"
We all laughed.
Then he said seriously, "At most only two percent of the people in the world can do what we do. We are all freaks of nature. That's why we like getting together."
We then went back to our game.
It was a battalion level recreation of the D-Day landings using all five British and American beaches. I also have regimental and divisional level games of the Normandy landings of June 1944.
I may be a freak. I may be an alien. But at least I know there are others like me. War gamers are not war mongers. We know full well the cost of war. We know how many casualties there were in every battle ever fought.
It may be said that those who know war the best, despise it the most. I think Robert E. Lee said something close to that. Lee knew a lot about war.

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