European Resistance Archive/European Resistance Archive (ERA)

where one had to consider the potential betrayal of the locals.

That is, elsewhere, the Home Guard and their informants were lurking. There was none of that in the Primorje area.

I never came across a single Slovenian enemy, dead or alive.

So I realize I have a somewhat idealized conception.

Nonetheless, it was genuine, the idealization that a war could unfold such a beautiful humanity,

if I may say so, because war is far from beautiful.

It is true though that as a poet it was hard for me to choose death, even the enemy’s.

This is also why I selected tasks which were far more hazardous than being in the brigade.

However, it was less imperative in the tasks I chose to have to kill someone standing before me, even the enemy.

I have always tried to live my life with as little death as possible, even with regard to the Germans.

Killing, even in the name of great ideals, will ultimately come back to you later in form of a trauma.