Declarations of War

Len Deighton's unfashionable compassion for soldiers and his almost pardoxical hatred of war was the theme of his previous book "Bomber". Here he expands and develops the idea that the strategies and machines of war push men into dehumanised, machine-like roles with which they are very ill-equipped to cope. A series of literary jump-cuts between actions as far apart as the Punjab and an S.A.C base in Vietnam takes you inside the minds of men facing the bizarre situations which war produces.