Eighty years ago, the Germans surrendered unconditionally to the Allied Forces, ending the Second World War in Europe. King Charles of England began a four-day commemoration of that historic moment. However, from where we stand in South Asia — staring into the eyes of a possible large-scale war — this celebration feels like an irony lost in time. In our part of the world, war is no distant memory but a looming possibility. Since the terror attack on Pahalgam on April 22, the air has been thick with fear, tension, and uncertainty. Rumors, claims, and counterclaims, drone strikes, retaliations, and televised declarations of strength flood every medium — from breaking news to TikTok reels. Underneath all the noise lies a silent and growing sense of dread. Schools are opening and closing unpredictably, exams are being cancelled and reinstated, and businesses are disrupted. Daily routines have crumbled, and in their place is an eerie rhythm of crisis. A friend recently shared that he has filled his deep freezer with two months’ worth of groceries — a detail that at first seemed excessive, but now feels like a perfectly rational response to an irrational world. Because when the world spins into uncertainty, people instinctively seek control — no matter how small. Stockpiling food, scanning news obsessively, canceling travel plans — these are not just reactions to headlines; they are acts of survival. There are ways to anchor oneself in the face of an invisible tide. War is the ultimate disruption to human life. Its chaos is not only in the destruction it causes, but also in the psychological fractures it leaves behind. Even in the Second World War, amidst bombings and scarcity, families clung to rituals — making burnt rice coffee in the morning to simulate a vanished routine. Because survival is not just about physical safety, it is about preserving sanity. The tragedy of war is not only measured in body counts or battlefield wins. It is written into the smaller, quieter traumas: the child who cannot concentrate in class, the mother who wakes up to every loud sound, the man who buries fear beneath stoicism. Even the lucky survivors carry burdens that cannot be seen — anxiety, dislocation, grief, guilt. Yet today, amid rising tensions, any voice raised against war risks being branded unpatriotic. To advocate for peace is to risk being silenced. Nationalistic fervor rewards calls for vengeance, not reason. We forget, amid the bluster and bravado, the true price of escalation, especially in a nuclearized region like ours. A full-scale conflict here would not just be another war; it would be annihilation. The Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish once wrote, ‘The war would end, the leaders will shake hands… only the mother who lost her son will remain crying.’ Wars do end — treaties are signed, hands are shaken — but for the ones left grieving, the war goes on forever. The mothers, daughters, spouses, and siblings carry its weight long after the last missile falls silent. If we fail to think now, we risk condemning a new generation to the endless, shapeless loss. By comparing the commemoration of World War II’s end with the looming threat of another large-scale conflict in South Asia, the conflict underscores the cyclical nature of human conflict and our persistent failure to learn from history. A visceral sense of dread and disorientation that accompanies the threat of war — the hoarding of food, the disruption of routines, the fragile attempts to maintain normalcy rightly points out that survival is not only about dodging bombs or finding shelter — it’s about coping with fear, enduring disruption, and bearing the grief of irreparable personal loss.
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