Catch-22
Essay Preview: Catch-22
Report this essay
Milo’s business affairs take a darker turn when he starts to organize contracts with the German’s to shoot down American planes. When Yossarian confronts him about the deal he’s made with the enemy his simple response is that he “just saw a wonderful opportunity to make some profit out of the mission, and took it. What’s so horrible about that?” (255). He doesn’t see the error in his ways because in the end the money he received for his deal went to the syndicate and that is seen as profitable to all. His lack of morals or understanding what is right from wrong is shown once again when he makes another deal with the Germans to bomb his own squadron. His own men are killed and hurt and it is realized that his business ventures and the syndicate have spun out of control. Milo has no regard for the people they are fighting that he is doing business with or the people he is supposed to be fighting with he is just looking to make a profit in anyway on the war and bombing his own squadron causes people to react to his immoral actions:
This time Milo had gone too far. Bombing his own men and planes was more than even the most phlegmatic observer could stomach, and it looked like the end for him. High-ranking government officials poured in to investigate. Newspapers inveighed against Milo with glaring headlines, and Congressmen denounced the atrocity in stentorian wrath and clamored for punishment. Mothers with children in the service organized into militant groups and demanded revenge. Not once voice was raised in his defense. Decent people everywhere were affronted, and Milo was all washed up until he opened his books to the public and disclosed the tremendous profit he had made. (259)
Once he tells the Americans that he did it for a good price and they would benefit in a way, they agree and fail to punish him for his destructive actions showing the corruption the idea of