Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
After action interviews with upwards of a hundred rifle companies and many patrols and platoons that have engaged independently in Vietnam, to learn what mad it successful or a failure. Every action was reconstructed in the fullest possible detail, including the logistical and intelligence data, employment of weapons, timing and placement of battle losses in the unit, location of wounds, etc. What is said herein of the enemy derives in whole from what officers and men who have fought him in battle learned and reported out of their experience. Nothing has been taken from any intelligence document circulated to the United States Army. The document therefore is in itself evidence of the great store of information about the Viet Cong that can be tapped by talking with men of our combat line, all of which knowledge lies waste unless someone makes the effort. The briefing actions at the company level generally took less than one hour. The longest lasted two days and more. The average ran about three and one-half hours. To reconstruct a fight over that span of time required from seven to eight hours of steady interrogation.
Soon after engagement, any combat unit commander can do this same thing: group interview his men until he knows all that happened to them during the fire fight. In their interest, in his own interest, and for the good of the Army he cannot afford to do less. There is no particular art to the work; so long as exact chronology is maintained in developing the story of the action, and so long as his men feel confident that he seeks nothing from them but the truth, the whole truth, then the needed results will come. Every division and every independent brigade in Vietnam has at least one combat historian. He is charged with conducting this kind of research; he can also assist and advise any unit commander who would like to know how to do it on his own.
Special rewards come to the unit commander who will make the try. Nothing else will give him a closer bond with his men. Not until he does it will he truly know what they did under fire. Just as the combat critique is a powerful stimulant of unit morale, having all the warming effect of a good cocktail on an empty stomach, and even as it strengthens each Soldier's appreciation of his fellows, it enables troops to understand for the first time the multitudinous problems and pressures on the commander. They will go all the better for him the next time out and he will have a much clearer view of his human resources. Combat does have a way of separating the men from the boys; but on the other hand the boys want to be classed with the men, and influence of a number of shining examples in their midst does accelerate the maturing process. The seasoning of a combat outfit comes fundamentally from men working together under stress growing in knowledge of one another. Continue reading the whole piece.......
