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Sometimes we come across some moments in life when we are compelled to make hard choices between our roles as private individuals and as citizens with a sense of national loyalty. For instance, in the story ‘The Enemy’ Dr. Sadao and his wife Hana saw a man on his hand and knees crawling, from the verandah of their house. Sadao thought that he was perhaps a fisherman who was washed from his boat.
They came toward the man motionless with his face in the sand. An old cap stuck to his head soaked with sea water. Sadao turned the man’s head and they saw the face. They found that he was a white man. From his cap, Sadao found that he was U.S. Navy’s sailor and thus was an American prisoner of war. It was the time of the World War and America was an enemy country. The man had escaped and that is why he was wounded in the back.
Now the problem with Dr. Sadao was what to do with the man. He hated him because he belonged to an enemy country. His national loyalty demanded that the young American should be handed over to the police. Dr. Sadao also thought of throwing the man back into the sea. Dr. Sadao was a distinguished and famous surgeon. He had a tough choice.
If he turned over the wounded man over to police as a prisoner, he’ would certainly die. As a doctor, he was trained to save a human being’s life as far as he could. Dr. Sadao cared nothing for the white man because he was an American and all Americans were his enemies. Whether he should hand over the man to the police and let him be killed or as a doctor’s duty, he should save that wounded and dying human being.