SubscribeOnce a year, few are the proud who remember:
The Philadelphian who founded the Marines is buried here.
Every Nov. 10 for perhaps two decades, a simple sunrise ceremony has taken place at the unlikely site where Maj. Samuel Nicholas is buried, the Quaker meetinghouse at Fourth and Arch Streets.
It's an obscure ritual at a hardly noticed resting place - an almost-unknown tomb of a well-known soldier.
No gravestone marks the spot, and no sign or engraving commemorates his life.
The Religious Society of Friends, renowned for its pacifism, has kept the matter quiet - a remarkable feat in a city that worships history-makers.
There's not a lick of difference between the two sides, save for cultural details.Orthogonality
Whether you believe humans are innately violent and constrained only by society, or must be broken and reshaped into killing machines, the real tragedy of war is that either way, it requires that man's better nature (or nurture) must be submerged and sometimes drowned to release the killer of men necessary to the exigencies of war.To your point Burhanistan, there is not a lot of surface difference in approach to war, and I think Orthogonality touched on why in his quote above. The difference is what are they fighting for and why. Equating approaches without a discussion of the idealogies at conflict is pretty much useless. What society is the jihadist attempting to enforce through violence? and what society is the Marine trying to enforce through violence?
...a suicide bomber struck people trying to help schoolgirls trapped in a bus hit moments earlier by a roadside bomb.That does make more sense.
Tuesday's attacks happened in Palestine Street, one of the major thoroughfares in eastern Baghdad.
There's a condition in combat. Most people know about it. It's when a fighting person's nervous system has been stressed to it's absolute peak and maximum. Can't take anymore input. The nervous system has either (click) snapped or is about to snap. In the first world war, that condition was called shell shock. Simple, honest, direct language. Two syllables, shell shock. Almost sounds like the guns themselves. That was seventy years ago. Then a whole generation went by and the Second World War came along and very same combat condition was called battle fatigue. Four syllables now. Takes a little longer to say. Doesn't seem to hurt as much. Fatigue is a nicer word than shock. Shell shock! Battle fatigue. Then we had the war in Korea, 1950. Madison Avenue was riding high by that time, and the very same combat condition was called operational exhaustion. Hey, were up to eight syllables now! And the humanity has been squeezed completely out of the phrase. It's totally sterile now. Operational exhaustion. Sounds like something that might happen to your car. Then of course, came the war in Viet Nam, which has only been over for about sixteen or seventeen years, and thanks to the lies and deceits surrounding that war, I guess it's no surprise that the very same condition was called post-traumatic stress disorder. Still eight syllables, but we've added a hyphen! And the pain is completely buried under jargon. Post-traumatic stress disorder. I'll bet you if we'd of still been calling it shell shock, some of those Viet Nam veterans might have gotten the attention they needed at the time. I'll betcha. I'll betcha.Michael Moore:
I've always been amazed that the very people forced to live in the worst parts of town, go to the worst schools, and who have it the hardest are always the first to step up, to defend us. They serve so that we don't have to. They offer to give up their lives so that we can be free. It is remarkably their gift to us. And all they ask for in return is that we never send them into harm's way unless it is absolutely necessary. Will they ever trust us again?Ulysses S. Grant:
For myself, I was bitterly opposed to the measure, and to this day regard the [Mexican-American] war, which resulted, as one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation. It was an instance of a republic following the bad example of European monarchies, in not considering justice in their desire to acquire additional territory.
...
The Southern rebellion was largely the outgrowth of the Mexican war. Nations, like individuals, are punished for their transgressions. We got our punishment in the most sanguinary and expensive war of modern times.
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posted by Burhanistan at 9:07 AM on November 11, 2008 [3 favorites has favorites]