The remains of Paul Baumer's company had moved behind the German front
             lines for a short rest at the beginning of the novel. After Behm became
             Paul's first dead schoolmate, Paul viewed the older generation bitterly,
             particularly Kantorek, the teacher who convinced Paul and his classmates to
             join the military, feeling alone and betrayed in the world that they had
             left for him. Paul's generation felt empty and isolated from the rest of
             the world due to the fact that they had never truly established any part of
             themselves in civilian life. At boot camp, Himmelstoss abused Paul and his
             friends, yet the harassment only brought them closer together and developed
             a strong spirit amongst them. Katczinsky, or Kat, was soon shown to be a
             master scavenger, being able to provide the group with food or virtually
             anything else; on this basis Paul and him grew quite close. Paul's unit
             was assigned to lay barbed wire on the front line, and a sudden shelling
             resulted in the severe wounding of a recruit that Paul had comforted
             earlier. Paul and Kat again strongly questioned the War. After Paul's
             company were returned to the huts behind the lines, Himmelstoss appeared
             and was insulted by some of the members of Paul's unit, who were then only
             mildly punished. During a bloody battle, 120 of the men in Paul's unit were
             killed. Paul was given leave and returned home only to find himself very
             distant from his family as a result of the war. He left in agony knowing
             that his youth was lost forever. Before returning to his unit, Paul spent
             a little while at a military camp where he viewed a Russian prisoner of war
             camp with severe starvation problems and again questioned the values that
             he had grown up with contrasted to the values while fighting the war.
             After Paul returned to his unit, they were sent to the front. During an
             attack, Paul killed a French soldier. After discovering that this sold
             ...