Independence Day

It was unintentional, but I finished E. B. Sledge's War War II memoir With the Old Breed:  At Peleliu and Okinawa July 3 and now post this July 4.  Sledge, aka "Sledgehammer," of Mobile, Alabama, enlisted in the Marines in 1942.  With the Old Breed guides us through his experiences of basic training, traveling to the South Pacific, and his two combat experiences at Peleliu and Okinawa with the 1st Division, 3d Battalion, 5th Marines, K Company.  Sledge survived combat and eventually became a professor of biology at the University of Montevallo, just south of Birmingham, Alabama.

Many rank With the Old Breed among the best war memoirs ever written.  It became one of the sources for the HBO miniseries The Pacific as well as Studs Terkel's The Good War.  I suspect this acclaim is due in large part to Sledge's cynicism and his depictions of the horror of war.  The reader will find no glory of war in this account.  At one point as Sledge's company is bogged down on a ridge in Okinawa under unending rain Sledge must endure the terrible view of the body of a Marine, in sitting position whose face seems to gaze directly at Sledge, slowly decomposing out in no man's land.

After his accounts of each battle Sledge sums up his thoughts.  After Peleliu:

None of us would ever be the same after what we had endured.  To some degree that is true, of course, of all human experience.  But something in me died at Peleliu.  Perhaps it was a childish innocence that accepted as faith the claim that man is basically good.  Possibly I lost faith that politicians in high places who do not have to endure war's savagery will ever stop blundering and sending others to endure it.

But I also learned important things on Peleliu.  A man's ability to depend on his comrades and immediate leadership is absolutely necessary.  I'm convinced that our discipline, esprit de corps, and tough training were the ingredients that equipped me to survive the ordeal physically and mentally--given a lot of good luck, of course.  I learned realism, too.  To defeat an enemy as tough and dedicated as the Japanese, we had to be just as tough.  We had to be just as dedicated to America as they were to their emperor.  I think this was the essence of Marine Corps doctrine in World War II, and that history vindicates this doctrine.

After Okinawa, and the conclusion to his book:

War is brutish, inglorious, and a terrible waste.  Combat leaves an indelible mark on those who are forced to endure it.  The only redeeming factors were my comrades' incredible bravery and their devotion to each other.  Marine Corps training taught us to kill efficiently and to try to survive.  But it also taught us loyalty to each other--and love.  That esprit de corps sustained us.

Until the millenium arrives [this was published in 1981] and countries cease trying to enslave others, it will be necessary to accept one's responsibilities and to be willing to make sacrifices for one's country--as my comrades did.  As the troops used to say, "If the country is good enough to live in, it's good enough to fight for."  With privilege goes responsibility."

Good words for Independence Day.