Slouching Towards Oblivion

Sunday, November 11, 2012

For Veterans' Day

A quote by PFC Robert Leckie (USMC, Guadalcanal, 1942: [in a letter to Vera Keller - the future Mrs Leckie]
Dear Vera, it seems a lifetime since we met outside Saint Mary's. This great undertaking for God and country has landed us in a tropical paradise, somewhere in what Jack London refers to as "those terrible Solomons." It is a garden of Eden. The jungle holds both beauty and terror in its depths, most terrible of which is man. We have met the enemy and have learned nothing more about him. I have, however, learned some things about myself. There are things men can do to one another that are sobering to the soul. It is one thing to reconcile these things with God, but another to square it with yourself.
There's nothing worse than war.  And nothing with less believable justification.

I refuse to glorify the war or the warrior by waxing poetic about either.  We simply have to find ways to settle our differences that don't include bashing each over the head with sticks and rocks.

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