Jünger arrives near the front at Bazancourt and sees his first artillery shell burst in the December sky.

An artillery shell strikes the nearby chateau, killing 13 men and visibly blunting the soldiers' enthusiasm for war.

Jünger is wounded by shrapnel in the leg during his first battle at Les Éparges and is evacuated.

After officer school at Döberitz in Germany, Jünger returns to the front as an ensign.

Jünger is ordered into no man's land on multiple nights to eavesdrop on enemy trenches before the Somme offensive.

Jünger's regiment is shipped to the ruined village of Guillemont at the heart of the Battle of the Somme.

Jünger is wounded by shrapnel in Guillemont village after being relieved from the front line.

Jünger learns that his entire regiment, save one survivor, was wiped out when their Guillemont position was overrun.

Jünger is shot through both legs by a sniper during night reconnaissance near Gonnelieu.

Jünger's rehearsed raid on French trenches near Regniéville collapses into chaos, with only 4 of 14 men returning.

Jünger's old friend Tebbe is shot through the head and killed during the Battle of Cambrai.

After a massive German artillery barrage, Jünger and his men storm forward in the great battle offensive.

Jünger is shot through the chest and then wounded in the head during the final assault near Favreuil.

Surrounded by British forces, Jünger's men carry him through enemy fire to a dressing station.

After recovering in Germany, Jünger receives the Pour le Mérite from the Kaiser himself.

Ernst Jünger arrives on the Western Front as an eager 19-year-old volunteer and quickly experiences the brutal reality of artillery and trench warfare. After his first wounding at Les Éparges, he returns as an officer and faces the catastrophic destruction of the Battle of the Somme at Guillemont. A series of wounds and recoveries punctuate his service, with each return to the front finding the war more devastating and the German position more desperate. He leads men through failed raids, major offensives, and the loss of his closest friends, including the sudden death of his longtime companion Tebbe. As the great battle offensive marks the beginning of the end, Jünger is twice wounded in the final assault and carried to safety by his own men. The memoir closes with Jünger receiving Germany's highest honor from the Kaiser, though the war itself continues without him.

The decisive battles and wounds that defined Jünger's war.

At the Recouvrence training course, Jünger and fellow soldiers revert to heavy drinking and student pranks.

Jünger's regiment is billeted in Belgium, where local civilians warmly welcome them with coffee and home-cooked meals.

During his first battle, Jünger stumbles at night upon dozens of unburied French corpses that are months old.

Jünger gets drunk one evening and wanders lost near the trenches, narrowly avoiding being shot by his own side.

A soldier who stutters is shot at by the enemy because he cannot get out the password in time.

A stray bomb kills a little girl who had been digging for scraps in a garden pit near the front.

A German airplane shoots down a British observation balloon while Jünger watches during the retreat from the Somme.

Retreating German forces poison wells, booby-trap roads with buried shells, and blow up the last bridge over the Somme.

During the defense of the Rattenburg, Jünger draws his weapon and orders unwilling soldiers to fight at gunpoint.

Jünger and NCO Kloppmann decide on a whim to enter French trenches for prisoners but are driven back under fire.

Jünger calms a frightened orphan girl during an artillery attack in Roeselare by turning on his flashlight.

Hundreds of British soldiers surrender to Jünger's men, and Jünger speaks cordially with their wounded officer.

Back near Vraucourt, Jünger surveys the ruins and openly questions whether his purpose in fighting still holds.

Both sides are struck by Spanish influenza at the front, and British troops break into the trenches.

New Zealand troops force Jünger's depleted men into a deadly bottleneck, compelling the Germans to retreat.

Away from the main battles, Jünger's war is shaped by moments of dark comedy, unexpected kindness, and the grinding misery of trench life. Early reprieves in Belgium and at Recouvrence show the bonds soldiers forge during brief stretches of peace, while diary entries reveal the absurdity and terror of daily existence near the front. Civilians caught in the war's path — welcoming Belgian families, a little girl killed by a stray bomb, a frightened orphan girl in Roeselare — appear as reminders of what the fighting destroys. The retreating German army's scorched-earth tactics and Jünger's increasingly desperate defensive actions show how the war's balance shifts irreversibly. By the final chapters, Jünger surveys ruined landscapes and questions his own motivations, as understrengthed German units are overwhelmed by New Zealand and British forces. These secondary events build the texture of a war that consumes everything — soldiers, civilians, and the land itself.

The smaller moments of camaraderie, chaos, and civilian life that shaped the war's texture.

Jünger's initial excitement about war is shattered by forced marches and the sight of men dying from artillery in Champagne.

Jünger is sent on a near-fatal night patrol as punishment for allowing a fellow soldier to steal his rifle.

Wounded and evacuated after Les Éparges, Jünger reflects for the first time that the war is more than a great adventure.

Jünger and an enemy commander exchange accusations of treachery in a cordial conversation, then both immediately open fire.

Jünger watches chlorine gas kill all the small animals in a trench pit and recognizes he could die the same way.

Returning to the front from a shortened furlough, Jünger is haunted by the sight of three girls carrying tennis racquets.

Jünger shoots a British soldier crossing open ground — the first time he explicitly describes killing an enemy.

Jünger discovers the bodies of Indian soldiers who had traveled thousands of miles across the sea to fight in Flanders.

During the battle at Langemarck, Jünger weakens his own defensive position by sending men to rescue his wounded brother.

Jünger and his brother have a tearful reunion on the Langemarck battlefield after both survive the fighting.

Jünger runs into Tebbe at the reserve lines before the Battle of Cambrai assault, and the two briefly exchange pleasantries.

A fearless soldier charges an enemy position in a rage during the Battle of Cambrai, inspiring Jünger's entire unit to follow.

Jünger momentarily flees in terror after an opening shell kills many of his men at the start of the great battle.

Colonel von Oppen, Jünger's commander throughout most of the war, dies of Asiatic cholera while serving in Palestine.

Before the final assault near Favreuil, Jünger tells his men that Germany cannot win but that they will stand firm.

This pool traces the emotional and psychological arc of Jünger's war through its key turning points, from his early disillusionment in Champagne to his final resignation before the last assault. Each event marks a shift in how Jünger sees himself, his enemy, or the conflict — whether it is his first recognition that war is more than adventure, or his discovery that Indian soldiers died thousands of miles from home fighting for the British cause. Acts of loyalty, such as weakening his own position to save his brother, sit alongside acts of cold pragmatism, like forcing his own men to fight at gunpoint. The deaths of close companions and trusted commanders strip away any remaining illusions about glory, and the great battle's opening terror briefly breaks even Jünger's hard-won composure. By the end, Jünger leads his men into a final assault with the full knowledge that Germany has already lost, a soldier continuing not out of hope but out of duty.

The moments of discovery and transformation that changed Jünger's understanding of war.