But Amelina’s book is also revelatory in other aspects. The Ukraine war, like many other contemporary hostilities, has been extensively documented not only visually — on television and social media — but also in print — books and the legacy media. Looking at Women Looking at War also challenges popular notions of courage and heroism by expanding their boundaries, their meanings. But some of the bravest acts during war, Amelina shows, can also be the ones that are committed by ordinary people who are not combatants in the conventional sense. Or should Amelina’s war and justice diary force us to take sides, in the fourth year of the Ukraine war, against warmongers and the many different kinds of conflict they bring in their wake?

Source: The Telegraph February 28, 2026 02:35 UTC