Dulce et decorum est . . .

May I let Wilfred Owen speak for me?

Dulce Et Decorum Est

"Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas shells dropping softly behind.
Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . .
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.


In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, -
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori."

My Latin must be really rusty because I thought it meant "Always wear a bib when eating an Italian dessert."

It's hard for me to put myelf into the mind of a soldier, because I would never be one, precisely because they are expected to blindly follow orders. I am certain that many who are out there now feel that they are fighting a good cause. When the living came back from Vietnam, and were ridiculed and denigrated for participating in what was considered an unjust war, it is understandable that a common response was "You don't know, you weren't there."

I wonder, if the boys indeed do come home from Iraq, if society will simply feel sorry for them, and I'm not quite sure what's worse: derision or pity.

If you wanna feel sorry for someone Cav, feel sorry for Mrs Betty Jones of 134 Mulberry Str in anytown USA who has to deal with the fact that her only son is returning from Iraq in pieces in a body bag. Oh, and he's the 600th soldier killed so far in a video game war that unfortunately is all too real.

Sorry Set. Cav introduced the word Iraq and I couldn't help myself.

No, I'm sorry panzade, if I was unclear. My point was that I would never ridicule or pity a soldier. They are a far braver lot than me. However, I was alluding to the fact that in order for a soldier to function, they must be able to blindly follow orders. It disgusts me that society blames the soldiers for the wars, video game modern war or just the old-fashioned type, and not the shirking of responsibility for these boys lives on the government's end by sending them out to war under dubious moral reasons. I hope that clears it up.

Re: Dulce et decorum est . . .



If you really do love your country and are willing to sacrifice your life to help protect you and your countries beliefs, ways of life, and loved ones, death is proud. I would never go so far as to call it sweet, but the fighter can have a fulfilled sense of duty.

However, for a catch-22 kind of situation, in which a soldier is conscripted but is indifferent to or even in disagreement with the cause for which he is fighting, the only sweet thing you can offer that person is getting out of the military. Or you can distract them, with offerings of exotic travel, life experience, and job perks.

Thoughtful post Portal, and Cav...yes. You're as clear as the azure sky.

Most certainly we are obligated to send people to do harm or be harmed only when we are convinced it is somehow necessary and right to do so!

The problem is knowing when and if this is so, especially for we naked apes, beset as we all are by partisanship, wilful and unwilled denial, prejudice, forward blindness and backwards clarity, emotions of all sorts and strengths, confusion and stupidity.

I cannot imagine how awful must be the experience of anyone with a real ethical sense and unblunted sensibilities and a proper commitment to compassion whose job it is to assist in and make such a decision.

Do we not say - as at Nuremburg - that there is a limit to orders which must and should be obeyed, though? Or is that a standard to which we hold only defeated enemies?

The problem really is about the motivation of the leadership who send people to war without proper facts regarding the mission. We absolutely need a military to protect us, but when it is misused, it is a serious problem, and a huge waste of money.

As for the Nuremburg reference, yes, I do think that soldiers with conscience should have the right to question orders they think are unjust, without punishment. However, what kind of army would that be?

truth
I am willing to acknowledge, with Hitler in mind, that sometimes the sacrifice of our young is warranted, but it is never a sweet event. It is a horrendous lesser of evils. I wonder what percentage of wars in history were "just" wars. It is probably VERY small, in the single digits, and this applies to the defenders, not the aggressors. It is horrible to think that most wars have been expressions of kings' ambitions and ego needs, or the interests of economic classes and blind chauvinists. I have never had to go to war (too young for Korea and too old for Viet Nam, and 4F for both), my only experience with the military was as director of a USO club in a major city during the Viet Nam Holocaust. I recall the apparance of numbness of young men about to be swept into Hell. I tried to get some to talk about their experience. Most typically they were very repressed, not wanting to face their emotions. It was SO sad, but sadder still was the number of young men who died. I made the mistake of getting to know them. There should be a special place in Hell for autocrats who send young people to die for reasons they do not really understand or causes they do not really share, except at the level of jingoism and the fear of being branded cowards. War is both Hell and Sin. Consider Philip Wylie's discussion of Momism.

My thanks to all who have so far offered their thoughtful consideration of this troublesome subject. Especially, i want to take notice of Our Dear Wabbit's excellent exposition of the jostling mix of competing emotions which in the aggregate account for what are often inchoate decisions to back a nation's leadership in leading a drive to war.

The Hobit has often pointedly remarked that history is more than just the study of kings and battles--and how true that is. At the same time, my focus for all of the decades of my reading in history (and i consider myself a student, not an historian) has been whence derives the societies and the polities of which we are a part. This has meant that i've read a great deal on the subjects of kings and battles, as well as of republican magistrates and battles.

Friederich II von Hohenzollern, known to history as Frederick the Great (although he preferred and signed his name Fédéric--he preferred French to German), before ever he came to the throne wrote a political testament which is generally known as the Anti-Machiavel--his life-long correspondent, Voltaire, acted as a sounding board in and casual editor in preparing the book. In this work, he reviews the duties of the Prince in respect to his people. While he would obviously have had the then precarious position of Prussian in mind, he nevertheless made a genuine and largely successful effort to speak in terms of a standard for the discharge of the principiate duty to the state. An important conclusion to which he came was that the Prince in a vulnerable state (which Prussia was) had a duty to not only assure the military protection of the state, but given the vulnerability of the state, to launch pre-emptive war to seize the initiative, and afford the best protection, as well as assuring that war were not waged in the homeland, or at least, the homeland be spared the worst ravages of war. He followed his own dicta, and when his father died, within months he invaded the counties which comprise Silesia, alleging that the Austrians had illegally seized land traditionally in the gift of the House of Brandenburg, and coerced Prussian acquiescence (and he would have had a good case in court). Maria Theresa, whose father had died within a month of Frederick's, and who was deserted by every ally, except the Hungarians (who reconciled their difficulty in accepting a female ruler by referring to her as the King of Hungardy, and shouting vivat Rex!), was to spend the next twenty years trying to get it back at every opportunity.

For all of his undeniably great intellect, Frederick was no hypocrit in this matter of going in harm's way. (And incidentally, he is probably the most intelligent monarch in European history, with the single arguable exception of Christina of Sweden, who convinced René Descartes to reside for several years in Stockholm, so that they could arise and meet before dawn to study and debate, before she began her round of ceremonial duties as head of state.) To his soldiers, he became Alter Fritz--he was one of them, and they were life-long companions to go in harm's way. When he slapped them on the back with the flat of his sword, urging them forward while asking if they expected to live forever, they knew he would be there with them, to the bitter end if ever it came. Like George Washington, he lead some kind of charmed life, and was never touched, although his coat would frequently be cut by bullets. So how does one account for him, someone who arguably always sought peace, when first he had discharged his duty to the Brandenbergers and Prussians as he conceived it, and sought no more than he considered was due his house and his people? This is not an example of old men sending young men to die. There are a host of reasons to consider him as a Great Man (and he commented that to his mind, Maria Theresa was the greatest of the "Great Men" of their age), and especially his constant and genuine concern for the welfare of his people first, his soldiers thereafter, and the common soldier of the enemy after them. If any of these musings make sense to any of you, how are we to account for the examples of those who sought war to assure peace, those who did not sit in an richly furnished "war room" while the salt of earth were liberally plowed into that earth, but went in harm's way, and, often, the foremost among front rank of their nation's armies?

I can't speak for other countries but in the US Military they do have that right. The oath they swear to is to obey all LAWFUL orders and they are specifically prohibited from violating things like the Geneva Conventions. They are all supposed to be briefed on all of this at least annually as a part of their "Law of Armed Conflict" training.

Some obviously, will feel pressure NOT to ask. Some won't know what to ask (sometimes through fault of their own, sometimes through fault of others..).

Once given the proper authorative reference they are expected to follow the orders however.

Actually, an officer can theoretically order an action, which, in the character of a direct order, must be obeyed, and can only be subject to a posteriori protest. Noncommission officers can only issue lawful orders, as Fishin' explains. In fact, with the likely exception of the authority to marry people, general officers inhabit a realm of authority in a combat zone equivalent to the "life-and-death" power of an 18th century ship's captain at sea. This attitude of the place of command within the military structure is ubiquitous and demonstrable throughout the history of warfare. In the Confederate States Army, as was the case in the Continental Line, there was a single insignia for officers of General rank, whether Brigadier, Major General, Lieutenant General or General. The issues of authority are beyond the moral and legal palings of the ordinary run of mortals, and only other general officers may question authority, with jealous "turf-wars" leading to disasters more commonly in history than i have the life in me to recount. Any common foot soldier who were to challenge that authority in a war zone would as likely be dead for his effort, regardless of whatever eventual judgment of justice of his objections resulted, as any other result. Of course, general officers don't usually do the shooting themselves . . .