[lit-ideas] Re: Seriously/SLAM
- From: Mike Geary <jejunejesuit.geary2@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 12 Jun 2010 09:14:25 -0500
Eric: "...so far outside the bounds of manly conduct in war as to seem
inhuman. How quaint! (Sixty years later nuclear missiles aimed at all major
population centers.)"
You anticipated my reaction. : )
Mike Geary
On Fri, Jun 11, 2010 at 3:09 PM, Eric Yost <mr.eric.yost@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>
> On 6/10/2010 5:38 PM, John Wager wrote:
>
>> Now it seems the point is to document how bad you are, how much of a
>> "jackass" (recent TV show) you are.
>>
>
> Read Teddy Roosevelt's _The Rough Riders_ a while ago. The comparison with
> today's attitudes was vertiginous and a bit nauseating.
>
> Gatling guns in those battles too. The Spanish had the advantage of home
> ground, provisions, and the latest weaponry. While the Spanish had smokeless
> rounds, the terribly disorganized Americans had old Civil War equipment --
> smoke from gunshots giving away one's position -- and hardly any food.
>
> Particularly interesting was TR's account of the Spanish snipers, who
> deliberately killed doctors and ministers attending the wounded -- the
> single moment in the narrative where TR drops his calmly balanced style and
> expresses outrage. He assembled a group of backwoodsmen, sheriffs, and
> "Harvard hunters". They were sent out to hunt the snipers and in three days
> had killed them all without suffering any casualties. It's a moment of
> satisfaction actually, since snipers are "supposed" to shoot soldiers,
> particularly officers, but to shoot doctors and chaplains, in the
> sensibility established by the narrative, is so far outside the bounds of
> manly conduct in war as to seem inhuman. How quaint! (Sixty years later
> nuclear missiles aimed at all major population centers.)
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