Some of the new technology that they got were tanks, machine guns, chemical gas, and trench warfare. These three were also the most dangerous. The new technology led to even more deaths, some of which were their own. It made fighting the war a lot easier but in the end led to more tragedies then wins.
Early on in the story the characters were excited about going to war. They thought it would be grand and they would look like heroes. After about ten weeks in training and being on the western front for a few weeks they realized that war was not as spectacular as they were told and thought it would be. Once they got deep into the war they began to ignore all of their feelings as tragedy struck them hard. The characters that survived towards the end of the book had a hard time returning to their everyday lives that they once lived. The things that they saw and losing people that they were really close to took a huge toll on them. Throughout the book the characters lost people who they had been friends with forever. .
The book uses a lot of symbolism but the three main ones are Kemmerich's boots, butterflies, and horses. The boots show the insignificance of a lost life. Throughout the story the boots are passed along from man to man, after one dies another person inherits the boots. They do not pay attention to the person dead in the boots all they want is a nice pair of boots that will not rub their heels and that keep water out as much as possible. The butterfly is a symbol for the good things in life, that even though there is death and sadness all around them the butterfly is the one thing that reminds them that there are still good things in the world around them. He also uses a horse as a symbol. The horses showed how terrible the war was really by them being gassed and slowly dying. The book has a huge amount of historical context. It tells people what really happened in the war. How people were basically tricked into thinking war was a great and heroic thing, then they would get there and wonder why they signed up.
