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(I hope I get the tone right on this. I don't mean to insult any person or institution) The interesting thing here is how military service is respected to such

(I hope I get the tone right on this. I don't mean to insult any person or institution) The interesting thing here is how military service is respected to such a high degree, bordering on worship, in the United States. Other countries have voluntary armies too,and yes soldiers get some respect as people who do a necessary and dangerous job, but you don't see the "start your conversation with "Thank You for your service" " style everyday deference outside the United States. This is a little baffling to a non American,especially since America's wars post WW2 are mostly invasions of random third world countries against underequipped,and mostly untrained enemies, and even then the victory/defeat ratio is very mixed. Genuine question, why does a soldier deserve so much more respect than a doctor or teacher or fireman or policeman or engineer? Specifically wrt the article under discussion,(to a non American) this article is a generic feel good article which doesn't say very much at all. (I am sure Dan is a great person. Just saying there wasn't (imo) much meat to the article).

jboydyhacker 15y ago
Well they get a special amount of respect for two reasons. The obvious one is that they offer to give up their life in the service of their country. The second reason is, in the past it's been viewed as a far less lucrative career. So while we might all be making a ton of money in Silicon Valley- these guys are in Afghanistan risking their lives (irrespective of your support of a particular war, the sacrifice is still being made). Also, there is still a lingering guilt over how servicemen were treated returning home from Vietnam. That still informs how the military is viewed as being owed a bit more respect than say an investment banker.
- plinkplonk 15y ago
  "The obvious one is that they offer to give up their life in the service of their country." Sure, but how is this particularly unique? Every country has people who do exactly that and they don't get this degree of deference on HN. Just as an example,this is true for the Afghani insurgent who tries to blow up Americans, or a member of the Viet Cong. I am sure they see the(ir respective) wars as a fight for independence against evil rapacious invaders. The Redcoat who served in the American War of Independence (the English Army, not the Hessians etc) was risking his life for King and Country. Do we (or should we) unequivocally respect anyone who risks their lives for a "higher" cause and low pay? As a thought experiment, if an Afghani hacker who joined the Taliban were to write a "What I learned from ten years of Jihad" article, would that be on the front page of HN? (hmm that might be an interesting article. I probably wouldn't agree with it, but it would be interesting ) Your other points are very helpful, specifically the one about the Vietnam backlash. I think I understand better now.Thank You.
  - codeslush 15y ago
    I'm not certain a soldier deserves more respect than a doctor, teacher, fireman, policeman or engineer. I'm not even certain a soldier gets more respect than many of those occupations listed. Soldiers do not ask for respect. It is given to them. I don't know why, but let me throw out a few possibilities: 1. It's a national holiday. This draws national attention to the sacrifices made - even in post WWII invasions. Perhaps, more than any other career, more lives have been lost, or negatively mentally/physically altered, by military members. I don't know the stats here - so it's an assumption. 2. Maybe it's related to the sacrifices made by soldiers. I'm not limiting this to just the soldiers that get killed or seriously wounded either. Are you aware that lower ranking enlisted members (the majority that will do 3 to 5 years and then get out) are at, or very near, poverty level? They don't do it for the money. 3. People admire/respect bravery. This goes for police officers and firemen too. This, I think, is why a lot of women like a "man in uniform." 4. Many American families have lost loved ones in wars dating back a long way. They recognize the sacrifices their ancestors made for the country. These memories and feelings carry forward generations. I was writing this response before jboydyhacker chimed in. So to address your latest comments: 1. Soldiers don't always agree with the battle they are fighting. 2. You shouldn't respect anyone unless you respect them. If your choice is to not respect a soldier, that's your right! 3. It's quite likely if an Afghani hacker who joined the Taliban wrote the article mentioned that it would get great press - somewhere. Maybe not here, but somewhere. Had I written this particular article, it would not have made front page. In fact, it would not have received 3 upvotes. People respect the GOOG as much as they respect the soldier. Combine the two, and...this is what happens. There - your engineer just got some respect! ;-) I will bet my next paycheck that if an Afghani hacker joined the Taliban and then came to America, worked for GOOG and published the article referenced - yes, it will make it to the front page of HN. 4. I am at war against my company's competition every time I try to convince someone our software solution is better than the alternative. I believe in what I try to sell. If I went to one of my competitors tomorrow, I'm sure I would fight just as hard for them. Does that translate to an answer for your Viet Cong argument?
    - plinkplonk 15y ago
      Mostly good points (except one see below). Thank you. fwiw it was a genuine question. I am not trying to be anti American, anti US army etc. I am very pro American in real life and get flak for that attitude hereabouts. I was just puzzled to wake up in the morning and find a fairly content-lite article on the front page of HN. It does happen occasionally, but this one felt really weird to me.It doesn't say anything particularly interesting (imo). Other cultures are different and working with a diverse set of people teaches you tolerance? Well duh. Fwiw I suspect what Dan really learned from the war will be discussed only over drinks with his fellow soldiers and not on any public forum. "I am at war against my company's competition every time I try to convince someone our software solution is better than the alternative." I suspect using the word "war" as a substitute for "competition" obscures the point. Reductio ad absurdum that means every investment banker (say) is a soldier and so worthy of respect. "If I went to one of my competitors tomorrow, I'm sure I would fight just as hard for them. Does that translate to an answer for your Viet Cong argument?" No :). Because my point was not on whether the Vietnamese soldier fought for his country as hard as the American soldier would do for his. That is a given (or close enough). I am not sure if a Vietnamese (or Afghan or whoever) wrote such a content free article, it would get upvoted so heavily. It seemed to me ( I freely admit I could be wrong) that the upvotes for this article stemmed from some kind of patriotic impulse than because its content was intellectually stimulating, or even relevant to the community. I am (or was) surprised at this (imo very content lite) article being on the front page of HN and getting so many upvotes and (perhaps unjustifiably) attributed it to the (imo) excess respect Americans have for their military. Your reply helps me understand better. Thank You.
- gnosis 15y ago
  "Also, there is still a lingering guilt over how servicemen were treated returning home from Vietnam." You might be interested to read a book called "The Spitting Image": "The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory and the Legacy of Vietnam" is a 1998 book by sociologist Jerry Lembcke. The book argues that the common claim that American soldiers were spat upon and insulted by anti-war protesters upon returning home from the Vietnam War is an urban legend intended to discredit the anti-war movement. https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/The_Spitting_Image https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/The_Spitting_...
  - lucasjung 15y ago
    I have several friends and relatives who personally received this exact treatment. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the Vietnam veterans I personally know did. When my father left the service, he went to work for Pan Am and spent his first few years flying troops between the U.S. and Vietnam, and witnessed this sort of behavior on a regular basis. My sampling is hardly large enough to be representative, but I think that the author of this book is completely out of touch with reality. Also, FWIW, it apparently still happens today: http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-protesters-spit-on-coast-guard-member-20111013 http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-prot...
    - gnosis 15y ago
      "I have several friends and relatives who personally received this exact treatment. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the Vietnam veterans I personally know did. When my father left the service, he went to work for Pan Am and spent his first few years flying troops between the U.S. and Vietnam, and witnessed this sort of behavior on a regular basis." These are certainly some significant data points, if what they told you actually happened. It would be interesting to know whether they spoke about this sort of treatment in the 60's and 70's, rather than waiting until much later -- when the "antiwar protestors spitting on war vets" image has become so much a part of American folklore. "Also, FWIW, it apparently still happens today: http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-protesters-spit-on-coast-guard-member-20111013* http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-prot... FOX has a long and sordid history of outright lies and incredibly biased reporting. This particular story doesn't even mention the alleged victim's name. Nor does it mention whether there were any witnesses.
tkahn6 15y ago
> Genuine question, why does a soldier deserve so much more respect than a doctor or teacher or fireman or policeman or engineer? Unique to the soldier among these professions is that the soldier gives up many of his civil rights to do his job. Personally that is a large contributor to the respect I have for servicemen.
lucasjung 15y ago
Others have stated some of the big reasons why service members get so much respect: they risk their lives for their country, they give up some of their Constitutional rights (although they also gain some extra rights, such as Article 31 rights), and they generally accept lower compensation than they might get on the outside (still true, but not nearly as true as it used to be). I would add another reason: they accept the burden of spending many years of their lives away from home, often missing major life events (weddings, graduations, even the births of their own children), as well as the lesser burden of having to move every 2-3 years. However, there's another side to your question: why is the U.S. like this, and not other countries? My initial response would be to turn that around: why don't people in other countries hold military service to a higher level of respect, especially considering that some of the reasons given here for respecting the military (e.g. giving up rights or accepting lower pay) are more applicable in some other countries? Just because the U.S. is unique in this regard, doesn't mean we're the ones doing it wrong. There have been others who felt their nations didn't give their troops enough respect: http://www.web-books.com/Classics/Poetry/Anthology/Kipling/Tommy.htm http://www.web-books.com/Classics/Poetry/Anthology/Kipling/T... That being said, I think that there are some important differences in U.S. culture that help to explain the difference. One thing relatively unique about the U.S. is that, unlike most nations, we do not have an ethnic identity. For example, Spaniards can feel united in the fact that they are all Spaniards, the Japanese can feel united in the fact that they are all Japanese, etc. Certainly there are ethnic sub-groups within most countries, but for the most part they have a national identity that is rooted in their shared ancestry, and of a shared history that in almost all cases predates the existing government by centuries. Since the U.S. lacks that, we have a national identity rooted in ideals, embodied specifically in the Constitution. There is certainly a great deal of political disagreement about the specifics of those ideals (and of the meaning of the Constitution), but the generalities are largely agreed upon. So what does this have to do with the regard in which we hold military service? Well, part of it is an awareness, dating back to our war of independence, that our Constitutionally guaranteed rights were underwritten by a lot of individuals who left their homes to fight for those shared ideals which define us. We literally would never have come to exist as a nation if it were not for our military services. We also have an ideal in this country of "Citizen Soldiers." It is not unique to the U.S. (I believe it originated in ancient Greece, but please correct me if I'm wrong), but I think that the only nations that currently subscribe strongly to this idea are the U.S. and Israel. It's the idea that our military consists primarily of individuals who are not lifelong military professionals: most of the people in our military serve for only a few years, then go back to being ordinary Americans. This means that we have a lot of veterans spread throughout our society, so that almost everyone knows at least one veteran, raising cultural awareness of military life. Conversely, in a nation where the military consists primarily of individuals who make a lifelong career of it, the military tends to be a little less visible to the bulk of the population because they don't have as many veterans to interact with. There are quite a few nations with universal conscription (everybody has to serve for a few years), but with the exception of Israel, I haven't seen this same "citizen soldier" meme in such nations. I think there are two reasons for this. First, the time spent is very short (usually 2-3 years, as opposed to the minimum enlistment in the U.S., which is 4-5 years) and at the end of that time the choice is "get out, or commit to a life-long career," as opposed to the U.S. military, which allows a succession of short re-enlistments. The second reason is most important: in countries with universal conscription, it's just seen as something everyone has to go through, like high school, and the conscripts are not fully integrated into the military: they are given minimal combat training and are used primarily for drudgework, with more thorough combat training coming only after an individual commits to a professional military career. Finally, I can't end without addressing this: >America's wars post WW2 are mostly invasions of random third world countries against underequipped,and mostly untrained enemies, and even then the victory/defeat ratio is very mixed. Our two biggest wars since WWII were Korea and Vietnam. The Korean war was really a war fought against China on Korean soil. The People's Army is hardly something to sneeze at. The NVA was also a modern army, equipped and trained by the Soviets and the Chinese. Our next-biggest war (and longest, by far) was Iraq, which showed that "underequipped, and mostly untrained enemies" can be quite deadly. This statement also seems to imply that we should judge the merits of military service on the basis of our political views about the particular wars fought, and on the degree of success achieved. In reality, we judge the merits of military service on the basis that these individuals volunteered to make tremendous sacrifices in service to a noble ideal: our Constitution, and the concept it embodies (a self-governed people).
yason 15y ago
I would happily welcome any collective respect for voluntary soldiers stretched to a totally overboard, ridiculous and even hypocritical extent instead of having a mandatory all-encompassing military or civil service as does, for example, Finland—and this is in the 2000's.
wysguy 15y ago
As a current active duty soldier, I think you are confusing gratitude with respect. I have often come across grateful American's who pat me on the back, but have not yet come across an American who respected my skills over a doctor, teacher, etc.
chernevik 15y ago
On Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg you can find a monument to a company of 200 Minnesotans. They probably couldn't articulate their motivations, they were probably, to the extent they cared, pro-slavery. These men attacked a formation of 10,000 Confederates, holding an otherwise fatal gap for the scant minutes needed for reinforcement. Lincoln later explained that they fought "so that government of the people, for the people, by the people shall not perish from this earth". Those that heard Lincoln probably felt he explained something they felt but couldn't say. But there weren't many of them, the company suffered 90% casualties in five minutes. Those losses couldn't have surprised them, the company complement was the survivors of a 30% casualty rate on the prior day. Previously George Washington caused a Continental Army, which had not been _paid_, to resign and disperse in submission to a frankly contemptible Continental Congress. America's is government by reasoned principles, but that reason sometimes seems little more than explication of some generous impulse of freedom and justice. In the American soldier we've seen that impulse cause young men to lay down their lives, and strong men lay down arms rather than pursue their just complaints. Only later did they understand the logical necessity of their sacrifice for human freedom. The justice of America's wars isn't always so clear, but that is not the fault of the soldier, who _must_ subordinate his own judgment to that of his countrymen lest he himself become a tyrant. Until the lion lies down with the lamb, societies will need armies. Democracies will need armies with power to meet tyrants without using that power to become tyrants. If America's first miracle was democratic government, its second is the emergence of soldiers willing to die for it. I don't know what impulses brought forward such soldiers among us, but I suspect those same impulses today inspire our reverence for them. I know I'll always regret that I didn't take my turn at a lousy but absolutely necessary job.

jboydyhacker 15y ago

Well they get a special amount of respect for two reasons. The obvious one is that they offer to give up their life in the service of their country. The second reason is, in the past it's been viewed as a far less lucrative career. So while we might all be making a ton of money in Silicon Valley- these guys are in Afghanistan risking their lives (irrespective of your support of a particular war, the sacrifice is still being made). Also, there is still a lingering guilt over how servicemen were treated returning home from Vietnam. That still informs how the military is viewed as being owed a bit more respect than say an investment banker.

plinkplonk 15y ago
"The obvious one is that they offer to give up their life in the service of their country." Sure, but how is this particularly unique? Every country has people who do exactly that and they don't get this degree of deference on HN. Just as an example,this is true for the Afghani insurgent who tries to blow up Americans, or a member of the Viet Cong. I am sure they see the(ir respective) wars as a fight for independence against evil rapacious invaders. The Redcoat who served in the American War of Independence (the English Army, not the Hessians etc) was risking his life for King and Country. Do we (or should we) unequivocally respect anyone who risks their lives for a "higher" cause and low pay? As a thought experiment, if an Afghani hacker who joined the Taliban were to write a "What I learned from ten years of Jihad" article, would that be on the front page of HN? (hmm that might be an interesting article. I probably wouldn't agree with it, but it would be interesting ) Your other points are very helpful, specifically the one about the Vietnam backlash. I think I understand better now.Thank You.
- codeslush 15y ago
  I'm not certain a soldier deserves more respect than a doctor, teacher, fireman, policeman or engineer. I'm not even certain a soldier gets more respect than many of those occupations listed. Soldiers do not ask for respect. It is given to them. I don't know why, but let me throw out a few possibilities: 1. It's a national holiday. This draws national attention to the sacrifices made - even in post WWII invasions. Perhaps, more than any other career, more lives have been lost, or negatively mentally/physically altered, by military members. I don't know the stats here - so it's an assumption. 2. Maybe it's related to the sacrifices made by soldiers. I'm not limiting this to just the soldiers that get killed or seriously wounded either. Are you aware that lower ranking enlisted members (the majority that will do 3 to 5 years and then get out) are at, or very near, poverty level? They don't do it for the money. 3. People admire/respect bravery. This goes for police officers and firemen too. This, I think, is why a lot of women like a "man in uniform." 4. Many American families have lost loved ones in wars dating back a long way. They recognize the sacrifices their ancestors made for the country. These memories and feelings carry forward generations. I was writing this response before jboydyhacker chimed in. So to address your latest comments: 1. Soldiers don't always agree with the battle they are fighting. 2. You shouldn't respect anyone unless you respect them. If your choice is to not respect a soldier, that's your right! 3. It's quite likely if an Afghani hacker who joined the Taliban wrote the article mentioned that it would get great press - somewhere. Maybe not here, but somewhere. Had I written this particular article, it would not have made front page. In fact, it would not have received 3 upvotes. People respect the GOOG as much as they respect the soldier. Combine the two, and...this is what happens. There - your engineer just got some respect! ;-) I will bet my next paycheck that if an Afghani hacker joined the Taliban and then came to America, worked for GOOG and published the article referenced - yes, it will make it to the front page of HN. 4. I am at war against my company's competition every time I try to convince someone our software solution is better than the alternative. I believe in what I try to sell. If I went to one of my competitors tomorrow, I'm sure I would fight just as hard for them. Does that translate to an answer for your Viet Cong argument?
  - plinkplonk 15y ago
    Mostly good points (except one see below). Thank you. fwiw it was a genuine question. I am not trying to be anti American, anti US army etc. I am very pro American in real life and get flak for that attitude hereabouts. I was just puzzled to wake up in the morning and find a fairly content-lite article on the front page of HN. It does happen occasionally, but this one felt really weird to me.It doesn't say anything particularly interesting (imo). Other cultures are different and working with a diverse set of people teaches you tolerance? Well duh. Fwiw I suspect what Dan really learned from the war will be discussed only over drinks with his fellow soldiers and not on any public forum. "I am at war against my company's competition every time I try to convince someone our software solution is better than the alternative." I suspect using the word "war" as a substitute for "competition" obscures the point. Reductio ad absurdum that means every investment banker (say) is a soldier and so worthy of respect. "If I went to one of my competitors tomorrow, I'm sure I would fight just as hard for them. Does that translate to an answer for your Viet Cong argument?" No :). Because my point was not on whether the Vietnamese soldier fought for his country as hard as the American soldier would do for his. That is a given (or close enough). I am not sure if a Vietnamese (or Afghan or whoever) wrote such a content free article, it would get upvoted so heavily. It seemed to me ( I freely admit I could be wrong) that the upvotes for this article stemmed from some kind of patriotic impulse than because its content was intellectually stimulating, or even relevant to the community. I am (or was) surprised at this (imo very content lite) article being on the front page of HN and getting so many upvotes and (perhaps unjustifiably) attributed it to the (imo) excess respect Americans have for their military. Your reply helps me understand better. Thank You.
gnosis 15y ago
"Also, there is still a lingering guilt over how servicemen were treated returning home from Vietnam." You might be interested to read a book called "The Spitting Image": "The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory and the Legacy of Vietnam" is a 1998 book by sociologist Jerry Lembcke. The book argues that the common claim that American soldiers were spat upon and insulted by anti-war protesters upon returning home from the Vietnam War is an urban legend intended to discredit the anti-war movement. https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/The_Spitting_Image https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/The_Spitting_...
- lucasjung 15y ago
  I have several friends and relatives who personally received this exact treatment. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the Vietnam veterans I personally know did. When my father left the service, he went to work for Pan Am and spent his first few years flying troops between the U.S. and Vietnam, and witnessed this sort of behavior on a regular basis. My sampling is hardly large enough to be representative, but I think that the author of this book is completely out of touch with reality. Also, FWIW, it apparently still happens today: http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-protesters-spit-on-coast-guard-member-20111013 http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-prot...
  - gnosis 15y ago
    "I have several friends and relatives who personally received this exact treatment. In fact, the overwhelming majority of the Vietnam veterans I personally know did. When my father left the service, he went to work for Pan Am and spent his first few years flying troops between the U.S. and Vietnam, and witnessed this sort of behavior on a regular basis." These are certainly some significant data points, if what they told you actually happened. It would be interesting to know whether they spoke about this sort of treatment in the 60's and 70's, rather than waiting until much later -- when the "antiwar protestors spitting on war vets" image has become so much a part of American folklore. "Also, FWIW, it apparently still happens today: http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-protesters-spit-on-coast-guard-member-20111013* http://www.myfoxboston.com/dpp/news/local/occupy-boston-prot... FOX has a long and sordid history of outright lies and incredibly biased reporting. This particular story doesn't even mention the alleged victim's name. Nor does it mention whether there were any witnesses.

tkahn6 15y ago

> Genuine question, why does a soldier deserve so much more respect than a doctor or teacher or fireman or policeman or engineer? Unique to the soldier among these professions is that the soldier gives up many of his civil rights to do his job. Personally that is a large contributor to the respect I have for servicemen.

lucasjung 15y ago

Others have stated some of the big reasons why service members get so much respect: they risk their lives for their country, they give up some of their Constitutional rights (although they also gain some extra rights, such as Article 31 rights), and they generally accept lower compensation than they might get on the outside (still true, but not nearly as true as it used to be). I would add another reason: they accept the burden of spending many years of their lives away from home, often missing major life events (weddings, graduations, even the births of their own children), as well as the lesser burden of having to move every 2-3 years. However, there's another side to your question: why is the U.S. like this, and not other countries? My initial response would be to turn that around: why don't people in other countries hold military service to a higher level of respect, especially considering that some of the reasons given here for respecting the military (e.g. giving up rights or accepting lower pay) are more applicable in some other countries? Just because the U.S. is unique in this regard, doesn't mean we're the ones doing it wrong. There have been others who felt their nations didn't give their troops enough respect: http://www.web-books.com/Classics/Poetry/Anthology/Kipling/Tommy.htm http://www.web-books.com/Classics/Poetry/Anthology/Kipling/T... That being said, I think that there are some important differences in U.S. culture that help to explain the difference. One thing relatively unique about the U.S. is that, unlike most nations, we do not have an ethnic identity. For example, Spaniards can feel united in the fact that they are all Spaniards, the Japanese can feel united in the fact that they are all Japanese, etc. Certainly there are ethnic sub-groups within most countries, but for the most part they have a national identity that is rooted in their shared ancestry, and of a shared history that in almost all cases predates the existing government by centuries. Since the U.S. lacks that, we have a national identity rooted in ideals, embodied specifically in the Constitution. There is certainly a great deal of political disagreement about the specifics of those ideals (and of the meaning of the Constitution), but the generalities are largely agreed upon. So what does this have to do with the regard in which we hold military service? Well, part of it is an awareness, dating back to our war of independence, that our Constitutionally guaranteed rights were underwritten by a lot of individuals who left their homes to fight for those shared ideals which define us. We literally would never have come to exist as a nation if it were not for our military services. We also have an ideal in this country of "Citizen Soldiers." It is not unique to the U.S. (I believe it originated in ancient Greece, but please correct me if I'm wrong), but I think that the only nations that currently subscribe strongly to this idea are the U.S. and Israel. It's the idea that our military consists primarily of individuals who are not lifelong military professionals: most of the people in our military serve for only a few years, then go back to being ordinary Americans. This means that we have a lot of veterans spread throughout our society, so that almost everyone knows at least one veteran, raising cultural awareness of military life. Conversely, in a nation where the military consists primarily of individuals who make a lifelong career of it, the military tends to be a little less visible to the bulk of the population because they don't have as many veterans to interact with. There are quite a few nations with universal conscription (everybody has to serve for a few years), but with the exception of Israel, I haven't seen this same "citizen soldier" meme in such nations. I think there are two reasons for this. First, the time spent is very short (usually 2-3 years, as opposed to the minimum enlistment in the U.S., which is 4-5 years) and at the end of that time the choice is "get out, or commit to a life-long career," as opposed to the U.S. military, which allows a succession of short re-enlistments. The second reason is most important: in countries with universal conscription, it's just seen as something everyone has to go through, like high school, and the conscripts are not fully integrated into the military: they are given minimal combat training and are used primarily for drudgework, with more thorough combat training coming only after an individual commits to a professional military career. Finally, I can't end without addressing this: >America's wars post WW2 are mostly invasions of random third world countries against underequipped,and mostly untrained enemies, and even then the victory/defeat ratio is very mixed. Our two biggest wars since WWII were Korea and Vietnam. The Korean war was really a war fought against China on Korean soil. The People's Army is hardly something to sneeze at. The NVA was also a modern army, equipped and trained by the Soviets and the Chinese. Our next-biggest war (and longest, by far) was Iraq, which showed that "underequipped, and mostly untrained enemies" can be quite deadly. This statement also seems to imply that we should judge the merits of military service on the basis of our political views about the particular wars fought, and on the degree of success achieved. In reality, we judge the merits of military service on the basis that these individuals volunteered to make tremendous sacrifices in service to a noble ideal: our Constitution, and the concept it embodies (a self-governed people).

yason 15y ago

I would happily welcome any collective respect for voluntary soldiers stretched to a totally overboard, ridiculous and even hypocritical extent instead of having a mandatory all-encompassing military or civil service as does, for example, Finland—and this is in the 2000's.

wysguy 15y ago

As a current active duty soldier, I think you are confusing gratitude with respect. I have often come across grateful American's who pat me on the back, but have not yet come across an American who respected my skills over a doctor, teacher, etc.

chernevik 15y ago

On Cemetery Ridge at Gettysburg you can find a monument to a company of 200 Minnesotans. They probably couldn't articulate their motivations, they were probably, to the extent they cared, pro-slavery. These men attacked a formation of 10,000 Confederates, holding an otherwise fatal gap for the scant minutes needed for reinforcement. Lincoln later explained that they fought "so that government of the people, for the people, by the people shall not perish from this earth". Those that heard Lincoln probably felt he explained something they felt but couldn't say. But there weren't many of them, the company suffered 90% casualties in five minutes. Those losses couldn't have surprised them, the company complement was the survivors of a 30% casualty rate on the prior day. Previously George Washington caused a Continental Army, which had not been _paid_, to resign and disperse in submission to a frankly contemptible Continental Congress. America's is government by reasoned principles, but that reason sometimes seems little more than explication of some generous impulse of freedom and justice. In the American soldier we've seen that impulse cause young men to lay down their lives, and strong men lay down arms rather than pursue their just complaints. Only later did they understand the logical necessity of their sacrifice for human freedom. The justice of America's wars isn't always so clear, but that is not the fault of the soldier, who _must_ subordinate his own judgment to that of his countrymen lest he himself become a tyrant. Until the lion lies down with the lamb, societies will need armies. Democracies will need armies with power to meet tyrants without using that power to become tyrants. If America's first miracle was democratic government, its second is the emergence of soldiers willing to die for it. I don't know what impulses brought forward such soldiers among us, but I suspect those same impulses today inspire our reverence for them. I know I'll always regret that I didn't take my turn at a lousy but absolutely necessary job.