Soldiers

"Military experience may increase suicidal behavior, primarily due to the painful and provocative situations resulting from combat, which may increase acquired capability and enhance one’s ability to inflict lethal self-injury. Combat exposure may also result in feelings of thwarted belongingness and increased feelings of being a burden on others. When all three of these components are present, an individual’s suicide risk is likely to be high. Suicide in the military is a complex phenomenon, but using the IPTS framework may help improve the situation for some of our nation’s most valuable resources and the families of those who serve."

"One study found that military personnel are more likely to report “attitudinal barriers,” such as concerns about being seen as weak or that unit leadership would treat them differently, to seeking out mental health services, rather than “structural barriers,” such as the cost of health care (Hoge et al., 2004). Military personnel experiencing symptoms of PTSD may also experience increased feelings of being a burden on the military. One study of OIF veterans found that those with PTSD (approximately 16% of the sample) reported more sick call visits, more missed workdays, and more problems with physical health (Hoge et al., 2007). Furthermore, approximately one third of the homeless population consists of military veterans (Gamache, Rosenheck, & Tessler, 2003), a situation that may further increase perceived burdensomeness on family and/or society."

"For many individuals who experience feelings of positive contribution while serving in the military, a return from combat or discharge from the military may result in experiencing feelings of loss of purpose or perceived burdensomeness. While on the front lines or in the military, the individual may have felt a greater purpose; but, once discharged, the individual may feel like he or she has nothing more to contribute, or that he or she is a drain on society because of disabling injuries or other adjustment difficulties (Brenner et al., 2008). One study found that excessive motivation to excel in the Army was an important risk factor for completed suicide among soldiers who experienced combat (Bodner, Ben-Artzi, & Kaplan, 2006), suggesting that perhaps these same individuals were experiencing greater feelings of failure or perceived burdensomeness at the time of their deaths. Perceptions of burdensomeness may be particularly increased if one abandons or is expelled from the military. One study of veteran Finnish peacekeepers found that those who did not complete their service commitment due to premature repatriation had increased suicide risk relative to those who completed their service (Ponteva et al., 2000). In another study, a psychological autopsy of soldiers who died by suicide found that involuntary repatriation was a significant risk factor for completed suicide (Thoresen et al., 2006). In a related note, military personnel who develop mental disorders have significantly higher than average rates of attrition from the military (Hoge et al., 2002). There is also some evidence that legal problems, misconduct, unauthorized absences, and substance use problems may mediate the relationship between psychological illness and early attrition from the military (Hoge et al., 2005)."

"Military service is likely to be a positive occupational experience for most individuals, instilling feelings of honor, accomplishment, contributing to society, and having a sense of mission. Many military personnel may feel like they are part of a greater cause for their country and that they are helping to protect their family. In fact, feelings of pride about serving in the military have been found to exhibit significant negative correlations with a variety of negative outcomes (e.g., depression) in individuals involved in peacekeeping missions (Orsillo et al., 1998). Veterans of World War II and the Korean War reported that combat experience taught them how to cope with adversity and be self-disciplined, and it also instilled feelings of greater independence and broader perspectives on life (Elder & Clipp, 1989). One review found that most veterans of war and peacekeeping reported more positive than negative effects of theater experience, and that those who viewed the combat as having an overall positive meaning (i.e., a good cause) also reported better psychological adjustment (Schok et al., 2008). There is also evidence that many Vietnam veterans reported high levels of life satisfaction and attainment (Vogt et al., 2004), including occupational attainment. Yet, this same study also found that these positive effects of military service were attenuated by exposure to combat, wartime atrocities, perceived threats, and malevolent environments."

"Here rests in honored glory an American soldier known but to God."

"These endured all and gave all that justice among nations might prevail and that mankind might enjoy freedom and inherit peace."

"So, as you go into battle, remember your ancestors and remember your descendants."

"Our God and Souldiers we alike adore, Ev'n at the Brink of danger; not before: After deliverance, both alike required; Our God's forgotten, and our Souldiers slighted."

"It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived."

"An atheist could not be as great a military leader as one who is not an atheist."

"The soldier, above all other men, is required to perform the highest act of religious teaching—sacrifice. In battle and in the face of danger and death he discloses those divine attributes which his Maker gave when He created man in his own image. No physical courage and no brute instincts can take the place of the divine annunciation and spiritual uplift which will alone sustain him."

"Old soldiers never die; they just fade away."

"I have every confidence in the ultimate success of our joint cause; but success in modern war requires something more than courage and a willingness to die: it requires careful preparation. This means the furnishing of sufficient troops and sufficient material to meet the known strength of a potential enemy. No general can make something out of nothing. My success or failure will depend primarily upon the resources which the respective governments place at my disposal. My faith in them is complete. In any event I shall do my best. I shall keep the soldier's faith."

"This extraordinary war in which we are engaged falls heavily upon all classes of people, but the most heavily upon the soldier. For it has been said, all that a man hath will he give for his life; and while all contribute of their substance the soldier puts his life at stake, and often yields it up in his country's cause. The highest merit, then, is due to the soldier."

"Honor to the Soldier, and Sailor everywhere, who bravely bears his country's cause. Honor also to the citizen who cares for his brother in the field, and serves, as he best can, the same cause—honor to him, only less than to him, who braves, for the common good, the storms of heaven and the storms of battle."

"Oh, it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' 'Tommy, go away'; But it's 'Thank you, Mister Atkins', when the band begins to play— The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play, Oh, it's 'Thank you, Mister Atkins,' when the band begins to play."

"The patriot volunteer, fighting for country and his rights, makes the most reliable soldier on earth."

"Soldiers! When it is announced that a respected and beloved leader has died for our freedom in the course of the battle, do not grieve, do not lose hope! Observe that anyone who dies for his country is a fortunate man, but death takes what it wants, indiscriminately, in peace-time as well as in war. It is better to die with freedom than without it. Our fathers who have maintained our country in freedom for us have offered us their life in sacrifice; so let them be an example to you! Soldier, trader, peasant, young and old, man and woman, be united! Defend your country by helping each other! According to ancient custom, the women will stand in defence of their country by giving encouragement to the soldier and by caring for the wounded. Although Italy is doing everything possible to disunite us, whether Christian or Muslim we will unitedly resist. shelter and our shield is God. May our attackers' new weapons not deflect you from your thoughts which are dedicated to your defence of Ethiopia's freedom. Your King who speaks to you today will at that time be in your midst, prepared to shed his blood for the liberty of Ethiopia."

"If I should die, think only this of me: That there's some corner of a foreign field That is for ever England."

"Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corse to the rampart we hurried."

"Oh, a strange hand writes for our dear son—O, stricken mother's soul! All swims before her eyes—flashes with black—she catches the main words only; Sentences broken—gun-shot wound in the breast, cavalry skirmish, taken to hospital; At present low, but will soon be better."

"Where are the boys of the old Brigade, Who fought with us side by side?"

"Our youth has stormed the hosts of hell and won; Yet we who pay the price of their oblation Know that the greater war is just begun Which makes humanity the nations' Nation."

"The more we work, the more we may, It makes no difference to our pay."

"Under the tricolor, long khaki files of them Through the Étoile, down the Champs Elysées Marched, while grisettes blew their kisses to miles of them, And only the old brushed the tear stains away— Out where the crows spread their ominous pinions Shadowing France from Nancy to Fay, Singing they marched 'gainst the Kaiser's gray minions, Singing the song of boyhood at play."

"Old soldiers never die; They fade away!"

"Dans ce pays-ci il est bon de tuer de temps en temps un admiral pour encourager les autres."

"Home they brought him slain with spears, They brought him home at even-fall."

"For this is England's greatest son, He that gain'd a hundred fights, And never lost an English gun."

"Foremost captain of his time, Rich in saving common sense."

"Sleep, soldiers! still in honored rest Your truth and valor wearing: The bravest are the tenderest,— The loving are the daring."

"Does Djilas, who is himself a writer, not know what human suffering and the human heart are? Can't he understand it if a soldier who has crossed thousands of kilometers through blood and fire and death has fun with a wench or takes some trifle?"

"When the military man approaches, the world locks up its spoons and packs off its womankind."

"A soldier is an anachronism of which we must get rid."

"Yet what can they see in the longest kingly line in Europe, save that it runs back to a successful soldier?"

"Although too much of a soldier among sovereigns, no one could claim with better right to be a sovereign among soldiers."

"Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er, Dream of fighting fields no more: Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking, Morn of toil, nor night of waking."

"Abner … smote him under the fifth rib."

"'Tis a far, far cry from the "Minute-Men," And the times of the buff and blue To the days of the withering Jorgensen And the hand that holds it true. 'Tis a far, far cry from Lexington To the isles of the China Sea, But ever the same the man and the gun— Ever the same are we."

"A thousand leagues of ocean, a company of kings, You came across the watching world to show how heroes die. When the splendour of your story Builds the halo of its glory, 'Twill belt the earth like Saturn's rings And diadem the sky."

"I want to see you shoot the way you shout."

"But off with your hat and three times three for Columbia's true-blue sons; The men below who batter the foe—the men behind the guns!"

"Miles gloriosus."

"The muffled drum's sad roll has beat The soldier's last tattoo; No more on Life's parade shall meet The brave and fallen few. On Fame's eternal camping-ground Their silent tents are spread, And Glory guards, with solemn round The bivouac of the dead."

"Since as a rule only the king could afford to hire mercenaries in bulk they strengthened both King and nobles against the people with whom they had no ties or sympathy. While much more expensive than native troops, they left no troublesome widows and orphans; and at the end of the campaign they could be sent away unlike a country's own men coming home from the wars."

"Soldiers are not as other men – that is the lesson that I have learned from a life cast among warriors. The lesson has taught me to view with extreme suspicion all theories and representations of war that equate it with any other activity in human affairs. War undoubtedly connects, as the theorists demonstrate, with economics and diplomacy and politics. Connection does not amount to identity or even similarity. War is wholly unlike diplomacy or politics because it must be fought by men whose values and skills are not those of politicians and diplomats. They are those of a world apart, a very ancient world, which exists in parallel with the everyday world but does not belong to it. Both worlds change over time, and the warrior world adapts in step to the civilian. It follows it, however, at a distance. The distance can never be closed, for the culture of the warrior can never be that of civilization itself. All civilisations owe their origins to the warrior; their cultures nurture the warriors who defend them, and the differences between them will make those of one very different in externals from those of another. It is, indeed, a theme of this book that in externals there are three distinct warrior traditions. Ultimately, however, there is only one warrior culture. Its evolution and transformation over time and place, from man’s beginnings to his arrival in the contemporary world, is the history of warfare."

"Approximately 300,000 children are believed to be combatants in some thirty conflicts worldwide. Nearly half a million additional children serve in armies not currently at war, such that 40 percent of the world’s armed organizations have children in their ranks."

"The use of children as soldiers in armed conflict is among the most morally repugnant practices in the world, as illustrated by this Los Angeles Times photo essay. Children are combatants in nearly three-quarters of the world’s conflicts and have posed difficult dilemmas for the professional armies they confront, including the United States’."

"When primitives fight, two little bands of men shoot arrows or swing war-clubs at one another because they want to fight; or because they are defending themselves, their families, or their territory. In the modern world, soldiers fight because they have been brainwashed into believing in some kook ideology such as that of Nazism, socialism, or what American politicians choose to call "freedom". In any case the modern soldier is merely a pawn, a dupe who dies not for his family or his tribe but for the politicians who exploit him. If he's unlucky, maybe he does not die but comes home horribly crippled in a way that would never result from an arrow- or a spear-wound. Meanwhile, thousands of non-combatants are killed or mutilated. The environment is ravaged, not only in the war zone, but also back home, due to the accelerated consumption of natural resources needed to feed the war machine. In comparison, the violence of primitive man is relatively innocuous."

"And though ten out of twelve had fallen, still the last two, sure as death, were to be bound on the first evening of rest over the bottle, drinking a silent health to their death companions, talking and laughing over all they had been through. For dangers past - an old soldier laughs. For those to come - a full glass, though death and the devil grinn there, as long as the wine was good. Such has ever been the custom of war."