Das boot (1981)

"He asks the young war correspondent who is travelling with them, Lt. Werner (Herbert Groenemeyer) not to snap pictures of them now, because it would shame the British to see that the people sinking their ships are mere beardless boys, who should sti...(read more)ll be at their mothers? breasts. They make him feel old, the captain confides. He feels as if he is leading a children's crusade."

"You know - we've had to imagine the war here, and we have imagined that it was being fought by aging men like ourselves. We had forgotten that the wars were fought by babies. When I saw those freshly shaved faces, it was a shock. "My God, my God - " I said to myself, "it's the Children's Crusade."' (from Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut)