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."
The New Atlantis : Contemporary Islam is not known for its
engagement in the modern scientific project. But it is heir to a
legendary “Golden Age” of Arabic science frequently invoked by
commentators hoping to make Muslims and Westerners more respectful and
understanding of each other. President Obama, for instance, in his June 4, 2009 speech in Cairo, praised Muslims for their historical scientific and intellectual contributions to civilization:
It was Islam that carried the
light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe’s
Renaissance and Enlightenment. It was innovation in Muslim communities
that developed the order of algebra; our magnetic compass and tools of
navigation; our mastery of pens and printing; our understanding of how
disease spreads and how it can be healed.
Such tributes to the Arab world’s era of scientific achievement are
generally made in service of a broader political point, as they usually
precede discussion of the region’s contemporary problems. They serve as
an implicit exhortation: the great age of Arab science demonstrates that
there is no categorical or congenital barrier to tolerance,
cosmopolitanism, and advancement in the Islamic Middle East.
To anyone familiar with this Golden Age, roughly spanning the eighth through the thirteenth centuries a.d.,
the disparity between the intellectual achievements of the Middle East
then and now — particularly relative to the rest of the world — is
staggering indeed. In his 2002 book What Went Wrong?,
historian Bernard Lewis notes that “for many centuries the world of
Islam was in the forefront of human civilization and achievement.”
“Nothing in Europe,” notes Jamil Ragep,
a professor of the history of science at the University of Oklahoma,
“could hold a candle to what was going on in the Islamic world until
about 1600.” Algebra, algorithm, alchemy, alcohol, alkali, nadir,
zenith, coffee, and lemon: these words all derive from Arabic,
reflecting Islam’s contribution to the West.
Today, however, the spirit of science in the Muslim world is as dry
as the desert. Pakistani physicist Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy laid out the
grim statistics in a 2007 Physics Today article:
Muslim countries have nine scientists, engineers, and technicians per
thousand people, compared with a world average of forty-one. In these
nations, there are approximately 1,800 universities, but only 312 of
those universities have scholars who have published journal articles. Of
the fifty most-published of these universities, twenty-six are in
Turkey, nine are in Iran, three each are in Malaysia and Egypt, Pakistan
has two, and Uganda, the U.A.E., Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Kuwait, Jordan,
and Azerbaijan each have one.
