Global Wars and Writing Warrior Culture

of the Gulf War and Other Ball/es, is a memoir deta iling his experiences as a marine sniper during and after the first Gul f War.Released on the eve of the second war in the G ul f, the book recei ved considerab le critical attention and Swofford appeared in several interv iews w ith the popular press during the spring of 2003.During the summer of 2003 , disC/osure was fortunate to catch Swofford giving a reading from Jarhead at Lexington' s Joseph Beth Bookstore.After severa l hours of gentle p leadi ng Swofford agreed to a phone interview later that month.In his interview with disClosure, Swofford d iscus cs the U.S. wa rs in the Gulf in the contexts of the emergence of globa lization the transformations of nations and national identities and the changing social and political characteristics of the sold ier.dC : Your connection w ith this issue's theme- globa lizationseem almost intuitive.You foug ht in and wrote on the first Gu lf War.Have you given much thought to the way your work addresses any sorts of g lobal as opposed to nationa l concerns?AS: When a writer in thi century decides to write about war, the issue is in tantly global.That's largely a result of the Gulf War movements toward globalizi ng warfa re.T his happened