In the novel trilogy “Officers and Gentlemen” (“Sword of Honour”, 1952–1961), the English writer Evelyn Waugh, known for his penchant for delivering murderously ironic verdicts not only on individual characters, but also on entire classes, turns a merciless satirical look at beauty and the pride of Britain is its army. Tracing the fate of lieutenant and later captain Guy Crouchback, who served in the Royal Halberdier Corps during the Second World War, the author debunks the sovereign myth about the military as “empire builders.” The protagonist’s naive admiration for “armed men” and his lofty dreams of valor, exploits and service to the fatherland little by little give way to acute disappointment, which ends with the “unconditional surrender” of Crouchback’s former romantic ideals in the face of the ugly reality of the decrepit military machine of “good old England.” with its bureaucracy, careerism, veneration and corruption, stupidity, pompousness, cowardice and sometimes senseless cruelty...