The American Fighting Man

The soldier, above all others prays for peace, for he must bear the heaviest burdens and deepest scars of war.
- General Douglas MacArthur, 1963

In a cynical age, when history is obscured by the rhetoric of political pundits who claim that a flag is either to be carried high or forever furled based on a symbolism that reflects only their own selfishness, I call on my neighbors to remember not the flag itself today, but the spirit of the men who fought beneath it.

In both homespun butternut and federal blue, their legacy has never left us. Their story is our story, a reflection of our culture, our people, and our nations soul. The epic of the American citizen soldier was enriched with their contribution, and they mark the beginning of the slow evolution towards defender of liberty and freedom that is the reason for our current role as the world's only superpower.

The Confederate soldier, like his Union counterpart, was a thoroughly American fighting man. His quiet courage was evident in the hardships he stoically endured, and the epic battles he bravely fought. The same spirit that carried the soldiers across Gettysburg's deadly fields during Picketts Charge animated their sons up San Juan Hill, and their grandsons into the hellish Meuse-Argonne. It planted the flag at the top of Mount Surabachi, drove the Panzers back in the Ardennes, and the Chinese Communists from the pass at Toko-ri. That same determined courage and selfless service was evident in the two Army snipers who insisted on insertion to protect the crew of a downed helicopter in the streets of Mogadishu, where they gave their lives and earned their nations highest military honor.

Wherever he stood, in whatever uniform, Blue or Gray, Khaki or OD Green, Jungle, Woodland or Desert Camouflage, the American warrior stood with the same courage and tenacity that defended our nation and the world against the tyrants and empires of the previous centuries. His companions lie beneath the soil of four continents, and the waves of all the seven seas.

In a movie role as a Marine officer, the actor Jack Nicholson makes a statement that "...this world has walls and those walls need to be guarded by men with guns..." In this singular idea he is right, but afterwards his speech diverges dramatically from the true spirit of the American warrior. In that speech, he sneeringly asks for a grudging thanks and haughtily demands to be allowed to be as brutal as necessary to fulfill his mission. Nothing could be further from the true image of the American fighting man.

In battle after battle, throughout the bitterest fighting imaginable, he never lost his humanity nor his love of peace. In sharp contrast to the brutal conquest of other nations, the vanquished were always given help as soon as the guns were silent. While leaders were placed on legal trial, America distributed food to the starving citizens known as enemies only days before. The ambassadors of these gifts were often the very troops who fought the war, only scant days from the battlefield themselves. A generation of grateful Japanese and German children remember not the terror of the vanquished, but the new wonders of chewing gum and Coca-Cola distributed by laughing young soldiers who turned the phrase "occupation" from a curse to a welcome blessing.

As a new century dawns, the American fighting man still stands on other walls, though obscure and distant from his fellow citizens. These are the narrow walls between peace and war, or along the sorrowful boundary that keeps hunger and disease from consuming the lives of children. This role is entirely within his character, for, despite his penchant for war, the American Warrior who bore the bitter cold of Valley Forge…weathered storms of lead at the Angle…the Bloody Lane…and charged with cold steel into Bellaeu Wood; also tied parachutes to candy bars over a besieged Berlin, and handed out chewing gum, crackers and the rest of his rations to children in war-torn Tokyo, Frankfurt and a hundred other cities. He is, above all else, a man of peace.

Patrick J. Sullivan
Major SC
US Army Reserve
sullivan013.techemail.com