Lycanthropes in War

[Ganthan]

I finally saw X Men Origins: Wolverine, and the credit montage at the start of Logan and Victor fighting through The Civil War, World War One, World War Two and Vietnam was, in my opinion, the best part of the movie. And, since the strips are going into the dark side of lycanthrope history, I thought I'd ask a few questions regarding weres having fought in wars.

I can easily understand how enlisting as a soldier would be a promising career choice if you're superhumanly strong/fast and can heal from nearly any injury in minutes, but I can also see how getting up good as new after a point blank grenade blast would risk the Secret. I imagine governments would be all too eager to employ such people in their military and do what they can to cater to them? In fact, have there been any All Were combat squads in recent history?

It also seems like it would be easy to accidentally create thralls during war if lycanthrope soldiers get a little too feral in hand to hand fights. Also, while I know nobody really likes to talk about this, with war and conquest you get rape. Given the old fashioned ways of "Find out for yourself or die," just how much was lycanthropy spread by worked up weres who either didn't know or didn't care that sex can transmit it? If you really want to get dark with it, they could potentially get away with it if they made sure to kill the victim afterwards.

[Kris@WLP]

Before the Enlightenment, and the discrediting of belief in werewolves this brought, weres in armies were practically nonexistent. The vast, VAST majority of lycanthropes avoided military service for pretty much the same reasons you just listed, boiling down to, "good way to be outed and then killed." There were, however, exceptions, and thereby incidents, and thereby yet more stories to keep the werewolf hunters busy.

Lycanthropes returned to the battlefield in a big way with the rise of patriotism and nationalism, beginning more or less with the American Revolution. Early on the weres remained extremely careful to keep their nature secret, and for the most part this was easy enough. Only with the advent of modern bureaucracy, basically the rise of Bismark's Prussia, did governments have a way of identifying and tracking lycanthropes.

Only a few attempts have ever been made to create secret all-were forces, most notably Hitler's Operation Werewulf. They generally failed for the same reason: lycanthropes, being natually distrustful of governments and more independent than most people, could not be relied upon to maintain discipline and obedience if given orders contrary to their personal interests. Totalitarian governments had this problem more than democracies, but they all encountered it. (Yes, even America- especially after the Colorado Experiments became common knowledge among werekind.)

For obvious reasons there is no evidence or open knowledge, even among lycanthropes, of were special forces. The consensus of rumor, however, suggests that in the current day and age the only nation that maintains a were special unit is Israel- specifically, as a part of Mossad. American lycanthropes are strongly urged by their peers to serve, if they feel they must, only one enlistment- careerism is STRONGLY discouraged. Those weres who feel the need to use their regenerative abilities for the good of others are encouraged, pointedly, to join the police, fire department, or coast guard instead.

[Happygun]

[Kris@WLP]

[Happygun]

I'm assuming short jokes and wererats go about as well as cougar jokes with werecougars, bitch jokes with werewolves, and picnic basket jokes with werebears (not that ANYONE would have the guts). So...THAT'S the real reason lycanthrope variants usually don't mix - they can't resist making specist jokes about their counterparts!