What started as a friendly swap of Walla Walla college newspaper articles two weeks ago quickly turned into an all out battle. Despite the well-meaning effort, the swap did not go according to plan.

In order to encourage a sense of community between the two Walla Walla colleges, Whitman and Walla Walla University switched content in hopes of showing students that while the two schools are different, they actually have many similarities.

“At first, everyone seemed to love the idea,” The Wire Editor-in-Chief Mitchell Smith said. “The Editor-in-Chief of the WWU paper, ‘The Collegian,’ emailed us and said the students enjoyed reading articles written by Whitman students. Whitties told The Wire staff that they loved the WWU articles as well.”

Just as it seemed as though everything was going well, President Murray received an email from the president of WWU. The subject read “Fostering Community,” but the email was actually a declaration of war against Whitman. President Murray immediately sent an email to the student body warning people to prepare for the biggest war of the century, but no one read the email because it was sent via the student listserv.

Apparently, WWU students were disgusted by the humor section of The Wire, prompting them to stock up on automatic and nuclear weapons, and ultimately declare war. “It just wasn’t funny,” a WWU student told The Wire as she reloaded her gun. “It made me sick to my stomach, actually.”

World War Walla Walla is set to take place Oct. 18, following the beginning of the hot air balloon festival.