The remains of Paul Baumer's company had moved behind the German front lines for a short rest at the beginning of the novel. After Behm became Paul's first dead schoolmate, Paul viewed the older generation bitterly, particularly Kantorek, the teacher who convinced Paul and his classmates to join the military, feeling alone and betrayed in the world that they had left for him. Paul's generation felt empty and isolated from the rest of the world due to the fact that they had never truly established any part of themselves in civilian life. At boot camp, Himmelstoss abused Paul and his friends, yet the harassment only brought them closer together and developed a strong spirit amongst them. Katczinsky, or also known as Kat, was soon shown to be a master scavenger, being able to provide the group with food or basically anything else; on this basis Paul and him grew quite close. Paul's unit was assigned to lay barbed wire on the front line, and a sudden shelling was resulted in the severe wounding of a recruit that Paul had comforted earlier. Paul and Kat again strongly questioned the War. After Paul's company were returned to the huts behind the lines, Himmelstoss appeared and was insulted by some of the members of Paul's" unit, who were then only mildly punished. .
During a bloody battle, 120 of the men in Paul's unit were killed. Paul was given leave and returned home only to find himself very distant from his family as a result of the war. He left in agony knowing that his youth was lost forever. Before returning to his unit, Paul spent a little while at a military camp where he viewed a Russian prisoner of war camp with severe starvation problems and again questioned the values that he had grown up with contrasted to the values while fighting the war. After Paul returned to his unit, they were sent to the front. .
During another vicious attack Paul killed a French soldier; he had to kill him for his own protection.
