Well, LT. Smash's post sure struck a chord (Hat Tip: Howard Veit). As well it should. It also links right into a couple of articles today - on Winds of Change.NET, and beyond. Here's the short version:
"Martin Savidge of CNN, embedded with the 1st Marine battalion, ...turned to the four [Marines] and said he had cleared it with their commanders and they could use his video phone to call home. The 19 year old Marine next to him asked Martin if he would allow his platoon sergeant to use his call to call his pregnant wife back home whom he had not been able to talk to in three months... Savidge recovered after a few seconds and turned back to the three young Marines still sitting with him and asked which one of them would like to call home first.A prime example of a trend Blake C. Powers wrote about today: the slow collapse of the journalists' long, undeclared war on America's military. The shift will be noticeable from here on in.The Marine closest to him responded without a moments hesitation "Sir, if is all the same to you we would like to call the parents of a buddy of ours, Lance Cpl Brian Buesing of Cedar Key, Florida who was killed on 3-23-03 near Nasiriya to see how they are doing."
At that Martin Savidge totally broke down and was unable to speak. All he could get out before signing off was "Where do they get young men like this?"
Now, to answer Savidge's question.
CONTINUED...
You might start with Mike Hendrix at Cold Fury, who has a few thoughts to share. Meanwhile, Dad Smash Sr. discusses some of the best responses he's seen. The general consensus seems to be that something in America (and other free countries) encourages this, and that the character of these troops is also forged by their training and experiences. The history of Xenophon and Rome, Salamis and Lepanto certainly supports these theses.
Which brings me to my favourite response:
"As long as there is a United States of America there will be men like these?" I say "As long as there are men like these there will be a United States of America."Word. Which is why I think Dad Smash's segue into WSJ's "My Ivy League Soldier" by a Harvard Professor is so important. Mostly because it goes right to the heart of where we're not seeing people like this.
"The academic/professional guests were seated on damask-upholstered chairs perched on antique rugs, their charming, well-groomed images reflected in Chinese Chippendale-framed mirrors. They were onto a favorite topic--the stupidity of W., Rumsfeld, and the war. One, a hippie academic-turned-chef, was especially virulent. "The war won't accomplish anything. It is all about money. The Bushes are in bed with the oil industry. We are fighting to protect their interests."Been there too? Sure you have. Bet it didn't go down like this one, though:
"My husband broke into the conversation. "This is not an academic discussion for us," he noted. "Unlike most of his Harvard College 2000 classmates, our son Alex chose to serve his country as a first lieutenant in the U.S. Infantry. Stationed at Fort Drum, New York, he has just received deployment orders."First, the bad news. Apparently, this professor gets the same reaction from all of her other friends. No wonder. In 1957, 400 of 750 Princeton men served in the military. Last year, it was three in a class of 1,000. The statistics are depressingly similar in other Ivy League schools.It was as if he had switched on a flow of electricity. The tenor of the conversation changed entirely.
"I don't know anyone with a child in the military," said the hippie. The other guests nodded in agreement.
Now, the good news. Keep reading, and you'll find that the people she had been talking with, the people who had sneered so casually before, suddenly changed their tune and opened their minds. The academic-turned-chef? He offered to cook Alex a meal when he returned.
Amazed that these convictions changed so easily? Don't be. If the source isn't convction but prejudice, the switch can be sudden once "the other's" essential humanity becomes clear. You can see the same phenomenon at work in "My Heart on the Line," (Washington Post, Nov. 26, 2002) as a writer named Frank Schaeffer confesses a similar shift in his views. Along the way, however, he faced these reactions:
"But aren't the Marines terribly Southern?" asked one perplexed mother while standing next to me at the brunch following graduation. "What a waste, he was such a good student," said another parent. One parent (a professor at a nearby and rather famous university) spoke up at a school meeting and suggested that the school should "carefully evaluate what went wrong."Still think the class divide is imaginary here? Listen to the follow-up:
"My son has connected me to my country in a way that I was too selfish and insular to experience before. I feel closer to the waitress at our local diner than to some of my oldest friends. She has two sons in the Corps. They are facing the same dangers as my boy. When the guy who fixes my car asks me how John is doing, I know he means it. His younger brother is in the Navy."All clear now?
This. Is. Not. Good. A brilliant history teacher of mine named Neil McLean once described Rome's fading ages as "an alliance of the upper and lower classes against the middle." That thought flashed through my head as I read Victor Davis Hanson's "The Long Riders," and it hums there still, getting stronger and stronger. Read Hanson's eerily similar question:
"How do such men and women do such things, against such material, cultural, military, and psychological odds? I don't know. But in the last year all those who have bet against the Americans now riding into the desert - elite journalists, out-of-touch academics, and self-satisfied Europeans - have been consistently wrong in their shrill predictions that we were either incompetent or amoral or would fail."A different, and better sort of people." The flip side of "a different, tarnished sort of people," which seems to describe all too many Americans' perception of those who volunteer for military service. These articles didn't tell me that, but they do strengthen and amplify things I heard in from a number of military personnel in the wake of the Maine Educators Incident. Things I hear all the time here in Canada, too.Why is this so? It is not merely that so many are so ignorant of history, or that most who are degreed and certified are glib and swarmy, but not educated. No, the better explanation is that they rarely work among, know, see or care about the type of Americans now barreling to Baghdad - who are still a different, and I think, a better sort of people.
And now thousands of them ride on to Baghdad."
When a nation's self-proclaimed elite no longer serve in significant numbers within its military, the result is deeply troubling. It undermines support for the common defense. It corrupts policy around the use of military force. Worst of all, it begins to create a divided culture - with the military, inevitably, found mostly on one side. That, above all else, is a recipe for long-term disaster in an unavoidably perilous world.
I see these trends clearly now. Have seen them for a while, actually, but couldn't give them a name and a shape. Depressed? Hell no, I'm cheering. Let me tell you why.
I'm cheering for embeds like Martin Savidge, who are seeing first hand both the horrors of war and the character of America's soldiers. They will return changed, and the tales they tell on the cocktail circuit may begin to break down the cultural barrier between the circles they move in and the people who serve in America's military. I'm cheering for Prof. Herzlinger and Mr. Schaeffer, whose writings on the subject may herald the dawning of an important realization in more members of the chattering classes. Perhaps even a national debate of sorts, once the Democrats' self-immolation in 2004 is complete and the party begins to take stock.
As long as there are such people, in uniform and out of it, there will be an America worthy of the name. Make no mistake, correcting this situation demands attention and persistence. These attempts will be opposed. Nevertheless, an illness in the body politic has been given a name, and a shape. The first two critical pieces of our hope for a cure.
N.B. Phil Carter also has some excellent thoughts on this issue. He even has an interesting link to 1st Lt. Alex Herzlinger!
UPDATE: Apparently, Savidge's report may be a hoax. The above, and the very intelligent comments here, remain valid. Lt. Smash speaks for both of us on this subject.
Part of the truth is, they don't get them.
They make them.
Oh I read the rest of your post; didn't see it at first.
You make the same point.
I would also echo and expend on Shaeffer's point:
I told my son that even though he was going to Europe on a guaranteed contract, he would get to know the United States better. You really are in with all types of people. The class thing is overstated in my opinion, although the top elite does not serve.
Last Sunday when he called, he told me that one of his fellow enlisted soldiers had been an English teacher in Japan. I remember all types: farmers, ghetto boyz, Sioux off the res, holy rollers, porn maniacs - from all 50 states and a dozen countries. All in one barracks. My son's squad leader is from Mexico. There's a mechanic who's an East Indian from Kenya.
We were laughing when he told me about some of these conversations you have in the Army. Too much, and too kooky.
That's why my military isn't Tom Clancy's military - too square-jawed - it's the military of Catch-22, M*A*S*H, The Caine Mutiny, Soldier in the Rain, Beetle Bailey, Willie and Joe.
Hey, if someone doens't want to join, it's their loss.
Joe,
Abraham Lincoln famously said that you can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time. That’s the idea behind markets, like the stock market: everyone can make a bad bet now and then; some people will make bad bets till their money is gone. But eventually, the truth will out. The market will figure out whether a company is worth its share price. I think the same thing is happening with respect to media coverage of the military, and for the same reason.
Over the last twenty years, you could make good money in the market because the basic truth is that the market goes up. There are slips and sidesteps along the way, but Dow was at 800 when Reagan became president and it’s at 8000 now. What that means is that you could do pretty well not knowing anything, just by being in the market. Buggywhips tanked and Microsoft soared, but you don’t need much expertise to do alright in the market.
Similarly, you don’t need much expertise to do alright in cultural commentary. All you need is to be “in the market” – that is, to suppose that ordinary people are good, decent, intelligent, moral, and capable. If you suppose those things, you’ll be right more times than not. What this means is that the “elites” – in the news media and the academy – who scorn ordinary people are, in a sense, betting that the market will go down over the long term, and that’s a fool’s bet.
In the market, if you bet wrong, you are separated from your money. But in the news media and the universities, the elites are insulated from the real world. Because they agree with each other, because they do not test their theories (for example, the theory that American soldiers are blood-thirsty morons), they get no feedback, so they can be wrong for a long time. What’s happening in the Iraq war is that the elites are getting very public feedback. They’re doing their usual “ordinary people are stupid” schtick. But now, because of embedded reporters and videophones, we're seeing the truth of smart weapons and humane soldiers. We're seeing how common among Americans things like bravery, stamina, and invention are.
In the market for news, Martin Savidge is being bought; Peter Arnett is being sold. The elites are getting feedback. This is a wonderful thing, and what will come of it is change in the way the media portray the military. It won’t necessarily be that individual reporters will be changed by the Iraq experience, although that is likely. Rather, what is developing is a media reputation market with very good sources of information leading to efficient distribution of reputations.
Damn, that was intelligent. In some ways, Patrick, it's a shame that you're a professor of psychology only. Can't you apply for a "double major" or something :-)
Interesting commentary, Joe, and reminiscent of similar trains of thought of my own in the 8 years since I left the Navy. My time in the private sector has left me with many impressions on the nature of the relationship between military and civilian worlds and the perceived disconnects between the two. And, my own internal resolution of this issue comes down to the very nature of the all-volunteer service that has been a hallmark of the current US military. With the elimination (and non-reinstatement) of the draft, we have allowed the military to achieve a level of professionalism and prowess at a relative size that has never been equaled in the annals of history. But, that performance and power has removed, to a considerable extent, the cross-blending of class and culture that is the subject of so much nostalgic waxing when discussing the draft-based military of the mid-20th century.
I listened to the stories of my father and grandfather and the nature of their biggest leadership "challenges" as naval officers. I was relieved when my turn came as my sailors where simply superb - intelligent and motivated, not always happy, but excellent at their jobs and all volunteer. A few bad apples here and there, but nothing compared to what the draft levied to tax my elders! This benefit has allowed the nation to forge the greatest, smartest, and most advanced military with a minimal investment in numbers of people. In others words, it has created something that the American market will bear.
This all-volunteer service, created at a time when America has not been visibly threatened (to most citizens...) since the end of WWII, has flourished by drawing, by and large, from legacy service families and from those who are looking to the service to give them that boost up in life. This has tended to eliminate the upper tiers of the economic strata as money has replaced service as a driving force in our culture. (I am not criticizing this, I am just stating my observation. Peace and prosperity tend to create this condition.) At the same time, the services have all gotten smaller. While there is considerable room for increasing the size of the military to relieve operational tempo and equipment lifecycle loading, a lottery-based draft to fill in the gaps would revive many of the problems of our nation's past draft-based military arms. Problems that would weaken the morale and efficiency of the current service. And to what effect? To close the gap between military and civilian sectors that plague our society today? After much contemplation, I have decided it is not worth the cost. Most Americans here in Flyover Land get it and if our intellectual and political leadership don't, those that care eventually do. Our military just keeps doing the job it is asked and tasked to do and its performance keeps getting better and better. This is the most effective means at closing the gap I see.
Wow. I really enjoyed not only the original post, but the comments. Actually quite profound. Thanks.
Regarding "...[the elite liberals] are degreed and certified are glib and swarmy, but not educated.... they rarely work among, know, see or care about the type of Americans now barreling to Baghdad..."
The difference between Rome and America is that our military is so highly educated. American military citizen soldiers, and retirees--who at 42 are still in their prime--*become* America's corporate and civic leaders.
People of course do work among, know, and see the type of Americans now barreling to Baghdad, they're simply not aware.
-J Heslin
Interesting comments, Chuck. They helped me formulate some things that have been running around in my mind lately.
The modern American armed forces send decision making power downwards. You have special forces troops in small units, each of whom can order up a king’s ransom of air power and other assets. And you have NCOs with significant responsibility on the battlefield. This is possible because individual soldiers are highly-selected and highly-trained. As a result, they have both the knowledge and the temperament to usefully take responsibility where they are, rather than pass decisions on up the line when in combat. In this world, a major function of the top brass is to arrange for people to be selected and trained so that as far as possible the right person is in the right spot at the right time. The brass is aiming people at jobs. In the volunteer army, this may be easier because people stay in the force long enough to be selected and trained for a job.
There’s a parallel here to smart bombs. Smart bombs are targeted. There is intelligence in that targeting, not just in the sense of what target should be blown up, but also in the sense of what nearby non-targets should be left undamaged. The way to get this is to choose your bomb, choose your time, and choose your approach. We see the consequences in all those photos of Baghdad Glenn Reynolds and others have had on their sites the last few days.
I don’t think it’s just my imagination that there is a parallel between smart bombs and smart NCOs. Both arise from the same value system: The world, though complex, is understandable, if only a bit at a time. If you have the right experience, make the right observations, then whether mutt or magistrate you can make a decision. You can also make your bomb go to the right building and knock on the front door.
That, it seems to me, has long been the essence of American philosophy. Because we all have different experiences and different perspectives, individuals matter. If you believe that – if you believe that experience teaches, that it individuates, that it matters – then it makes sense to devolve power downwards in your army, to take advantage of as much experience as you can collect. And at the same time, your belief in the importance of individuals makes you want to hit targets and avoid innocent neighbours, because people matter.
This may be what so disturbs the French, the Germans, the Russians, and the Chinese. It’s not the explosions. They’re all used to those. It’s the control. That control is what is separating America from the axis of weasels. It makes America good and strong at the same time. And it’s bad news for the elites who run Europe and China, because it is based on the importance of ordinary people.
No, Patrick, bottom up is what has separated America from the world since 1781(?).
We are the original rogue nation. They know our history better than we do, yet they still do not understand US. But they have feared US for a very long time.
All of this "on the money" comment reminds me of a remark William F. Buckley made years ago when he noted that he would rather be governed by first 50 names in the Boston Telephone Book than by the entire faculty of Harvard. There is wisdom and many other positive characteristics "embedded" in the American people and the military knows this and has organized accordingly.
Charles, that is a wonderful quote from Buckley. I completely agree with him!
Patrick
I agree with most of these comments. But I disagree that having money makes one "elite", either as an individual or as a class.
Once, on campus in the Sixties, I was watching a local news show. A cop was relating how he'd saved somebody from a burning car. Next to me was one of those ubiquitous, weedy, protest-everything, insufferable types. The cop stumbled over a word and the hippy type sneered.
"He saves lives," I said, "you have good verb agreement."
I'm only about half sure the guy actually got it, but if he did, it had to be temporary.
The weedy types, having discovered they cannot make a showing in the mesomorphic world of actually doing stuff, have devised a new game. It's words. And, since they made up the game and the rules, they can keep changing the rules so nobody else has a chance. They need take no responsibility, come to no hard decisions, accomplish anything, or be the least bit useful to anybody.
Still, they need the men (and women). See Noonan's column in October of 2001, "Welcome Back, Duke".
It kills them.
So they sneer. They scorn. They hold in contempt. And every time the men take care of business, it hurts them worse.
A thousand of them publishing a hundred campus reviews don't do as much for people as a single sanitation crew.
In their hearts, they know it.
So they sneer.
But are ready to call for help.
And then sneer again.
And Tommy ain't a bloomin fool.
This doesn't change how true and well-written this post is, but I thought I had seen on anoher blog today (INTEL DUMP? Sgt. Stryker's?) that the Martin Savidge quote is being denied by CNN? I wish I had a link!
Anyway, I attend university but went to a high school with many enlistees, and this article is very accurate in gauging the feelings of the former about the latter, and it kills me to hear it from them everyday.
Unfortunately, the Martin Savidge thing is a hoax. See:
Homer Nods
We should have known it was too good to be true. CNN informs us that the story we noted Wednesday about correspondent Martin Savidge was a hoax.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110003299
Kyle
The reason this "story" has legs hoax or no is because even if it is not true it could have been true. It is how we see ourselves. This story is our myth. John Wayne 2003.
Kyle, that particular Martin Savidge story may be a hoax, but the basic point remains: lots of things are changing. In an odd way, it's not the soldiers who are under the microscope in Iraq, it's the reporters. The soldiers are our gold standard. We know who they are (they came from towns all over America). We're using them to measure the media. If this story wasn't true, it could have been.
I'm ultimately more interested in why CNN chose to devote several minutes tonight to an interview with a retired Indian army officer who claimed to know Saddam personally and who went on at length about how bloody the battle for Baghdad would be. Why was this broadcast? The man probably knows no more about what is going on in Baghdad than I do, but he spoke in very dire tones and his words - 100% speculation - were presented as practically fact.
If the Savidge story is a hoax, then so was that interview with the Indian officer. That is, the interview appeared on CNN, the guy is no doubt a real retired Indian officer, but his expertise is highly debatable. Nonetheless, CNN seems more interested in verifiability in the story of honor among young Americans in the field than when they interview spurious experts thousands of miles away from where those young Americans are fighting.
Me, I'm using coalition soldiers to measure the media.
Sandy P. writes on April 4, 2003 06:19 AM:
>No, Patrick, bottom up is what has separated
>America from the world since 1781(?). We
>are the original rogue nation.
Actually America has been "bottom up" since long before 1781. See this excerpt from Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America for precisely how far back.
Michael
Why, why, WHY do people do this? In all my years online, I've never understood it -- the compulsion to make stuff up and disseminate it around the world. What does it serve? Who does it serve? What kind of person does it? What do they look like as they sit at their keyboard typing in something they know is completely false, ready to hit the SEND button and present it as real information?
Whether it's the old "Microsoft will give you $5 for forwarding this e-mail" crap, or now this carefully honed tale about a CNN reporter, it's all the same: It clogs things up and makes the world spin just a little less efficiently.
Wasn't it only a few months ago that Chuckie Rangel was bemoaning the disproportionately "lower class/minority" makeup of the armed forces? (Hard data, by the way, thoroughly debunks that assertion.) Probably now, as the wake from this operation -- THE most successful in world military history thus far -- washes over his head, he'll change his tune and claim credit...on behalf of "his race" or something. Nine years in the military taught me many things, but probably the most important was: There is no race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, regionalism, anything, when a mission is in front of you and it has to get done. I observed the same thing (to a lesser degree) after the big snowfall in DC, where neighbors who barely speak to each other were out together, working and planning and discussing how all that snow was gonna get moved from behind our cars. I'm dead against a draft, but if any argument would sway me it would be this one: The insulated classes would get a real live experience with the "integration" they chatter about so often. Anyways...excellent article, Joe.
I am a child of the '60s - one of the boomiest of the boomers. Military service was not something that I would have considered at the time; I much preferred the extended adolesence of college undergraduate life.
Well, time and the rearing of a family compelled me to grow up. And then my eldest son joined the Marine Corps. Instead of sharing my experience of playing student, he's travelled the world, and has held responsibilities that are beyond my experience. He is a man.
This experience has certainly opened my eyes about the U.S. military. Just visiting Camp Pendleton and seeing the people there at work, was enlightening. Seeing how my son grew and matured was another eye-opener. The newspaper reports of how well our soldiers and Marines fought in Iraq do now surprise me now: I've met these people, and I know what they can do.
The biggest difference in the military today from the military in my youth is that in my day they drafted people like me (or the me I was in 1969) and today they enlist people like my son. What a world of improvement!
A number of posts in this thread have lamented the fact that the "upper classes" do not enlist in the military. That is worrisome to a degree; but the fact is that this, like low rates of reproduction and prevalent abortion, is a symptom that entering the upper class is a dead end from a Darwinian point of view. The attributes that bring you into the media/academic/government elites also ensure that you will be sterile. We in the middle, who live our lives by living our lives (as contrasted with those who live their lives by talking about living) will have to endure the foolishness of those purport to be our superiors; but as long as American society remains mobile - as long as talent from below can work its way into positions of real influence, as long as continue to attract talent from abroad, as long as enterprises like the military continue to attract men like my son - we'll be all right.
Regards ...
I'm sure many of you out there have read "Generations" by Srauss and Howe. Their take on the immediate future of American History is coming true. We are entering the secular crisis, the one that arrives every 70-80 years. And the generational cohort that usually does the heavy lifting in the crisis (the civics, as they call them) is on time also. Fred's son is a classic civic, raised with care (unlike the Gen Xers) and ready to do his duty. We are about to witness the efforts of the next "greatest generation" and America is moving into a new phase where the whinning of the baby boomers will sound exactly like what it is---whinning. I believe the chattering classes and the academics, who live in a virtual world rather than the real one, are in for a hard time.
"Where They Get Young Men Like This?"
Jonathan Chamberlain and his sons Jonathan Jr. and Samuel served in the Revolution, though Jonathan was 64 years of age at the outbreak of the war. In 1776 he hired John Savage to serve for him, but on the alarm of July 1, 1777, he and Jonathan Jr. entered the party of men raised from Captain Peter Clark’s company of militia. As privates, father and son marched with this unit (Samuel Houston, Lieutenant) from Lyndeborough, N.H. to Ticonderoga. The payroll, dated at Exeter, New Hampshire 26 February 1778, shows their entry as 1 July 1777, discharged 9 July 1777, time served 9 days, and amount of pay and expenses 3.2.10. Again in 1777 the two men marched with Captain Clark’s company, serving from September 30 to October 25. The company marched from Lyndeborough to Bennington to join the Northern Continental Army, covering a distance of 300 miles during the round trip. This pay for the 26 days was 6.18.10 each.
I can only imagine what Lt. Samuel Houston was thinking about the 65-year-old man in his company. For the Chamberlains, they knew they were protecting their security and that of their neighbors. Not much has changed over the years except the label "Patriot" is now accompanied with a sneer. It is especially offensive coming from those who refer to a weapon as a gun, Marines as soldiers and the 101st Airborne belongs to the USMC.
I would like to ask Martin Savidge about the where abouts is the marine he intervieved and was embedded with named Kyle?
I would like to kbow if he is safe or did something happen to him?
I noticed he was no longer seen as the end was neer to taking Bagdad!
Please emeail me and let me Know!
thanks
Gary Lick
Vicksburg, Ms
PS
I would also like Martin Savidge's email address
Your are not the only one.