Boiled down, he says that the American and Canadian militaries, and to a lesser extent the British military — are all products of democratic societies, and as such, tend to be more influenced by civilian values than, say the German Army, a product of the Prussian military/junker tradition. There is a tradeoff in having an army that’s the product of a free society — there is a certain difference in military efficiency. I may be oversimplifying a bit (I”m writing this on my lunch break, away from books and papers at home) — but Hastings thinks that the Germans were, in general, more militarily efficient.

We could have had military institutions like that, but we would not want to live in a society that could produce an institution like that. There’s this scene I remember from Armageddon from the end of the war. A German unit has surrendered to a Canadian unit at the end, and the generals are making conversation. The German is from a military family, a regular army soldier from before the war, like the rest of his family. The Canadian general, pre-war, ran an ice cream factory.

Anyway, different imputs and attitudes lead to different results. A harsher society might produce a better military, but we wouldn’t necessarily want it.

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“Arthur said his brave colleague, nicknamed Topsy, risked beatings from their cynical guards for whispering reassurances to him as he sat scared stiff and blindfolded on a boat after they were snatched at sea.”

“And he revealed that the hardest part of his nightmare in Tehran was when he was separated from mum-of-one Faye - who he said was like a big sister to him…”

“…speaking of the moment they were reunited, he told how he wept and begged the 26-year-old for a hug.”

” “I can’t describe how that felt…just every emotion rolled into one. I ran up to her, threw my arms round her and cried like a baby.”

” “When I’d calmed down, she asked, ‘Do you need another hug, a mother hug?’ and I said, ‘damn right’.”

“… the modest sailor said: “I’m not quite king of the jungle. There are lots more braver people. We had a giggle about it.”

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Professionalism, bravery, valor, honor, courage… these are the qualities that a military must train into its soldiers. “Nice” is not one of them, unless you substitute “civilized” for “nice”. Mr. Arthur Batchelor is very nice, but I don’t want him ever responsible for defending my freedoms. I don’t ever want to hear another comment similar to his by any soldier of any force that protects me.

A fantastic soldier can in fact be very nice, but when under pressure and under the gun, it is the qualities of professionalism, bravery, valor, honor and courage that count, not niceness.

Too bad I can’t find the link, but to summarize the author was talking about a state in which he felt disembodied. Meaning that he felt someone else was in control of his body and he was just off to the side watching him do all these violent and efficient things. All emotion and mercy disappears, to be replaced by the Machine. Efficient, brutal, and not all that human.

A lot of people tend to have different reactions, and it is hard to say what role their emotions play. Even the author of Killology wrote about several different reactions to fear in combat. And that was just one emotion and type of reaction to fear.

Cold rage is one of my ideals, which differs from most martial arts that say keep your mind clear of distractions, emotions, anger, hate, etc. I actually heard a great example of why from some black belt guy that got attacked in the streets at night, got angry, and basically caved in the ribs of his attacker with one blow. The black belt regreted that incident because it was a loss of control to him. He could have killed that guy and never realized it because his anger made him want to hurt the enemy. I tend to think it was cause if you don’t train with anger and use it, it can come sneaking up on you when your life is threatened.

However, anger and rage does give you the killing edge, if you can control it. It increases your strength, quickness, stamina, endurance, pain threshold tolerance, as well as various other benefits. The only detriment is that it reduces your thinking ability, and if you get rid of that, there is no detriment at all.

As an example of efficiency, hate is inefficient because when people get angry they start thinking about what they can do to hurt the object of their anger. This is ineffcient due to the fact that sure, it may be satisfying to take an enemy, chop off his legs, hang his body over a bridge, and let a helicopter or a boat take off his head but that is inefficient. I mean seriously, that is a lot of time allotted for such an execution technique, time you could spend doing other things, like killing more enemies or saving you buddies so they can kill more enemies. The anger and rage forces you to choose the attack that causes the most damage, while your mind chooses the attack that is the most efficient for your goals. Those two tend to collide.

Most people who do difficult things can compartmentalize pretty effectively. They respond to the environment at home in one way; to the environment when they put on their war face entirely differently.

No question that most–although certainly not all–of our troops come from a much gentler environment than do many others around the world. I think two things carry them through the brutal demands of war: outstanding training; and loyalty to their comrades. As has been recorded here, the factors that keep them from losing control in this brutal environment are instilled professionalism and unit discipline.

A highly decorated First Sergeant I experienced once said words to the effect that the fight will be white-hot, but the guys who win it won’t be: they’ll be thinking.

Just a sidelight on him. His first tour in Vietnam was in December, 1963 - very early. He was escorting a planeload of ammunition, and the VC evidently knew they were coming, and made a maximum effort to shoot the plane down. They succeeded. The guy driving the plane got the choppers in the air, then fought it down to a rough crash-landing, where it broke into three pieces. When the sections stopped sliding they were immediately in a fight. Sarge got everybody grouped in relatively secure positions, got them returning fire, and counted heads. Two guys missing. He spotted them in the open, and ran out and got one. He was hit twice doing so. Spotted the other, got him, and got hit again himself. The helicopters were almost immediately overhead, got everybody, and blew up the plane. The medic in the chopper patched up Sarge’s clipped ear (that’s pretty close, getting part of your ear shot off), and two other wounds. Then he said “where else are you hit?” Sarge said, “I’m not, that’s it.” Medic said: “well, you’re sitting in an expanding pool of blood, SOMETHING’S going on SOMEWHERE!” At which point Sarge passed out. He woke up once on the plane to Japan, then woke up again next day at Fort Sill in Oklahoma. Purple Heart, Bronze Star, Silver Star - the Heart for getting hit, the Bronze for organizing the group defense, the Silver for dragging the guys in. (All in, note, about twenty minutes.) That was what Sarge calls his “forty minute tour” in Vietnam.

I tell the story because it wraps everything up neatly. The professionalism of getting everyone in position to survive the crash not just intact, but able to fight. Then getting them out of the plane quick (filled with ordnance, it might have blown them all away if hit right), organized, and fighting. That immediate concern addressed, counting heads, and realizing two were missing. Finding them, realizing they were wounded and couldn’t join unaided, and providing aid. That took a little controlled anger, and full adrenaline - but it was still a reasoned action.

In the heat of it, as is often said, you fight for each other. This is why there is such emphasis on the team, and such emphasis on your buddies: the guys around you. You fight for them, as they fight for you. You may hate, but that’s a momentary and useless emotion, you use it as a motivation. It isn’t dominant, because it gets in the way of the assessing you need to be doing. You may get pissed off, but you use that too; you don’t go with it.

Our kids are not too nice. The regulars are pros. They have a job to do, and their concern is to do it right, and to the best of their ability.

The attitude back home is confusing to them, but they’re bright enough to know the real story isn’t being told here, and when on the ground they don’t spend a lot of time on it. And it isn’t the first time. The Vietnam war was won on the ground after Tet, but we still went ahead and snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

This is the real danger. The VC and NVA recognized that they couldn’t defeat the military, so they stopped fighting the military. They directed their efforts against Walter Cronkite - him they knew they could beat. And in Iraq they aren’t fighting the military either: they’re fighting for headlines. They’re fighting to beat the NY Times, Reid, Pelosi, Schumer, Kennedy, Murtha, and the rest of congress. And that’s a roomful of creampuffs. Al Quaeda KNOWS they can lick them.