Quote 7
This is what they've been doing. Taking the fundamental ideas behind Gale's traps and adapting them into weapons against humans. Bombs mostly. It's less about the mechanics of the traps than the psychology behind them. […] Gale and Beetee left the wilderness behind and focused on more human impulses. Like compassion. A bomb explodes. Time is allowed for people to rush to the aid of the wounded. Then a second, more powerful bomb kills them as well.
"That seems to be crossing some kind of line," I say. (13.41-42)
Katniss recognizes here that, in some regards, what her side is doing is no different from what the other side in the war is doing. Both are losing sight of compassion and morality in their attempts to win the war. Katniss is shocked to witness such deliberate cruelty and planning, and to realize it comes from people she loves and respects.
Quote 8
Someone joins me, his body tense. Finnick, of course. Because only a victor would see what I see so immediately. The arena. Laced with pods controlled by Gamemakers. Finnick's fingers caress a steady red glow over a doorway. "Ladies and gentlemen..."
His voice is quiet, but mine rings through the room. "Let the Seventy-sixth Hunger Games begin!" (18.15-16)
They might be in a middle of war, but that's what Katniss and Finnick have already been subjected to, over and over. Only being in the prior Games could have prepared them to see this war for what it is: another "arena." The Gamemakers they feared so much in the previous sets of Games have reappeared. They are, in some senses, right back where they started.
Quote 9
However, the true atrocities, the most frightening, incorporate a perverse psychological twist designed to terrify the victim. […] The smell of Snow's roses mixed with the victims' blood. Carried across the sewer. Cutting through even this foulness. Making my heart run wild, my skin turn to ice, my lungs unable to suck air. It's as if Snow's breathing right in my face, telling me it's time to die. (22.46)
What kind of war are Katniss and the others fighting, when their opponents are so cruel and inhumane? The kinds of "atrocities" they face are stunning. In their context, it's a little more understandable how someone like Gale could be pushed into devising inhumane traps himself.