The most recent Town Hall Lecture at Bethlehem’s City Hall was timely in light of the dilemma posed by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in the Middle East. Should we have troops on the ground in these two countries?

The speaker was Dr. John Pettegrew, professor of Modern United States Thought and Culture at Lehigh University and director of its American Studies Program. He is also the co-founder of the Southside Initiative, a program that brings together the university and the community “to share knowledge, foster democracy, and improve the quality of life in Bethlehem.” One of the activities in support of these goals is the Town Hall Lecture series, co-sponsored by Lehigh and the City of Bethlehem.

In his talk Pettegrew drew on his recently published book, titled “Light It Up: The Marine Eye for Battle in the War in Iraq,” which is intended to pose questions about contemporary history in the hope that they will generate discussion. Pettegrew gave three reasons for President Barack Obama’s decision to avoid putting troops on the ground in the Middle East: concern over the possibility of overextending the American military, the fact that Americans are war weary after years of fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq, and our ability to fight ISIS with air power instead. Pettegrew added another possible reason: concern for the veterans who are “suffering as a result of their war experience and the vicissitudes of fighting generally.”

Their difficulties raise the question of how the military recruits young men and women to leave home and take the lives of strangers in another country, a subject Pettegrew discussed at length both in his book and in his talk. Over the past several years the U.S. military has been decreasing troops on the ground, and instead using Predator drones, thus increasing the distance between the shooter and the target. In addition, we are using remotely controlled Gladiator robots to transport supplies. Waging war can thus seem less threatening to potential recruits.

Moreover, since World War I media culture has become pervasive. Soldiers have conflated the experience of being in a war with the war films they have seen. The baby boom generation, said Pettegrew, “seeing films about over-the-top heroes in World War II,” volunteered to fight in Southeast Asia.

Soldiers fighting in the Iraq War, equipped with digital technology, could look at clips of what they had just done and then post them on websites to share with their families. With the advent of YouTube, video sharing became ubiquitous.

The Pentagon has adopted war films as a recruitment tool. These films are not supposed to be an accurate picture of reality but rather, a way to glorify war, thus encouraging people to enlist. Viewers of these films, called “war porn,” never see people being killed. As Pettegrew put it, “they romanticize and eroticize the stuff of combat” by making “visual appeals to the human eye that create a desire to find gratification in fighting a war.” Reactions to the films have varied. Some have seen the Marines in one film as sadists while others think that those being attacked should die.

Combat video games are yet another recruitment tool. The Pentagon adopted them to give new recruits a virtual presence in combat. In 2003 it released a video depicting an Iraqi city where men who had just returned from battle describe their experiences. Vast sums of money have gone into creating these simulation programs, which intentionally make it impossible for the viewer to tell the difference between reality and simulation. So, for example, optical technology makes it possible for the viewer to get the idea that a soldier can kill from a distance.

After they were no longer engaged in combat, many veterans wondered why they were still alive while their comrades in arms were gone. This obsessive thinking resulted in an epidemic of suicides among veterans. In fact, Pettegrew noted, more Marines die by suicide than die in combat. Many who survive are haunted by their experiences in war.

Pettegrew’s book reflects his interest in and concerns regarding veterans’ affairs and was published in connection with Lehigh University’s Veterans Empathy Project, which Pettegrew directs. The Project is producing an oral history in the form of interviews concerning the military experience of U.S. soldiers and Marines in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, from 2001 to the present. It is intended to promote understanding of twentieth century warfare and to promote discussion and understanding of military service.