“War made the state,” said the political scientist Charles Tilly, “and the state made war.” Tilly was talking about actual states, but the same could be said about metaphorical states: states of mind, or perhaps of the soul.

Capture of the SS Mayaguez

On May 12, 1975, a military swift boat commanded by the Khmer Rouge captured the U.S. container ship Mayaguez off the Cambodian coast.