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."
In the life of a Libyan democratic dissident, Fathi Eljahmi, who died last month after seven years of abuse in the prisons of Muammar Gaddafi, his cause written off by both the Bush and Obama State Departments, I would say there was a struggle that speaks to something universal. In the efforts of North Korean defectors to call attention to the abominations of the Kim Jong Il regime; in the efforts of Chinese dissidents to speak out; in the efforts of Russian democrats, such as Garry Kasparov, to resist the reassertion of tyranny, there is heroism, coupled with a universal aspiration for freedom from tyranny.
Lebanon's voters showed that same aspiration in a parliamentary election this past Sunday, casting their ballots to resist the sway of the Iranian-backed terrorists of Hezbollah. It will almost certainly take more than just words, or even Lebanese votes, to protect that choice against the looming probability of nuclear-armed Iranian hegemony in the Middle East, or the Muslim World, or whatever we are calling it right now.
Meanwhile, the sun shines on Obama Beach. Somewhere on the horizon, the debts rise and the threats mount. At the D-Day ceremonies, Obama told moving stories of the veterans, and the thousands upon thousands of heroes who gave their lives to win that momentous assault, 65 years ago. He told tales of the Rangers, the paratroopers, the ordinary people who found in themselves, at such places as Omaha Beach, something extraordinary.
Obama did not mention that Omaha Beach became necessary because in the years leading up to World War II, politicians preferred to look the other way, talk, appease and hope they could muddle through. The longer we continue our sojourn in the improbable world of Obama Beach, the more likely become the scenarios in which the "claims and beliefs" now competing with American democracy will turn more deadly than the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944. In full......
