They had the guts to do it when no one else would. -Matt to his daughter
America is NOT the greatest nation in the world. Yes. We lead the world in some things. Per capita, we have the highest percentage of our citizens in jail. We lead the world in that respect.
Respect. We have that too; because we are the mightiest. Not the most moral. The mightiest. Smaller countries look to us for salvation. People question our nation. They should. But they should never question America’s fighting men. They are the Boy Scouts of America. The youth breed to fight. They know nothing greater than loyalty. They lay their very lives upon it. Like everyone, they wish only to serve a good greater than themselves. Unfortunately, the majority of wars fall under this general definition, the best I’ve seen.
"War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which profits are reckoned in dollars and losses in lives. A racket is best described as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small ‘inside’ group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few, at the expense of the very many. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes."
-Smedley Bulter 1935
Now that I have shown an aged fighting man’s misgivings for war, I will show the opposite. The East India company’s foray forming a Muslim/Hindi army. The Scottish highlanders fearing not for shot or artillery to save women & childen in 1858. The HMS Battleaxe docking in Jacksonville in 1982 & meeting the British Marines who upon serving the warmest, worst ale I’ve drunk in my life ran off to the throngs of (English accent please) “fire drill, fire drill, fire drill, fi-are, fi-are fi-are,” letting me know that bringing back their little ones Mickey Mouse ‘anything’ was foremost in their minds, told me theirs was a nation of people behind the Newsweek cover
Who once had the audacity to sail to unknown shores and unknowingly plant the staff of
into shifting sands, into which the Outer Banks didn’t exist in the times of Columbus, makes me marvel. All that makes me realize in my youth, if I’d have understood what stood before me, I’d never have accomplished it.
