This take just baffles me… you can disapprove of a war, and still respect people willing to put their life on the line for something they believe is right. Even in war, opposing sides have a long history of showing their enemy a certain amount of personal respect, even though they clearly disagree about something to the point of killing each other over it.
Your take is just condescending and unempathetic. You can respect someone for sacrificing themselves without agreeing with them about what they’re sacrificing themselves for. Regardless, it shouldn’t be hard to see how someone fighting to depose an infamously brutal dictator (Iraq) or a fundamentalist regime that stones women for wanting a divorce (Afghanistan) can believe that they are doing something good.
Very dense, yes, but stuff can be very dense and have low viscosity at the same time. Lava has a viscosity similar to peanut butter is what I’ve heard. You can push stuff down into it, it just requires some force to prevent the stuff from floating back to the top.
You could in principle walk on lava, either by moving quickly enough that you stay on top, or by protecting your legs enough that you could sink in maybe around knee deep where you would float.