From LtGen James Mattis' talk at the Naval Academy in March of 2006 ... "Your moral crisis will hit you when you least expect it. If you don't have your moral code firmly established – it will probably be too late."
In my case, [my moral crisis came in 1991]. I came this close to murdering two people - this close. I had not slept for three days. I had wandered off as my Marines were cleaning over a battlefield we had just taken over, knocked out an artillery unit and I noticed a Marine down on all fours vomiting and two other Marines digging with their e-tools. I walked over, and a young Marine was puking his guts out. There was a lady in pieces, nude, chopped into pieces, and they were trying to bury her. And my point to you is, at that moment, I felt so murderous about what I was seeing, I could hardly see straight.
I grabbed an e-tool, helped them bury the poor girl, the innocent lady, and then got them on their way. I went over, and I sat down on the edge of a trench line where there is a ready bunker. Out of the ready bunker probably 10 minutes after I sat down, just cooling it, came two officers wearing their epaulets, obviously from that battery position. Neither one had a weapon on them, but I could have shot them easily. My Marines probably would have been quite impressed that their battalion commander had shot a couple people, and for a moment, I thought, "That girl was murdered and chopped into pieces in their battery position. I am going to kill them," and I came this close to doing it. The only thing that stopped me was I don't like living life with any regrets, and somehow my training kicked in, and they right away threw their hands up when they saw me, and so I took them prisoner. I came that close to doing it.
So whether you are ordered to do things with your 25,000-man division going into Fallujah as a major general or as a lieutenant colonel or as a lance corporal, I promise you the day will come when you are put into that situation, and it's best you go through the mental gyrations now. Know what you are going to do and, more importantly, what you are not going to do so that you never end up in a situation where you regret what you have done, because it's very hard to live with yourself for what you have done if you don't stick with your moral code. By the way, it turns out later these two officers had fled into that battery position ahead of the Marines. They had nothing to do with this girl's death. So you have got to think your way through these sorts of things, my fine young folks, because at the time you actually get there, you had better have the process in place to keep yourself morally strong. If you don't, it will probably be too late.
04 Feb 2011
From LtGen James Mattis' talk at the Naval Academy in March of 2006
... "Mentally and physically, the Academy provides a very rigorous program.
But your spiritual path is much more of your
own choosing. Just make real sure you don't dismiss this."
I'll give you an example. I was the senior U.S. negotiator when I
was ordered to pull out of Fallujah and start negotiations. I was
negotiating with people I'd rather have been shooting, to put it
bluntly, because they were the enemy. I was reminded each
morning there about this Abu Ghraib prison scandal, where we
had some people who - some toy soldiers - who brought disgrace
on the U.S. Army and the U.S. armed forces. They did not
represent the U.S. military, but because of today's media focus,
the story was constantly in the papers. Every day, I was
confronted with this by their negotiators. Now, believe me, when
you come out as a Navy or Marine officer, you have plenty of
toughness to handle some punk who tries that. In the
negotiations, we would go right back after them. But it shows the
damage that can be done to our country if one small unit, one
NCO or petty officer, incorrectly guided by his coach, by his
junior officer, is allowed to run rampant.
De Tocqueville, a Frenchman who wandered around America in
the 1830s, wrote a very telling story about our country. In there,
he said that America is going to become a great country, because
America is a good country, and if America ever ceases to be
good, she will cease to be great.
There is no one harsher about what those soldiers did in Abu
Ghraib than your fellow sailors, Marines, and soldiers on the
ground in Iraq right now. No one. There was no call for it. It
was a bunch of punks is all it was, but a lack of moral fortitude
cost our country greatly.
04 Feb 2011
I remember talking to my Marines as they were getting ready to
go into a town called Tikrit, which was Saddam's hometown. I
said, "You guys ready to go?" They said, "Oh, yeah, no sweat,
General. You go on, go back to sleep, whatever you generals do.
We'll take care of it." I said, "Okay," and they said, "We've got
this all taken care of." I said, "Okay. Why are you so
confident?" They said, "Oh, this is going to be a perfect war,
General, because we just heard that the officers are up there
talking to them about surrendering. They don't want to
surrender. They said they want to die, so it is going to be a
perfect war. They want to die. We want to kill them. Let's have
at it. It will be a good fight." I thought, "Hey, that's a good way
to look at it, you know." So they were on their way, and they're
going to go nail them. That was the bottom line.
04 Feb 2011
From LtGen James Mattis' talk at the Naval Academy in March of 2006
It comes down to the social energy of the lieutenants who are in
that company. That's what it comes down to, the social energy
that they infused in that company, and let me tell you what
happened. Let me tell you how Rich Gannon started his way
home after he was killed. That night, the company that had been
knocked back, fought their way back in, collected up what
prisoners they had, and loaded them up in a vehicle with their
hands tied. Since they couldn't afford to send many guards, there
was one Marine in the back of the truck, a lance corporal.
Remember, this was a company commander who, when I went
down to see them, I would say, "How are you guys doing?" They
would say, "Oh, great, sir. We have the best company
commander in the division." And one of these lance corporals on
a dark night now gets in the back of that Humvee with three guys
with their hands tied and the dead company commander lying on
the floor of the vehicle. When that vehicle showed up at the
battalion command post, there were still three live prisoners.
Now that's a Marine who understands that when it's time to kill,
I can kill them, and when it's time not to kill, I don't kill them.
Had the officers not set that tone properly, you can end up with
a tragedy.
04 Feb 2011
Oliver Wendell Holmes, one of the most articulate associate
justices that our Supreme Court has ever had, could not
articulate war. Yet he had been an infantry officer in the Civil
War, and he would say to his fellow veterans, "You and I have
shared the incommunicable experience of war." My fine young
midshipmen, I cannot tell you in all sorts of detail what you are
going to go into, but I can assure you of this. If you have the
strong character that you can develop through study, through
time on the athletic field, at times by going out, once you are over
21, and having a good toot with your buddies - Admiral, I won't
glamorize alcohol any further. But if you can enjoy the
challenges that are coming your way, if you can make certain that
you know, no matter what comes your way in an uncertain world,
you are sure of yourself and your moral standards, then bring
it on.
You know, there is nothing better, my fine young folks, than
getting shot at and missed. It's really great. It's more fun than
you can imagine. You know, it really feels good. So don't let the
grimness of this world get you down. Okay, it's not a perfect
world, but America is worth fighting for on its worst day. So if
you have got the guts to step across that line, as each of you have,
then just go out and enjoy the brawl. Just have a damn good
time. Train your men well. Go beat the crap out of people who
deserve it, and when they throw down their gun, then you have
won. Don't apologize to anybody for it, because your moral
standards are so high, and you will have been places that maybe
Oliver Wendell Holmes cannot define, and maybe I cannot
discuss. Maybe you won't be able to discuss it very well either,
but the bottom line is you will have gone there and come back
with your honor intact, and this experiment will move on one
more generation, thanks to you.
Ethical Challenges in Contemporary Conflict – part 4
One other thing that I would tell you is that we expect you to
come out of here at the top of your game. Now, physically, you
know what that means. We want you in good shape. You know
how to do it. Just get on with it, put in the miles, put in the time
in the weight room, that sort of thing. Mentally, you are going
through a very rigorous program. We are very happy with what
we get out of the Academy, and intellectually, we are not in the
least bit concerned. But your spiritual path is much more of your
own choosing. Just make real sure that you don't dismiss this as
something of idle interest or not that important, because with the
physical and the mental, you can aspire and kick ass. You can
sometimes put things on the spiritual level behind you, and the
problem is then that we endanger our very country.
Ethical Challenges in Contemporary Conflict – part 5
Ethical Challenges in Contemporary Conflict – part 6
There are units to me as a general, as I look across my division,
where I have got a platoon that is worth a company. Now why is
one lieutenant so different that his platoon of 40 Marines and
sailors is worth 160 to me? What happened there? I looked
across the division and saw one company that could lose its
beloved company commander, Captain Rich Gannon - some of
you may know who I am talking about - could lose him in the
middle of a fight as he goes down swinging, trying to save a
corporal's life, and both of them are machine-gunned. How could
that company eventually lose over 65 men killed and wounded
and still continue to fight as if they were undismayed by it? A
company losing 65 men out of 160. How could they do that?
Ethical Challenges in Contemporary Conflict – part 7
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Have you seen "The Caine Mutiny"? ... Humphrey Bogart is the ship's captain (LtCdr Queeg) during WWII. He is portrayed as tyrannical and paranoid. Eventually there is a crisis resulting from rough seas, and the XO (Executive Officer) assumes command. Afterward, the XO is charged with mutiny. A Navy lawyer wins an acquittal by aggressively questioning Captain Queeg on the witness stand until his paranoia is exposed. At the subsequent celebration, the lawyer "attacks the officers of the Caine for not appreciating the years of danger and hardship endured by Queeg, a career naval man, whereas the rest of them have only joined up due to the war. He then lambastes Maryk, Keith, and finally Keefer, for not supporting their captain when he most needed it and gets Maryk and Keith to admit that if they had given Queeg the support he had asked for he might not have frozen during the typhoon."
I typed "the navy is a system designed by geniuses" into Google and found a discussion about economic recovery, a more educated work force, more college graduates, white collar vs blue collar jobs, the notion of analytical skills. Someone volunteered, "Most jobs - even many mid-level white collar jobs - don't require much in the way of analytical skills. They require people who can understand and follow directions and use a bit of common sense. Remember how Herman Wouk described the U.S. Navy in The Caine Mutiny - 'a system designed by geniuses to be run by idiots'? Most big companies and other organizations are like that as well."
I think Herman Wouk was on target ... about every large organization or bureaucracy. What he is talking about is why Dilbert is so popular: people are human, and large groups of people too easily devolve into inhumanity. The letter of the law replaces the spirit of the law. Endless attempts are made to legislate morality. Fragmentation of conscience, dilution of responsibility, centralization of decision-making, standardization of thinking. A recent editorial described two opposing economic models that highlight the life-draining qualities of elites, apparatchiks, and the fruits of their labors: the private sector's animal spirit and dynamism, versus the dead hand of government bureaucrats and their unions.
Prayer from the "Navy Hymn" ... |
Lord, guard and guide the men who fly And those who on the ocean ply; Be with our soldiers on the land, And all who for their country stand: Protect these guardians day and night And may their trust be in Thy might.
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Eternal Father, grant, we pray To all Marines, both night and day, The courage, honor, strength, and skill Their land to serve, thy law fulfill; Be thou the shield forevermore From every peril to the Corps. |
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people; it is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. -- John Adams
22 Feb 2011
Bill Millin, Scottish D-Day Piper, Dies at 88
LONDON - Bill Millin, a Scottish bagpiper who played highland
tunes as his fellow commandos landed on a Normandy beach on
D-Day and lived to see his bravado immortalized in the 1962
film "The Longest Day," died on Wednesday in a hospital in
the western England county of Devon. He was 88.
The cause was complications from a stroke, his family said.
Mr. Millin was a 21-year-old private in Britain's First
Special Service Brigade when his unit landed on the strip
of coast the Allies code-named Sword Beach, near the
French city of Caen at the eastern end of the invasion
front chosen by the Allies for the landings on June 6, 1944.
By one estimate, about 4,400 Allied troops died in the first
24 hours of the landings, about two-thirds of them Americans.
The young piper was approached shortly before the landings
by the brigade's commanding officer, Brig. Simon Fraser,
who as the 15th Lord Lovat was the hereditary chief of the
Clan Fraser and one of Scotland's most celebrated aristocrats.
Against orders from World War I that forbade playing bagpipes
on the battlefield because of the high risk of attracting
enemy fire, Lord Lovat, then 32, asked Private Millin to play
on the beachhead to raise morale.
When Private Millin demurred, citing the regulations, he
recalled later, Lord Lovat replied: "Ah, but that's the English
War Office. You and I are both Scottish, and that doesn't apply."
After wading ashore in waist-high water that he said caused his
kilt to float, Private Millin reached the beach, then marched
up and down, unarmed, playing the tunes Lord Lovat had requested,
including "Highland Laddie" and "Road to the Isles."
With German troops raking the beach with artillery and
machine-gun fire, the young piper played on as his fellow
soldiers advanced through smoke and flame on the German
positions, or fell on the beach. The scene provided an
emotional high point in "The Longest Day."
In later years Mr. Millin told the BBC he did not regard
what he had done as heroic. When Lord Lovat insisted that
he play, he said, "I just said 'O.K.,' and got on with it."
He added: "I didn't notice I was being shot at. When you're
young, you do things you wouldn't dream of doing when you're
older."
He said he found out later, after meeting Germans who had
manned guns above the beach, that they didn't shoot him
"because they thought I was crazy."
Other British commandos cheered and waved, Mr. Millin recalled,
though he said he felt bad as he marched among ranks of wounded
soldiers needing medical help. But those who survived the landings
offered no reproach.
"I shall never forget hearing the skirl of Bill Millin's pipes,"
one of the commandos, Tom Duncan, said years later. "As well as
the pride we felt, it reminded us of home, and why we were
fighting there for our lives and those of our loved ones."
From the beach, Private Millin moved inland with the commandos
to relieve British paratroopers who had seized a bridge near
the village of Ouistreham that was vital to German attempts to
move reinforcements toward the beaches. As the commandos crossed
the bridge under German fire, Lord Lovat again asked Private Millin
to play his pipes.
... After the war, he worked on Lord Lovat's estate near Inverness,
but found the life too quiet and took a job as a piper with a
traveling theater company. In the late 1950s, he trained in Glasgow
as a psychiatric nurse and eventually settled in Devon, retiring in
1988. He visited the United States several times, lecturing on his
D-Day experiences.
09 Feb 2011
09 Feb 2011
With apologies to Sir Winston Churchill ...
"I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.
We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind.
We have before us many, many long months of struggle and
of [hardshp]. You ask, what is our policy? I can say:
It is to wage [growth], [in mind], [body] and [spirit],
with all our might and with all the strength that God
can give us; to wage [perseverance] against a monstrous [schedule],
never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of
human [development]. That is our policy."
"You ask, what
is our aim? I can answer in one word: victory.
Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all [adversity],
victory, however long and hard the road may be; for
without victory, there is no survival. Let that be realised;
no survival for the [individual], no survival for
all that the [Academy] has stood for,
no survival for the urge and impulse of the ages,
that mankind will move forward towards its goal.
But I take up my task with buoyancy and hope.
I feel sure that our cause will not be suffered
to fail among men. At this time I feel entitled
to claim the aid of all, and I say, 'come then,
let us go forward together with our united strength.'"
06 Feb 2011
Do you remember the scene from the movie "Patton" where the German
offensive in the Battle of the Bulge is being aided by bad weather,
and the General calls for his chaplain to produce a "weather prayer"?
In real life, that was Third Army chaplain James H. O'Neill.
Monsignor O'Neill has written an inspiring account at
link Here is
a summary.
"Chaplain, how much praying is being done in the Third Army?" [asked the
General. I responded,] "Does the General mean by chaplains, or by the
men?" "By everybody," he replied. To this I countered: "I am afraid to
admit it, but I do not believe that much praying is going on. When
there Is fighting, everyone prays, but now with this constant rain
– when things are quiet, dangerously quiet, men just sit and
wait for things to happen. Prayer out here is difficult. Both chaplains
and men are removed from a special building with a steeple. Prayer to
most of them is a formal, ritualized affair, involving special posture
and a liturgical setting. I do not believe that much praying is being done."
The General, seated at his desk, leaned back in his swivel chair,
toying with a long lead pencil between his index fingers.
"Chaplain, I am a strong believer in Prayer. There are three ways that men get what they want; by planning, by working, and by Praying. Any great military operation takes careful planning, or thinking. Then you must have well-trained troops to carry it out: that's working. But between the plan and the operation there is always an unknown. That unknown spells defeat or victory, success or failure. It is the reaction of the actors to the ordeal when it actually comes. Some people call that getting the breaks; I call it God. God has His part, or margin in everything, That's where prayer comes in. Up to now, in the Third Army, God has been very good to us. We have never retreated; we have suffered no defeats, no famine, no epidemics. This is because a lot of people back home are praying for us. We were lucky in Africa, in Sicily, and in Italy. Simply because people prayed. But we have to pray for ourselves, too. A good soldier is not made merely by making him think and work. There is something in every soldier that goes deeper than thinking or working – it's his "guts."
It is something that he has built in there: it is a world of truth
and power that is higher than himself. Great living is not all
output of thought and work. A man has to have intake as well.
I don't know what you call it, but I call it Religion, Prayer, or God."
"I wish you would put out a Training Letter on this subject of Prayer
to all the chaplains; write about nothing else, just the importance
of prayer. Let me see it before you send it. We've got to get not
only the chaplains but every man in the Third Army to pray. We must
ask God to stop these rains. These rains are that margin that hold
defeat or victory. If we all pray, it will be like what Dr. Carrel
said [the allusion was to a press quote some days previously when
Dr. Alexis Carrel, one of the foremost scientists, described prayer
'as one of the most powerful forms of energy man can generate'], it
will be like plugging in on a current whose source is in Heaven.
I believe that prayer completes that circuit. It is power."
With that the General arose from his chair, a sign that the interview
was ended. I returned to my field desk, typed Training Letter No. 5
while the "copy" was "hot," touching on some or all of the General's
reverie on Prayer, and after staff processing, presented it to
General Patton on the next day. The General read it and without
change directed that it be circulated not only to the 486 chaplains,
but to every organization commander down to and including the
regimental level. Three thousand two hundred copies were
distributed to every unit in the Third Army over my signature
as Third Army Chaplain.
Excerpts ...
"Those who pray do more for the world than those who fight; and
if the world goes from bad to worse, it is because there are more
battles than prayers. 'Hands lifted up,' said Bosuet, 'smash more
battalions than hands that strike.' Gideon of Bible fame was least
in his father's house. He came from Israel's smallest tribe. But
he was a mighty man of valor. His strength lay not in his military
might, but in his recognition of God's proper claims upon his life.
He reduced his Army from thirty-two thousand to three hundred men
lest the people of Israel would think that their valor had saved
them. We have no intention to reduce our vast striking force. But
we must urge, instruct, and indoctrinate every fighting man to
pray as well as fight. In Gideon's day, and in our own,
spiritually alert minorities carry the burdens and bring the victories."
"Urge all of your men to pray, not alone in church, but everywhere.
Pray when driving. Pray when fighting. Pray alone. Pray with others.
Pray by night and pray by day. Pray for the cessation of immoderate
rains, for good weather for Battle. Pray for the defeat of our
wicked enemy whose banner is injustice and whose good is oppression.
Pray for victory. Pray for our Army, and Pray for Peace."
My "Prayer Conference" with General Patton was 8 December.
The 250,000 copies of the Prayer Card
and Training Letter No. 5 reached the troops 12-14 December.
On the 19th of December, the Third Army turned from East to North to
meet the attack. As General Patton rushed his divisions north from
the Saar Valley to the relief of the beleaguered Bastogne, the
prayer was answered. On December 20, to the consternation of the
Germans and the delight of the American forecasters who were
equally surprised at the turn-about, the rains and the fogs ceased.
For the better part of a week came bright clear skies and perfect
flying weather. Our planes came over by tens, hundreds, and thousands.
They knocked out hundreds of tanks, killed thousands of enemy troops
in the Bastogne salient, and harried the enemy as he valiantly tried
to bring up reinforcements. The 101st Airborne, with the 4th, 9th,
and 10th Armored Divisions, which saved Bastogne, and other
divisions which assisted so valiantly in driving the Germans home,
will testify to the great support rendered by our air forces.
General Patton prayed for fair weather for battle. He got it.
It was late in January of 1945 when I saw the Army Commander again.
This was in the city of Luxembourg. He stood directly in front of me,
smiled: "Well, Padre, our prayers worked. I knew they would." Then he
cracked me on the side of my steel helmet with his riding crop.
That was his way of saying, "Well done."
The pride and power of hearth and home
by John F. Burns, New York Times, 19 Aug 2010
 [link]
The Yard in winter
The Dark Ages
The Patton Prayer
A telephone call to the Third Army Chaplain on the morning of
December 8, 1944 – "This is General Patton; do you have a good
prayer for weather? We must do something about those rains if we
are to win the war." My reply was that I know where to look for such
a prayer, that I would locate one, and report within the hour ...
The few prayer books at hand contained no formal prayer on weather
that might prove acceptable to the Army Commander. Keeping
his immediate objective in mind, I typed an original on a 5" x 3"
filing card:
[I] crossed the quadrangle of the old French military barracks,
and reported to General Patton. He read the prayer copy, returned
it to me with a very casual directive, "Have 250,000 copies printed
and see to it that every man in the Third Army gets one."
Almighty and most merciful Father, we humbly beseech Thee, of Thy
great goodness, to restrain these immoderate rains with which we
have had to contend. Grant us fair weather for Battle. Graciously
hearken to us as soldiers who call upon Thee that, armed with Thy
power, we may advance from victory to victory, and crush the
oppression and wickedness of our enemies and establish Thy justice
among men and nations.
06 Feb 2011 Alumni House – jib door Ogle Hall (aka Alumni House) is a block away from the main gate of the Naval Academy (across from the east corner of St Johns). This picture of the front of the house belies a remarkable architectural element from the early 1700s. The first floor has 4 windows and one door (not including the wing on the left) – correct? |
The 1907 room houses 3 of the 4 windows. |
And the 1923 room houses the other 2 windows. No wait ... 3 plus 2 does not equal 4! As Elmer Fudd would say, "There's something sqwuey goin' on wound here."
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Here is a jib door in the Blue Room of the White House. For more Blue Room pictures see: here there yonder
06 Feb 2011 This Old B-Hut video A wonderful take-off on "This Old House" is here ... "When you've got a contract with the government, the two places where they don't mind if you cut costs: soldier safety, and soldier comfort." |
04 Feb 2011
How far can a carrier list?
The USS Reagan conducting rudder control checks. |
The USS Nimitz in a vigorous turn to port. The USS Coral Sea was operating in the western Pacific in 1980. After a recovery cycle, the aircraft were being respotted from the bow to the stern. One of our F-4s was being backed into the aft-most starboard parking place. The ship went into a standard turn to port, it listed to starboard, and the F-4 and tractor slid over the side. The tractor driver and the plane captain riding the brakes were rescued by the alert helicopter. |
04 Feb 2011 Speak softly and carry a big stick From navy.mil several years ago. |
04 Feb 2011
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance
Sir! Fidelity is up and Obedience is down on our bayonet belt buckles, sir!2> |
04 Feb 2011
A brave arm makes a short sword long
06 Feb 2011 Bloom where you are planted
Sometimes the only difference between a budding genius and a blooming idiot is where they choose to take a stand [from a despair.com poster contest] |
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