I read this poem in my 4th grade English textbook:

Don't believe in war, lad
You can never win a fight
War constricts the heart, lad
A pair of boots too tight
Your mighty horses swift and true
Will be no use at all
As, exposed upon a giants palm,
Beneath musket shot you'll fall

This poem was written by the Soviet poet and songwriter Bulat Okudzhava, who had experienced war firsthand in the World War 2.

At the time I read this poem, in 4th grade, I didn't understand it at all.

My understanding of war came from watching movies and tv series, and reading children's storybooks. War was always glorified in those as some great contest of voluntary heroes.
It was only as I grew older that I came to understand the true cost of war.

I came to understand how the armies on both sides are largely made up of kids from poor and uneducated backgrounds, who're handed weapons and told to go die in the name of God and country.
I came to understand the looting, destruction, civilian massacres, mass rapes that

Always accompany war. I came to understand how war destabilizes entire regions, leaving behind a power vacuum that is often filled by extremist militant groups. How conflict rages on for years and decades without solution.

If only the ultranationalists of today always caping for war understood this. War helps no one but the ruling class. Its their power thats increased, their coffers that are filled.
For people like us, there is no gain at all.