OF THE
TIMES
At the book's climax, Yossarian, deeply traumatized by Snowden's awful death, finally explains Snowden's secret to the reader: "Man was matter, that was Snowden's secret. Drop him out a window, and he'll fall. Set fire to him and he'll burn. Bury him and he'll rot, like other kinds of garbage. The spirit gone, man is garbage. That was Snowden's secret. Ripeness was all."Pondering "Snowden's secret" inspires Yossarian to act heroically - by deserting from the US military and thereby refusing to betray his friends to an insane, out-of-control bureaucracy. Yossarian's courageous act of desertion, inspired by the spilled guts of Snowden, ends the novel on an upbeat note of endless possibility.
"A government which will turn its tanks upon its people, for any reason, is a government with a taste of blood and a thirst for power and must either be smartly rebuked, or blindly obeyed in deadly fear." - John Salter
Comment: So here we have evidence of Kiev using airplanes to bomb its own people. This is the so-called "red line" that were invoked so many times in the past by the US government to justify its invasions of other countries. Yet, we can almost be certain that in this case, not a single word of condemnation will be heard from Western government and the mainstream media.