The most important theme of the story is the common story of all civil wars in that they often end up pitting brothers against brothers. At times it may simply be brothers in the sense that members of the same community or nation are brothers or it might also mean actual brothers.
The Irish Civil War, like any civil war, broke families apart and often forced participants to choose loyalty to their side of the war or loyalty to their family or the community that raised them.
Another aspect of the story that is highlighted is the terrible cruelty that comes about when men are convinced that their cause is more important than other people's lives. The way that the sniper kills the woman without hesitation because she's pointed out his position is an example of this. There is a strange willingness to accept when combatants like the snipers or the soldier in the armored car shoot each other but a sense of revulsion generally follows the killing of a civilian.
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