Paramedics enjoy throwing around these sorts of terms. Particularly when they’re having lunch with non-paramedics.
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So far our focus is focused on Anglophone soldiers that generally hail from similiar cultures. After a few hours of reading today about Japanese soldiers during the early days of WWII it is clear that they not only didn't hesitate to kill, but relished in torturing innocents and participating in mass rape long after the excitement of any combat. The German SS were also capable of visiting exceptional cruelity, as a number of others throughout history. As Anglophones we do surprisingly well at killing considering the values accepted as norms in our society, but there are others in the world who seem to be completely unhindered by what we would consider moral norms.
What enabled the Germans and especially the Japanese to participate in mass murder and torture? Their culture? Lower level of social development? Superior social development? Is it undefinable? When did we become relatively moral compared to our enemies? Was there a turning point in history?
This is from a guy who hasn't seen nearly what you guys have.
I think that capability exists in almost all of us, and it exists very close to the surface. In young men it is even closer to the surface. What holds it in check is the process of acculturation and learning that parents do from just a little after the day of birth. The results of that process are reinforced and held in place by a social structure. If you remove that social structure, all that learning and nodding your head yes when your mother tells you not to pull the wings off flies can be forgotten in a extremely short time, almost as if was never there.
To me the most important part of the that social structure that keeps us from savagery is the "legitimate authority figure". I put that in quotes because that can vary with circumstance, but if the authority figure says it's ok to (name your atrocity), those "good boys (or men or women)" will do it and have fun doing it and brag about it. There are some saints out who won't, God bless them, but they will tend to get washed away with the tide if they aren't backed by authority figures.
That is one reason I get so upset when people want to give a pass on things like hazing or desecrating bodies. It is chipping away at the dike holding back that tide of savagery and that dike is always under severe strains. Even minor cracks can develop into catastrophic breaks unless they are fixed immediately.
An example of that is Capt. Medina's company. He set that company up for that crime for months by, IIRC, telling them that it was ok to act on their savage impulses. The legitimate authority figure gave them permission so they did it.
A more extreme but perhaps more illuminating example is the child soldier of Africa. These kids are removed from their social support world and given a new authority figure who is then able to create a sweet faced monster in just a few days. This is independent of continent or race. You can take most any 12 year, 14 or 16 year old anywhere and if you handle him right, you will have a stone cold but giggly killer of his own parents in 3 weeks or less. (Peter Singer's book Child Soldiers is great on this.)
The Germans and Japanese did those things because their leaders told them it was ok. If our leaders tell us it is ok, we will do the same thing. We already have on a minor scale, "enhanced interrogation." We can revert to savagery in a very short time if we don't constantly tell each other "We're Americans. We don't do that ####." (Thank you Brandon Friedman.)
Of course that begs the question, when do leaders on a big scale, say that #### is ok? Maybe it is a millenniumist (sic) ideology, Nazi for the Germans, that contrived bushido emporer nonsense for the Japanese, and you can add communism for any number of countries. All totalitarian ideologies that subordinated everything to the ideology.
Copy on Copper Country people. One of the reasons I really like the UP is because the people are so mostly old fashioned sensible in all things. Not a lot of posturing up there.
This comes from a forever a civilian regarding your asking for thoughts.
I think what Sydney Jary said is true, especially because you maybe aren't looking for exceptional individuals, you are looking for individuals who can be formed, and are willing to be formed, into an exceptional group. This is just a civilian's guess but the exceptional individual fighters may just sort of show up within a group that is selected for the qualities Jary mentioned.
Something else that goes with that is something else that I read long ago but forgot where. When you are selecting for a good military unit, you are selecting for the same things that you would select for if you were hiring for a business. You look for honesty, maturity, ability to get along, work ethic, punctuality, stick-to-itiveness etc. The only thing different for a military is perhaps physical fitness.
The above is one reason I was so optimistic about the chances the Libyan rebels had to win their fight, so many of them seemed to be small businessmen, teachers, university students etc; Copper Country guys who decided they had had enough. If the heavy weapons could be kept at bay for a while, I didn't think those guys could lose.
Yes most certainly happens outside the military. Need some input from someone with Psych qualification.
Starts with boys and their tree-house. Members only and no girls allowed.
Not just anyone can become a member. There has to be some initiation/selection/hazing. Some sort of (blood) oath or swearing of allegiance etc etc. Then there are codes and customised slang only members will understand... and so on.
Look at gangs... look at university fraternities... look everywhere men group and realise that the military will be (can't be otherwise) no different.
Its just that in the military 'looking after our own' means just that and the level of trust and belief in their mates is essential to their very existence.
When you shout 'cover me' to your buddy it means you are putting your life in his hands. That's special. That's why 30 years after my Regiment - a single almost always under strength battalion - was disbanded we still gather together in hundreds to share a little time with people we shared moments in combat with (300 odd in South Africa and 200 odd in the UK last year).
Civilians don't get near creating this non-sexual bond between men. They will never understand ... and as we soldiers say:
So f**k them.Quote:
You have never lived until you have almost died. For those who have fought for it, life has a special flavor the protected will never know.
Let us learn to understand ourselves and the psychological dynamics of what we are expected to do so we can prepare those who choose the profession of arms in our footsteps.
We know that to be able to just walk up to random guy the politicians line us up against and blow him away would require an army of psychopaths so we need a little help. Calling the enemy a kraut, nip, gook or rag-head makes it a little easier (as no doubt the names they use for us makes it for them) and when they commit atrocities like the Japanese and the Germans did and like in the photo up this thread killing them is made a whole lot easier.
So Backwards Observer the use of the word 'gook' is more of a necessary crutch for us soldiers than a racial slur directed at all people of East Asian origin... try to understand that.
I remember going through the pockets of a dead guy once and found a handkerchief which had been crudely (but lovingly) embroidered with some words and a heart. I looked at him and realised that someone out there loved this 'gook' and would never see him again nor probably hear what had happened to him. I was sad for her. I still have that handkerchief somewhere.
Look at the kid in the photo. Lucky if he is 18. Been around or he would not be carrying a machine gun. Saw a lot of $hit in his time in the RLI and slayed a lot of bad guys. Wonder what's going through his mind - still dirty from being out on an op. Time for the civvies to start cutting our young soldiers some slack ... and if they don't its up to us who have nothing to lose to dish out a few slaps... (verbally of course ;) )
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7156/6...ea667c191f.jpg
Not sure this is how it works. A widespread remark was "Wenn der Fuehrer das wuesste!" (~ "If only Hitler knew about it!")
They often KNEW it was wrong and they often ASSUMED that top leadership was not intently tolerating it. That was usually an illusion, of course.
The reason for bystanding passively was probably more the feeling of being but a tiny wheel in a huge, unstoppable machinery.
The ones who actually committed (war) crimes (and there's no war, no active war party without some!) probably did it for the reasons illuminated in the Stanford Prison Experiment.
PS: Since when does the forum delete Umlaute?
What goes on in the mind of a sniper?
25 January 2012
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16544490
Fuchs:
I think we are thinking about approximately the same thing. That entry on the Stanford experiment contained this quote "In other words, it seemed the situation caused the participants' behavior, rather than anything inherent in their individual personalities." The most important part of the situation i think being the immediate authority figures explicitly saying it is ok or tacitly approving things by not stopping them. The Milford experiment, mentioned in that entry showed the same thing.
One thing I should have mentioned is that young males in groups without supervision are inventively cruel almost by nature. If they aren't stopped they take that as approval and get worse and worse.
Fuchs:
With the changeover to the new server, the associated editor doesn't do "umlauts" (whether German, French or Finnish) with any consistency. Notice of problem in Nov 2011 by JMM99 and Stan (1, 2, 3, 4).Quote:
PS: Since when does the forum delete Umlaute?
My BLUF:
I won't make jokes about bears being near-sighted. I won't makes jokes about bears being near-sighted ... (repeat 100 times). :)Quote:
... that good result [umlauts] occurs only if I use the basic Edit. If I Go Advanced, the umlauts are wiped out again.
Umlaut - Advanced:
Umlaut - Basic (Edit button): ä
Regards (really)
Mike
I love this clip:
http://youtu.be/isfn4OxCPQs
I know less about the Japanese case than the German. The standard published point of departure is John Dower’s War without mercy. There certainly did seem to be some important differences—I’ll call them cultural and/or social, though some would haggle over whether either is the appropriate term—between the Japanese and U.S. troops. To put it roughly, I think it fair to say that by and large the Japanese saw Americans’ willingness to surrender and Americans saw Japanese willingness to engage in banzai charges and kamikaze attacks (a favorite scholar of mine, Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, has published one book and a collection of edited primary documents related to the latter; here’s an article stemming from her work on them) as things done by animals.
As for the SS and particularly the Einsatzgruppen, they were fighting international Bolshevism. There were other things in the mix beyond a hatred and fear of Marxism (Omer Bartov’s work is once place to look) but the perpetrators saw themselves as enmeshed in an existential conflict. That may completely implausible motivation seven decades on, but I suspect future generations are going to have a hard time buying contemporary motivations for the Global War on Terror (before anyone suggests otherwise, I am not equating the Holocaust and the Global War on Terror), as well.
American troops have never perpetrated anything of the scale that Japanese and German forces did during World War Two. But I don’t think any American should kid themselves about some sort of inherent American decency. The Philippine-American War is an example too often overlooked in our country’s military history. During World War Two American soldiers and Marines are well known to have collected Japanese skulls as trophies (I understand perfectly well how the conditions they were under could have lead them to find that to be acceptable behavior, I’m just pointing out that being American didn’t stop them from being capable of it). And we can be quite inhumane to our own. Look at our country’s history of lynchings and the fact that something like 1% of our adults are imprisoned on any given day and 600 or so of them are sexually assaulted on that day and the public at large doesn’t really seem too concerned about it.
My computer network isn't set up for Internet video. Yeah, I know, three months of real retired time - and still no CAT-5 run in the basement. That's not even a good reason. :)
However, I get the general drift from the comments. Yes, there is satisfaction from confronting the bully - esp. if he is a couple of years older and ends up bawling and wetting his pants. Violence can be used for good and for bad ends.
Regards
Mike
Mike,
It's the video of the Australian gentle giant kid (and older at 16), pile-driving the younger (at 12) kid who is clearly the aggressor in the video. Both had their own separate interviews afterwards, and to hear the 12-yr old punk tell it, he's an angel who was "abused" first.
One point that comes out in George Feifer's excellent work on the Battle of Okinawa - Tennozan - is that IJA basic training emphasized systematic physical abuse of its recruits to instill hardiness and obedience. Beatings were brutal and routine, being inflicted by both NCOs and officers for the smallest infraction.
Edward J. Drea's Japan's Imperial Army emphasizes that this sort of training was seen by the officer corps as required to mold peasant recruits into the sort of disciplined soldiers capable of defeating samurai rebels in the civil wars of the Meiji era. Reading Drea is instructive as to differences in the behavior of Japanese troops in wars leading up to WWII - Japanese treatment of civilians and POWs was exemplary during the Boxer Rebellion (where Japanese forces avoided massacres of civilians, unlike British, French, German, and Russian troops), and also during the Russo-Japanese war (despite gruesome casualties inflicted on them by Russian forces in fixed defenses).
However the IJA's behavior during its conquest and 'pacification' of Korea and Manchuria was markedly different, more reminiscent of European behavior in Africa and Asia on a larger scale (punitive expeditions, decimation, etc.).
kind of an odd matchup - that Aussie one.
My bully was more traditional - 8th grader; I was in 5th. But, I'd gone back to school the year before in 4th (a year behind my age group), after 4 years in a body cast. So, our age difference was a couple of years. He was larger than I, but "soft". The only way you get around in a body cast is to use your arms - hundreds of "push ups" and dozens of "pull ups" per day, in effect.
As it turned out, I had a couple of other advantages. My left hip and right wrist had been fused because of the bone-eating bacteria - the fused hip turned out to be a natural for a hip throw; the fused wrist turned my right arm into a pretty good club (you can't break your hand cuz it's solid bone :D).
Anyway this knucklehead (upon whom someone had wasted a good a$$hole by putting teeth in it) had a penchant for bullying 5th graders. One day he went after me - hit on the 5th grade cripple for some sport, I suppose. He shoved. I got him in a headlock; grounded him in a choke hold and pounded him a couple of dozen times in the face.
The net result was that thereafter he avoided me - and also my classmates. A moment of clarity some 58 years ago, which I still relish.
Regards
Mike
That that kind of matchup existed indicates the hell that fat kid must have been going through. In one of the interviews with the body slammer he said this has been going on for years and I believe he said that he was the target of many. Getting picked on by somebody so much younger, smaller and weaker further indicates that there was a whole group tormenting that kid. The body slammee would not have gone through with such a mismatch if he didn't think he had a lot of backup.
It seems that way from the video. I think it was another cruel twist in a long and sad story - just look how the other persons react in that video.
I think that in general we humans are very good at coming up with arguments to support our reactions and the one of the group. Some of them hold water, others not so much, some are rather objective others rely on perceptions and some apply just for 'our' good side and not for the bad others.
Being 'soft' against the enemy has been of course in general seen as a bigger weakness then being hard and tough. You don't want to be the weak guy and you want a brother in arm which is aggressive on the battlefield against the enemy.Quote:
(From Wikipeda, on the 'Indian mutiny')
In terms of sheer numbers, the casualties were much higher on the Indian side. A letter published after the fall of Delhi in the "Bombay Telegraph" and reproduced in the British press testified to the scale of the Indian casualties:
.... All the city's people found within the walls of the city of Delhi when our troops entered were bayoneted on the spot, and the number was considerable, as you may suppose, when I tell you that in some houses forty and fifty people were hiding. These were not mutineers but residents of the city, who trusted to our well-known mild rule for pardon. I am glad to say they were disappointed.[117]
Edward Vibart, a 19-year-old officer, recorded his experience:
It was literally murder... I have seen many bloody and awful sights lately but such a one as I witnessed yesterday I pray I never see again. The women were all spared but their screams on seeing their husbands and sons butchered, were most painful... Heaven knows I feel no pity, but when some old grey bearded man is brought and shot before your very eyes, hard must be that man's heart I think who can look on with indifference...
Note that in the first case civilians among them women were killed, while in the second 'only' male civilians were murdered, showing that it depended also on the circumstances, the unit and the leadership. Revenge seemed to have been a strong motivator. The first is glad that they did not give any quarter, while the second says he feels no pity, but that some of the killings were hard on him.
Such actions seem to have partly justified by such reports, similar to the one, horrific murder, posted earlier by JMA.
Quote:
The incidents of rape committed by Indian rebels against European women and girls appalled the British public. These atrocities were often used to justify the British reaction to the rebellion. British newspapers printed various eyewitness accounts of the rape of English women and girls. One such account published by The Times, regarding an incident where 48 English girls as young as 10 had been raped by Indian rebels in Delhi. Karl Marx later claimed that this was propaganda stating that the account was written by a clergyman in Bangalore, far from the events of the rebellion, though he produced no evidence to support this.[121]
Even when I today read the stories I feel the emotions.
That was 1857. Things were a little different for the Brits then.
But then fast forward to the 1980s and zimbabwe to the Gukurahundi genocide.
That great African liberator and darling of the political left Robert Mugabe committed a genocide in zimbabwe where men, women and children were massacred amongst the Ndebele people of that country. (20,000 confirmed but likely to have been much more.)
Not too much was heard out of North American and European universities over this of course.
Some light at the end of the tunnel though...Gukurahundi perpetrators face prosecution
Is it going to happen? Nah... no oil in zimbabwe you see and no balls in the West to address this genocide.
On the other hand, in Central America one of the real bastards of recent history is having some of his dirty laundry aired for the world to see—his countrymen are well aware of who he is and what he’s done—before his time on earth is done.
While I was and remain impressed with Dower's work, I also agree with John Shy's assessment that:Citation from: John Shy, "The Cultural Approach to the History of War," Proceedings of the Symposium on "The History of War as Part of General History", 12-13 March 1993, The Journal of Military History, 57:5 (special issue) (October 1993): 15. Shy recommends the book that was published after his presentation Craig Cameron, American Samurai: Myth and Imagination in the Conduct of Battle in the First Marine Division 1941-1951 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994). I have not yet gotten around to reading this book--which I may or may not own.:rolleyes:Quote:
the actual links between thought and action are more often assumed in [Dower's] book than explored.
With respect, I think you're taking lightly the debate that has caused an extraordinary degree of intellectual, political, and personal conflict among professional academic historians over the past two decades. While some historians are comfortable with a formulation in which the relationship between the 'base' and the 'superstructure' is much more dynamic than initially thought, American social and cultural historians are still slugging it out--to the unending sorrow of those who don't have tenure, to say nothing of a tenure-track job, in the Ivory Tower.
IMO, the historiographical debate is much more nuanced than you present in this summary. Yes, the Nazis viewed the conflict with Bolshevism as existential. However, this mortal struggle contained a racial component that was unrecoverable. Moreover, a number of historians including Peter Fritzsche, Peter Longerich, Wolfram Wette, Alan E. Steinweis, and Stephen G. Fritz (who has sparred with Bartov over an unfavorable review) have provided compelling arguments that rank and file Germans (both civilians and soldiers) had a higher level of 'buy in' to this component of Nazi ideology than previously thought.
Here, you present an interesting linkage between the American soldier (broadly conceived) and his/her former life as a civilian. If your interpretation is correct, what does it say of the efficacy of the training and indoctrination of American servicemen? Are they provided the technical expertise to kill while relying more on their social and cultural upbringing rather than the ethos of professional soldiers? If such is the case, can the "warrior spirit" be learned (much less taught)? Or, as many of the QPs at PS.COM aver, are warriors born and not made--and thus individual differences trump social and cultural backgrounds?
The tenure process keeps a lot of debates alive. Publish–or–perish, even if everyone on the tenure committee knows its a make–work publication. (While on an above department level tenure review committee my advisor went to the mat for a guy who had edited a collection of primary documents which no one else on the committee wanted to count toward his publication record. My advisor asked them which would count more in a couple of decades, a couple of deprecated journal articles or easy access to what would have otherwise been practically inaccessible documents? “They never thought of it that way.” Sigh.)
As for ideological buy–in, for me its as much a question of method as anything. I am dubious we can really get into a person’s head when we are sitting in the room with him or her, much less decades on. Others disagree, of course.
That wasn’t really my intent. I was implying that Westerners often like to pat themselves on the back about their relative degree of civilization (civilizedness?) and suggest that they really shouldn’t.Quote:
Here, you present an interesting linkage between the American soldier (broadly conceived) and his/her former life as a civilian. If your interpretation is correct, what does it say of the efficacy of the training and indoctrination of American servicemen? Are they provided the technical expertise to kill while relying more on their social and cultural upbringing rather than the ethos of professional soldiers? If such is the case, can the "warrior spirit" be learned (much less taught)? Or, as many of the QPs at PS.COM aver, are warriors born and not made--and thus individual differences trump social and cultural backgrounds?
In Chapter 2 he states:
The ideal response?Quote:
The ideal response to killing in war should be one similar to a mercy killing, sadness mingled with respect.
Not sure about that.
What feelings should I (or the gunship crew) have when I see a video on Youtube where a gunship kills some Afghans in the process of laying an IED?
All killing is not equal.
Is killing an enemy in war the same as that of a drive-by shooting? The killings perpetrated by a deranged serial killer?
So if soldiers select another word for killing -destroy/annihilate/dispatch/eradicate/erase/neutralize/obliterate/slay/waste/wipe out/zap - it has more to do with differentiating the act of killing which they get involved on with that of criminal murderers than mask their own actions. Of course much of the motivation behind the replacement words chosen for killing has no subliminal psychological basis at all.
Yeah, that doesn't seem like an ideal response at all. I mean, ideal for whom? The soldier, who is likely to either get himself killed out on the battlefield because he's distracted by all that sadness and respect, or have serious issues back home when the weight of all that sadness and respect comes down on him? The nation employing the soldier, who has to deal with a bunch more dead and damaged soldiers? Seems like the only party for whom that would be an ideal response is the guys the soldier is shooting at.
I get that what's supposed to happen is that the soldier's trigger finger will be more discerning if he empathizes with everyone he shoots at, but emotion as a mechanism for shoot/don't shoot differentiation seems like a terrible idea from the ground up.
There is a problem here which may have infected the US military (and maybe other militaries as well).
I note with horror that US junior officers themselves (as opposed reading lists imposed on them) list 'On Killing, by Dave Grossman' as number 7 on their own reading list. ( What do Army junior officers actually recommend reading?: Their own top 10 )
Someone needs to carry out some serious damage control right now as these young officers heads are being filled with nonsense.
I would like to learn more about Marlantes and his post Vietnam descent into a world of 'sex, drugs and rock and roll'. There are hundreds of thousands of soldiers (probably millions) over time - say since the Great War - who experienced more violent combat than him who did not fall apart.
Grossman and the like tell soldiers that they will suffer remorse (or worse) after having killed. (He does accept that for some/many/whatever this post killing phase may be fleeting - so fleeting that I must have missed it)
So if you don't have nightmares/have visions of the person you killed/suffer from depression/seek solace in drink and drugs/ etc etc then maybe you have a more serious problem.
This crap has to stop.
Surely there are enough US servicemen who have experienced combat and have not entered a self destructive spiral who can report that they did their duty and are still A-OK? Why is it always those who have issues who get interviewed and have their experiences included in case studies?
I contend that for the vast majority of soldiers the combat experience makes them stronger people.
Quote:
It is also fair to say that at the war's end the infantry soldier who played his full part emerged strengthened and enlivened by the experience of battle. Above all, he knew the true meaning and true value of comradeship. Fostered by unity of purpose, the team spirit of the New Zealand battalions was a force of great power, rarely encountered in other walks of life. The sense of comradeship and mutual reliance was new in degree to those who found themselves in the team, and in itself was enough to submerge much of the uncertainty and unpleasantness of war. – New Zealand Infantry In Battle In World War II
You’re not the first person to have asked some form of that question.
JMA & Motorfirebox: When Marlantes made his statement:
"The ideal response to killing in war should be one similar to a mercy killing, sadness mingled with respect."
Didn't that refer to how he felt the thing as a whole should be viewed decades, maybe many decades later? I don't have a copy to refer to (the library copy isn't back yet) so I may have the context wrong but what I remember is something more along the lines of being proud of professional accomplishment but a bit sad that the accomplishment involved killing a lot of people, NVA soldiers, who may not have had much choice about being there. Again I remember him saying that after decades of reflection, this is how he felt he should best view it.
That he came to that after so much time implies that Marlantes, the old man came to the conclusion that that is how old men should best view it. But what worked good for Marlantes long after the fighting stopped. For others who knows?
That viewpoint would not be so workable for soldiers during and in the immediate aftermath of fight I imagine. I read once of a B-26 crew that caught a Chinese unit in the open in the daylight and killed over 1,000, that one crew. Feeling anything but pride and happiness that those dead Chinese weren't around to kill G.I.s would have been a handicap to future missions.
I am not sure his descent into sex, drugs and rock and roll isn't anything more than a young man leaving a highly regimented world and entering the US of the late 60s and 70s (I forgot if he partied in Europe too). Sex, drugs and rock and roll was a way of life easily engaged in by a lot of people in those days. Maybe it had something to do with his combat experience but maybe it had just as much to do with being a young man in a place where it was easy.
I always thought Grossman was dead wrong too. He always talked about humans instead of culture and I never remembered reading anything about the Mongols being troubled by angst. The comments section in the Best Defense junior officer preferred reads list cited by JMA tore Grossman apart.
Not all of the writing is about guys who have problems. Most maybe because problems are inherently more dramatic than people who are well adjusted. But not all. Bob Greene wrote a very good book called "Duty" (I think). It was about his father and also about Paul Tibbets whom Greene got to know very well. IIRC Tibbets had no guilt, was proud of his unit and its accomplishment and knew that dropping the bomb ended the war sooner thereby saving many.
I reread the chapter just to be sure I didn't miss something.
Yes the book comprises Marlantes' reflections looking back some 40 years.
At the end of the chapter he sums it up like this:
You see here we go in the direction of Grossman in the thinking that killing is somehow 'bad' and will inevitably lead to feelings of guilt and grief.Quote:
We cannot expect normal eighteen year olds to kill someone and contain it in a healthy way. They must be helped to sort out what will be healthy grief about taking a life because it is part of the sorrow of war.
Not so. Combat killing in war is not murder, it is not a homicide, it is a justifiable killing. (I'm not talking atrocities here)
I am involved with a compilation of narratives written by individuals who served in my regiment during my little war. If there is grief it is over their mates who were KIA. Here is some 'raw data' from one account:
Did this kid fall apart then or later? No, like the vast majority of others who went through that mill he just got on with his life.Quote:
... Literally the minute we hit the ground the $hit hit the fan. All hell broke loose and a long and fierce fire fight took place. I experienced just about everything a soldier could expect to face in a lifetime in the army. There were airstrikes that nearly hit us, a terrorist threw and hit me with an empty AK magazine, two of my friends Kevin and Kim were seriously injured and flown out, and I had my first kill. I have never forgotten that moment….18 years old and I took another human beings life. Raised as a Catholic this had a severe impact on me. The worst was to come. At the end of the day we had to retrace our movements and collect all the bodies and drag them to a pick up point. The sight of the fatal injuries were horrific, limbs shattered, huge holes everywhere, exposed internal organs and brains oozing and falling adrift from the bodies. The yellow fat, the flies and the stench of death was gut retching. No training could have prepared me for this... "
Exactly. If you have heard the 'Green Leader' audio from a camp attack against ZIPRA in Zambia (nah... not a refugee camp) one can hear from the cockpit transmissions this euphoria you speak of.Quote:
That viewpoint would not be so workable for soldiers during and in the immediate aftermath of fight I imagine. I read once of a B-26 crew that caught a Chinese unit in the open in the daylight and killed over 1,000, that one crew. Feeling anything but pride and happiness that those dead Chinese weren't around to kill G.I.s would have been a handicap to future missions.
Well maybe I oversimplify his experience by using 'sex, drugs and rock and roll'. He claims to have has visions of the face of an NVA who threw a grenade at him and who he mat or may not have killed. I don't for one minute doubt his account but I do have my concerns of his mental state if that is all it took to tip him over the edge.Quote:
I am not sure his descent into sex, drugs and rock and roll isn't anything more than a young man leaving a highly regimented world and entering the US of the late 60s and 70s (I forgot if he partied in Europe too). Sex, drugs and rock and roll was a way of life easily engaged in by a lot of people in those days. Maybe it had something to do with his combat experience but maybe it had just as much to do with being a young man in a place where it was easy.
Perhaps for this and other reasons your man, Ken White, has stated often here that there should be some sort of psychological screening of all soldiers attempting to enter the service. (maybe he can clarify)
My experience is that those who had issues had them already when they entered the service. Combat had little to do with their later problems although 'the war' was a convenient excuse to hide behind.
Not in the comment I read:Quote:
I always thought Grossman was dead wrong too. He always talked about humans instead of culture and I never remembered reading anything about the Mongols being troubled by angst. The comments section in the Best Defense junior officer preferred reads list cited by JMA tore Grossman apart.
So please guide me to the critical comment.Quote:
7. On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society by Dave Grossman
Pete Kilner: This book opened my eyes to the psychological, physical and even moral impacts of killing another human being. As professionals of arms, we recruit, equip, train and order our Soldiers to kill. On Killing gave me a much deeper appreciation for what it’s like to kill, as well as how I can help my Soldiers prepare for and make sense of killing in war.
C.J. Douglas: I read this book with my company leadership— officers and SNCOs [senior non-commissioned officers]— prior to deploying to Iraq each time. It served as a discussion primer for the company to talk about the human factors in combat.
What is sad is that they need to work off Grossman as a base. There should be something better available for use.
Yes but... I'll bet the book 'Black Hearts: One platoon's descent into madness in Iraq's triangle of death' will sell more copies than that book about normal, well adjusted soldiers (read boring) as opposed to a bunch of head-jobs.Quote:
Not all of the writing is about guys who have problems. Most maybe because problems are inherently more dramatic than people who are well adjusted. But not all. Bob Greene wrote a very good book called "Duty" (I think). It was about his father and also about Paul Tibbets whom Greene got to know very well. IIRC Tibbets had no guilt, was proud of his unit and its accomplishment and knew that dropping the bomb ended the war sooner thereby saving many.
This headline nearly put me off even reading this BBC report, it has some "gems":Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-16973421Quote:
Prof Jones said a study undertaken in January and February 2010, found that around 70% of troops reported high levels of unit cohesion, and this was associated with having better mental health.
The report also found that the increased risks encountered in forward operating bases and patrol bases in Afghanistan were off-set by morale and esprit de corps. Yet, psychological problems and severe stress are not unavoidable, especially for those who have been on multiple tours to the region.
The charity Combat Stress say that rates of post traumatic stress disorder in personnel who served in Iraq and Afghanistan are around 4%.
The King's College London study says this increases to 7% for UK frontline troops in Afghanistan. US forces experience higher rates of post-traumatic stress disorder - 13% - due to longer tours of duty, and the use of reservists of a younger age.
Agreed. Perhaps Marlantes is mixing up what would be normal from a civilian peacetime standpoint and what would work in that situation, with what is in the best intests of the man in wartime and what would work in the that situation. The object of "what would work" is to help the man function normally in the months and years to come. Since the situations are so different, what would work would be different too.
Marlantes suggestion should be born in mind though, for if it proved useful to him, it may be proved useful to others. Another tool to be used if needed so to speak.
The father of a freind was a 20mm Oerlikon gunner on a ship in the Pacific in WWII. A natural born gunner like the man said in Twelvo O'Clock High. They were under Japanese air attack and Japanese plane flew by his gun very very close heading for a nearby ship. My freind's father swung the gun to kill the pilot, did so and splashed the plane immediately. The plane was close enought to see the pilot clearly and he always felt bad about what he did, not about splashing the plane, but about aiming for the pilot instead of the engine. It didn't matter that the quickest and surest way to down the plane was to get the pilot. He still felt bad.
So I believe that Marlantes sees that and maybe his way of looking at the thing would have helped that one particular Oerlikon gunner, then or later on.
I didn't read the Company Commander comment. The first 4 comments to the Best Defense blog post itself tear Grossman apart. Sorry for the confused wording on my part.
http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts...eir_own_top_10
True, Black Hearts may sell more. But a good thing to take from that as far as junior leaders reading it may be that they will learn more per page from a narritive of failures.
If you ever get a chance to read Duty, I would be interested in what you think. It is more about a son relating to his dead father though.
Have you read Black Hearts? I'm pretty sure the reason why it's a favorite among young officers is because it is a remarkably sharp picture of how massive leadership failures at the battalion and company level, combined with lack of forces (reflecting a much broader leadership failure), led to an almost intolerable strain on the platoon in question. That strain led directly to the lack of supervision which allowed some soldiers to commit the atrocities they did. It's one of the best books about the dynamics of one platoon throughout the entirety of their tour to come out of the Iraq war. It's a good read for platoon and company leaders, and an even better one for NCOs.Quote:
Yes but... I'll bet the book 'Black Hearts: One platoon's descent into madness in Iraq's triangle of death' will sell more copies than that book about normal, well adjusted soldiers (read boring) as opposed to a bunch of head-jobs.
It's clear from reading the book that most of the platoon are not "head jobs" - Green, the ringleader, who is a clear "head job" and regarded as such by most of the platoon, is not the focus of the book.
Yes, Marlantes obviously had to work through some stuff. Initially when he told of the incident of the NVA and the grenade he said he could not be sure whether he or hi radio op killed him. In the Chapter 'Guilt' he talks of the NVA he had killed... no longer any doubt it seems.
The issue here as I see it is when the officers have a tenuous grip on reality what chance do the troopies have? Marlantes speaks of being the second oldest in the company at 22. The oldest being the company commander at 23. This asks big questions of the USMC of that era as to where were all the NCOs who are the backbone of the Corps?
There are of course many other questions that are raised... but I don't wish to digress.
How Marlantes finally pulled himself together is less of an issue than how one so 'fragile' found himself in a position of command in combat in the first place. Then again we have his company commander was all of 23 and could hardly be expected to guide and council a young platoon commander during his introduction to combat... and of course where were the old/experienced NCOs when you needed them?
OK, what Marlantes said was:
"The ideal response to killing in war should be one similar to a mercy killing, sadness mingled with respect."
How do you teach this? Where does the 'mercy killing' angle come from? When the enemy gives you a hard time killing them it is nowhere near a 'mercy killing' which insinuates you assisting a helpless person on their way. If they have given a good account of themselves then some grudging respect would follow.
You appear to be characterizing the book as being about a bunch of nutjobs who raped and murdered an Iraqi girl. The book is not really about that at all, which is why it is one of the more popular books among junior officers (or at least those who read Company Command).
As a fellow Marine, I'm going to step up and defend Marlantes a little bit. Haven't read the second book, but have listened to a few interviews that he has given, so have heard some biographical information that you might not have. I'm not sure where you get the idea that Marlantes was a head case or an ineffective officer, but he did win the Navy Cross and numerous other medals in Vietnam. They don't give that first one out for just checking the box - his citation is here for those interested.
He also emerged from the rock 'n' roll Sixties with a Yale degree and became a Rhodes Scholar post-Vietnam, so maybe he didn't quite disintegrate to the extent you appear to be picturing? He did say that he never had any PTSD-type symptoms until after decades as a successful energy consultant in Asia.
JMA:
When he used the term mercy killing, I didn't think of people, I thought of animals. You put down a horse or a dog when you have to. Maybe Marlantes meant people but what I got was animals and I think that viewpoint would be more helpful to some, not all.
You can't teach it and I don't think it may be all that relevant but if an occasional individual was troubled by something, a suggestion that he think of it that way may be of help.
Very young officers and NCOs was perhaps the best that could be done in Vietnam. As the war progressed the NCOs got younger and younger because IIRC all the older guys who started out weren't available anymore, many because they didn't want to face the prospect of deployment after deployment. Maybe the same thing with the officers. We had a lot of people over there for years. That added to the inequities of the draft system and there just wasn't that much to choose from.
Marlantes was young but he was a very effective combat officer. The choice wasn't really between a Marlantes and somebody better; at that time it was between a Marlantes and a Calley.
What I said was:
No I have not read the book... but on the publicity in the media those involved in the rape and murders were indeed head-jobs. I mean does a sane person commit rape and murder? The death penalty should be obligatory in such cases.Quote:
Yes but... I'll bet the book 'Black Hearts: One platoon's descent into madness in Iraq's triangle of death' will sell more copies than that book about normal, well adjusted soldiers (read boring) as opposed to a bunch of head-jobs.
Back to my point... my position is simply that books dealing with such horrific crimes will (sadly) attract more readers than one about the non headline grabbing exploits of an officer who led his troops carefully and courageously through some operational tour.
He needs no defence. He has chosen to go public with his thoughts on this (and other) matters. What he writes can this be debated without fear or favour.Quote:
As a fellow Marine, I'm going to step up and defend Marlantes a little bit.
My point relating to my joy at reading this book by Marlantes is that he has been there and done that (Navy Cross, Bronze Star and more). This makes what he writes more credible than Grossman, Beevor, Holmes, Bourke etc who appear not to have experienced combat.
That said it does not mean that what he says in incontestable or that his bravery awards should he held up to somehow excuse his self admitted 'issues'. Not so.
Yes.
Regards
Mike
Yes he spoke of two incidents. One where he saved an injured seagull from dogs then rung its neck and having to have his dog put down.
Let me repeat what I said earlier:
At the end of the chapter he sums it up like this:
You see here we go in the direction of Grossman in the thinking that killing is somehow 'bad' and will inevitably lead to feelings of guilt and grief.Quote:
We cannot expect normal eighteen year olds to kill someone and contain it in a healthy way. They must be helped to sort out what will be healthy grief about taking a life because it is part of the sorrow of war.
Not so. Combat killing in war is not murder, it is not a homicide, it is a justifiable killing. (I'm not talking atrocities here)
I seems to have turned into a Henry Ford type production line by the end.Quote:
Very young officers and NCOs was perhaps the best that could be done in Vietnam. As the war progressed the NCOs got younger and younger because IIRC all the older guys who started out weren't available anymore, many because they didn't want to face the prospect of deployment after deployment. Maybe the same thing with the officers. We had a lot of people over there for years. That added to the inequities of the draft system and there just wasn't that much to choose from.
Talking about the older NCOs I noted that where they had been in the service before the war (meaning they joined up in peacetime for peacetime) tended to fall out early (meaning leave the service or find less onerous posts from where to see out the war). The younger ones who joined up during the war (or for the war) seemed to last a lot better. Similar back then for the US maybe?
Help me understand it. He did a year (?) tour of which how long was he a platoon commander? Raw soldiers and officers often do well but there is no substitute for experience.Quote:
Marlantes was young but he was a very effective combat officer. The choice wasn't really between a Marlantes and somebody better; at that time it was between a Marlantes and a Calley.
I don't follow the link with Calley.
JMA:Carl:Quote:
This asks big questions of the USMC of that era as to where were all the NCOs who are the backbone of the Corps?
JMA:Quote:
Very young officers and NCOs was perhaps the best that could be done in Vietnam. As the war progressed the NCOs got younger and younger because IIRC all the older guys who started out weren't available anymore, many because they didn't want to face the prospect of deployment after deployment. Maybe the same thing with the officers. We had a lot of people over there for years. That added to the inequities of the draft system and there just wasn't that much to choose from.
Those who served in WW II -- most of the senior NCOs in the Marines and the Army -- hit 20 years service and retirement eligibility in 1962. Some retired but most continued to serve, headed for 30 years. When the US committed to Viet Nam in large numbers, the relatively smaller pre-Viet Nam services had NCOs scattered around the world in jobs that ranged from non-essential to essential. The units that deployed to Viet Nam in 1965-66 took a slew of experienced senior NCOs and most did fairly well. Those NCOs finished their tours in 1966-67 and returned to CONUS. The 'second string' of NCOs culled from around the World went to VN in 1966-67 and they did less well but at least they were there. By 1968-69, it was time for the 'third string' -- except there was none. The stopgap was to send graduates of the Non-Commissioned Officers Candidate course as SGTs to VN plus some returning senior NCOs from the 1965-66 era and a second tour. Good kids, do anything you asked but they didn't know much...Quote:
Talking about the older NCOs I noted that where they had been in the service before the war (meaning they joined up in peacetime for peacetime) tended to fall out early (meaning leave the service or find less onerous posts from where to see out the war). The younger ones who joined up during the war (or for the war) seemed to last a lot better. Similar back then for the US maybe?
In the meantime, the world wide commitments did not go away; they were culled and cut but there were still plenty of requirements. In 1969 I volunteered to go to VN for a third tour but they called me and said as I had two tours, I would instead go fill a shortfall at either SHAPE or in the MAAG in Iran, my choice -- but VN was out for me. What had also happened was the folks who had completed a second tour decided to depart as had some after a single tour. Most of the WW II folks had over 25 years by 1967 and decided that WWI, Korea and A VN tour were enough. Those of us who'd been in Korea but not WW II couldn't have retired if we wanted to but we were sent to fiull those other requirements so that folks who had been in those slots could get a tour in the SEA War Games.
It all boils down to numbers -- demand exceeded supply due to casualties and retirements and the Army and Marines were directed to not hold anyone over involuntarily to avoid upsetting Voters. Lyndon didn't want to do that. In 2004, Bush did it regardless...
Buried in that comments section, is a link to Tom Aveni's critique of certain Grossman statements, The Dave Grossman Debate. Aveni is part of a larger LEO webpage, The Police Policy Council, which deals with the practical side (as well as the legal side) of LE use of deadly force - and of the various switches that flip or are flipped.Quote:
from you
The comments section in the Best Defense junior officer preferred reads list cited by JMA tore Grossman apart.
Aveni's work is well known in Michigan because of The MMRMA Deadly Force Project: A Critical Analysis of Police Shootings Under Ambiguous Circumstances (Thomas J. Aveni, MSFP; The Police Policy Studies Counci; February 9, 2008).
I discussed that report and its findings in the HVT thread, Back to the "Standard of Proof" .....
Regards
Mike
I agree.
Professor White is the man to ask. I only know what I read. Now if you want to know how to give soccer moms speeding tickets without them getting mad at you, I'm the guy to ask.
Again, refer to Prof. White. But from what I've read, that was a common pattern, at least with the Army. Six months with troops and then six months in some kind of staff position. Madness.
I understood you to say that Marlantes had some weaknesses from your point of view. When I mentioned Calley, it was along the same lines as when Ken said demand exceeded supply. The choice we had wasn't between Marlantes and an officer who wouldn't have had the weaknesses you perceived. It was between him and a horror of an officer like Calley.
Mike: I read Aveni's critique of Grossman that was buried in the comments. Very good and I got to bed later than usual that night.
Thank you for providing the link to that MMRMA report. I will read it. That kind of thing still fascinates me.
Marlantes' problems (thankfully for his troops) seemed to manifest themselves after his service in Vietnam. The fact that (by his own admission) he became barely functional for a period indicates that problem (rather than a weakness). So then by all accounts Marlantes' service in Vietnam was good.
So it all comes back to selection then. My point is that one needs to set minimum levels for intellectual capability (SAT, ACT) and physical ability and spend most of the time the leadership and performance under stress tests ... with the odd psych test thrown in.
The first prize is that nobody falls apart either during or after combat service.
Second prize is that the officer can hold himself and his men together during that combat service and face what the future brings thereafter.
An absolute no-no is for an officer himself to fall apart during a combat tour or prove to be unable to provide the necessary leadership to help his men keep it together when under the stress of combat. Officer selection should attempt to screen for this.
Where this selection and screening fails and the officer fails to perform in combat (and on operations in general) he should be relieved immediately.
JMA, by your measure the Wehrmacht was a terrible military force.
Its officers were falling apart quite often, turned into walking dead, many became alcoholics (especially in rear or flying units).
They did send their officers into vacation, into especially healthy and relaxing Kurorte", sent them away from combat on staff or training assignments and so on or simply insisted that they recovered fully after injuries, requiring weeks of recovery from combat.
Methinks you misunderstand me.
An officer falling apart in combat is the worst case scenario. Panic spreads faster than lightning (I'm told). Therefore all efforts must be made to prevent that happening. When it happens, and it will, act quickly to remove and replace he person.
Two problems. In peacetime there is less importance attached to careful officer selection (based on the martial requirements of soldiering) so those with gregarious sociability (but often little backbone) seem to slip through the selection net. As the war progresses the standard of candidates for officer selection starts to drop and the demand for 'numbers' allows weaker candidates to slip through.
While this is happening with the officers the NCOs are having their own problems (read recent post by Ken White on the matter). So at the end of the day you hope and pray your enemy are having greater problems than you are in this regard... because in the end it is the least incompetent military that wins the fighting war (of course the politicians are bound to screw that up as well).
Rotations are a good thing if they can be maintained (which as the war drags on they probably can't). The system which I agreed with was based on three years as a platoon/troop commander and thereafter 18 months/two years per posting.
The 'route' followed by an officer would be determined by his performance and not some egalitarian ticket punching requirement. That's as I see it.
Let's assume a small platoon of 20 and 100% officer retention for 30 years. Plus: The entire army is made up of platoons and all-officers staffs, nothing else.
5% of the platoon force would be officers, and 100% of the rest.
With officers serving 1/10th of their career as Plt Ldr, this would mean that there are 9 times as many officers outside of the platoons than inside.
It would be a 2/3 platoon 1/3 staff force with a ratio of enlisted/NCO : officer of 19:10.
Reduce officer retention and the qty of needed Plts would rise, increase platoon size and the army size needed to train enough officers as preparation for worse times would rise. Add non-officers to staffs and staffs would be even more bloated.
Additional layers of command can for the sake of simple math be considered represented by the staff pool.
3 years Plt command for every officer is simply unacceptable. Feel free to calculate it with variables of your choice; you end up with the conclusion that there are simply not enough platoons.
It might be debatable to send a 2nd Lt to a Coy, then promote him to 1st Lt once accustomed with the Coy's mode of operation and assign him to a Plt command for a year. The feel free to extend this for the best 1st Lts - not as an arrested career, but as a distinction and preparation for higher commands.
3 years for all is too much.