Bombing, particularly from the perspective of the receiving end

Host: The desert night was a wound of silence stretched beneath a bruised sky. The air smelled of smoke, metal, and something older — a scent that lingered long after the last explosion, when even the wind forgot how to move softly. In the distance, faint fires flickered across the horizon, their glow dimming into the endless black.

In the shadow of a half-collapsed building, Jack sat on a broken crate, his hands streaked with dust and dried blood. He stared at what used to be a radio, the wires curled and burnt. Beside him, Jeeny approached slowly, her boots crunching on scattered debris. She wore a torn jacket, her eyes steady but tired — the kind of tired that sinks into the soul, not the body.

For a moment, neither spoke. The world didn’t seem to have room for words.

Then Jeeny’s voice broke through the smoke.

Jeeny: “H. R. McMaster said once, ‘Bombing, particularly from the perspective of the receiving end, is not communication. Bombs result in death and destruction.’”

Jack: (Dryly.) “Yeah. But it sure as hell sends a message.”

Host: The wind carried the faint echo of sirens — far away, fading, as if even rescue had given up. Jeeny sat down beside him, brushing dust from a concrete slab before resting her hands on her knees.

Jeeny: “That’s the tragedy, Jack. It feels like communication to the sender. They think destruction equals persuasion. But on the other side, all that’s heard is silence — the kind that screams.”

Jack: “You’re talking philosophy. But when you’re the one holding the trigger, philosophy’s a luxury. War’s not about messages; it’s about math. Numbers, targets, probabilities. Who gets hit, who doesn’t.”

Jeeny: (Shaking her head.) “That’s what makes it monstrous. The illusion that precision erases pain. That distance sterilizes guilt.”

Jack: (Turning to her, his eyes sharp.) “You think I don’t know pain? I’ve seen what bombs do. I’ve smelled it. I’ve carried it.”

Jeeny: “Then why still defend it?”

Jack: “Because sometimes it’s the only language people understand.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. It’s the only language we refuse to stop speaking.”

Host: The flames nearby crackled softly, each pop a punctuation to their argument. The moonlight glinted off a shard of glass, reflecting Jeeny’s face — serene yet fierce, like someone who’d learned compassion not from comfort but from chaos.

Jeeny: “Communication means understanding, doesn’t it? Bombing doesn’t seek to understand. It silences. It decides. It ends the conversation before it begins.”

Jack: “You’re thinking too idealistically. You can’t talk a tyrant out of tyranny. Some people only listen when they’re forced to.”

Jeeny: “And others never listen again after you’ve destroyed their home.”

Host: A long pause stretched between them. The night held its breath. Somewhere, a dog barked, lonely and persistent.

Jack: “I once thought like you. I thought wars were about winning hearts, freeing people, teaching peace through strength. Then I watched a six-year-old boy crawl out from under the rubble of a bakery. He didn’t look grateful. He looked… blank. Like the world had spoken to him in a language he’d never learn.”

Jeeny: (Softly.) “That’s because we weren’t teaching. We were shouting.”

Jack: (Voice trembling slightly.) “You think I don’t know that now? Every explosion I see — even in memory — sounds like a word I can’t take back.”

Host: The wind shifted, carrying with it the ghostly sound of fluttering fabric — a torn flag, clinging to the remains of a wall. Its movement was rhythmic, like a pulse trying to remind the world it still had one.

Jeeny: “You once told me every mission has a message. What was the message tonight?”

Jack: (Quietly.) “That we still don’t know how to talk.”

Host: The silence that followed was heavier than gunfire. Jeeny looked out toward the horizon, where faint flashes of light marked another city, another night of “communication.”

Jeeny: “McMaster wasn’t just talking about warfare, you know. He was talking about humanity. About how we mistake domination for dialogue — whether it’s countries or people.”

Jack: “You think the two are the same?”

Jeeny: “Always. Every war starts the same way — someone stops listening.”

Host: Jack leaned forward, his hands clasped, his eyes hollow. The firelight flickered across his face, carving the lines of a man who’d seen too much to believe in salvation, but not enough to stop wanting it.

Jack: “You think empathy can survive this? You think you can look at this ruin and tell me there’s a way back to understanding?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because empathy isn’t destroyed by bombs. It hides in the rubble, waiting for someone to remember it exists.”

Jack: “You sound like a saint.”

Jeeny: “No. Just someone who’s tired of the noise.”

Host: A faint rumble rolled across the desert — distant thunder or another strike. No one could tell anymore. The stars trembled behind the smoke, as if even the sky were uncertain.

Jack: “You ever wonder if the people dropping the bombs know what it sounds like down here?”

Jeeny: “They hear the blast. But not the silence that follows. The silence where a father counts the seconds until he knows who didn’t make it.”

Jack: “Then maybe McMaster’s wrong. Maybe bombing is communication — it’s just a language that only pain understands.”

Jeeny: “That’s not communication, Jack. That’s confession. Every bomb is an admission that we’ve run out of words.”

Host: The wind howled briefly through the hollow building, scattering ash like snow. Jack stood, brushing the dust from his knees, his silhouette framed against the flickering glow of dying fire.

Jack: “You really believe words are enough? Against power, against hatred?”

Jeeny: “Not always. But bombs never are.”

Jack: (After a pause.) “Then what do we do?”

Jeeny: (Looking up at him, her voice trembling like the flame.) “We speak. Even when no one listens. We rebuild. Even when it feels pointless. Because silence might be the only thing louder than destruction.”

Host: The flames beside them dimmed to embers. The sky, bruised and vast, seemed to lean closer, listening to their fragile defiance.

Jack looked at Jeeny — and for the first time, something human flickered back into his eyes. Not hope, not yet, but recognition — the first step toward it.

Jack: “You know what I miss most? Before the bombs? The sound of conversation. The kind that didn’t need to win — just to be heard.”

Jeeny: (Smiling faintly.) “Then maybe that’s how we start again.”

Host: The night grew quiet. Somewhere far off, a city still burned — but here, in the ruins, two voices remained, small but unbroken.

The camera would pull back now — revealing them as tiny figures in a landscape too vast for victory, but just big enough for redemption.

And as the wind carried their words into the darkness, one truth lingered, fragile but unyielding:

that violence never speaks,
it only echoes.