Interesting thing...Bierce was missing and presumed dead after going to Mexico to fight alongside Pancho Villa (in another Bierce/RMT episode "The D-mned thing", E.G. says he disappeared mysteriously), so Mr. Bierce apparently believed there were some causes worth fighting and going to war for. There are at least two other RMT episodes based on his Civil War works, "Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge", and "One of the missing".

I'm guessing that Bierce knew there were indeed some very good reasons for fighting the horrific "Civil War" (here in northwest Arkansas there were some particularly tragic battles, and (which not everyone's aware of) accompanying guerrilla campaigns that left their mark on the people of the Ozarks plateau).

On listening to this again, it does convey the sadness of war's aftermath, but I'm not sure it's an antiwar story. Without being able to convey my thoughts in more accurate terms, the moral of this story to me was: "Young man...war, like life, will usually never unfold as you fantasize it will. Know what you're getting into, and be prepared."