1600's, and so forth, millions of draft-age men did leave their nations in order not to kill, in order not to be a soldier, not to battle in countless killings. The clearest example are the many thousands of Germans such as the Mennonites and Brethren who immigrated to the United States in the 19th century and before to escape the endless political and religious wars which devastated Europe year after year, century after century.

A perceptive secular thinker on the Internet, Keith Parsons, has spoken to this several days ago on the blog, Secular Outpost, in relation to those who are vandalizing or taking down statues to Confederate soldiers:
"I was born in Macon, Georgia in 1952, the fourth generation of the Parsons family to be born in Georgia. Myinstitution” that inspired him to face shot and shell?

"I don’t think so. Consider a parallel case: Did the average Russian of the Great Patriotic War fight for Stalin? Did he fight for Communism and for the ultimate victory of Marxism/Leninism?

"No, he fought because the Germans had invaded his country. He fought because he hated the invading enemy, whatever he thought of Marxist theory, if he thought about it at all.
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"Except for Gettysburg, practically all of the major Civil War battles were fought in the southern or border states. For the southern soldier, it truly was The War of Yankee Aggression.

"So, my bet is that my ancestors fought because they felt a threat to their homeland.

" The despised Yankees had marched onto sacred southern soil and had to be