When men fought with swords, you actually had to face your opponent, pitting your strength, skill, and wits directly against his. There was actually a chance for the individual soldier to survive; he had a measure of control over his fate. He could increase his likelihood of returning home to his family by training and improving his skill at arms. In a sword fight, a man at least knows he has a chance to fight for his own survival, and won't just get shot down at any moment.
There's no skill, no honor, in a gunfight. The individual soldier is just more fodder for the bullets. He really can't do anything to increase his chances of survival, as it's all pretty much random chance. Sure, he can train to be a better shot, but the best marksman in the world can still be shot down by some noob firing hundreds of rounds a minute on full auto--no matter how bad a shot the other guy is, with so many bullets some of them are going to hit! A man can't do anything to protect himself from thousands of bullets flying through the air, other than hope there's good cover to crouch behind. Out in an open field, no one has a chance, and they all just butcher each other.
You might say, well, in the days of swords, a man could still get shot down with no say in the matter--they had bows and crossbows, you know. Well, I wasn't talking about the days of swords, but about swords themselves vs. guns. But I'll take up that point. First of all, I detest archers, and I never said I agreed with bows and crossbows in war either. However, at least bows had much shorter range than guns, much slower firing rate, much slower projectile speed, required much more skill and were therefore rarer, and you could actually protect yourself from arrows with shield and armor.
That being said, I reiterate that I don't agree with bows in war either. Guns or bows, it's cowardly to just hide at a safe distance and shoot down the enemy with no chance to defend himself. Wretched archers! Nothing better I like than to finally close with those pesky archers that have been harrassing your men from a distance and annihilate them in close combat! Take that, you dishonorable cowards! Whenever I have a choice between ranged or melee characters in a game (board, computer, video), I choose melee, and I take great delight whenever I have the chance to destroy those annoying ranged enemies with my blade!
(Note: this is why I love the Jedi of Star Wars, the Black Templars of Warhammer 40,000, and other such heroes who, in a futuristic world of advanced guns, still prefer to face their foes in good old-fashioned close combat, lighsabers or chainswords in hand)
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| Source: lozdoodle.wordpress.com |
Very good points, Nick. Modern warfare IS random butchery, and it is engaged in not for true defense but as a means to accumulating wealth for a select few. I think this quote from Smedley Butler explains it best:
ReplyDelete“I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”
― Smedley D. Butler, War is a Racket: The Antiwar Classic by America's Most Decorated Soldier
We're really no better off now than the feudal days, with rival countries fighting over land--except now it's not so much land as oil and commodities.
ReplyDeleteHey Nick, Thanks for making this blog! Good entertainment. I hope you don’t mind if I throw a few of my pennies into this thread.
ReplyDelete"A gun is just a tool. No better and no worse than any other tool, a shovel- or an axe or a saddle or a stove or anything. Think of it always that way. A gun is as good-- and as bad-- as the man who carries it. Remember that.”
--Jack Schaefer
Guns, bows and arrows, ranged weapons of various kinds certainly give an individual an advantage over one, or even many, armed with only hand-to-hand weapons. However, does dishonor lie in dispatching someone from a distance, or does it lie in killing someone else who is not as well equipped or skilled as they? One swordsman can have significant advantages over another swordsman; height, strength, experience, stamina, armour (or the lack thereof), quality of the weapons, presence of mind etc. Does this make it dishonorable for the better swordsmen to kill the obviously lesser swordsmen? If it is dishonorable for an archer to kill swordsmen in an open field where they have the high ground and plenty of range, then is it likewise dishonorable for the swordsmen to kill the archer in a wood where the archer has a limited range of fifteen to twenty yards?
Is butchery in war caused by the weapons used, or is it because of the principles (or lack of principles) of the political and military leaders involved? There is a saying that the first casualty of war is truth, and all too frequently the first tactic employed by either side is to dehumanize the enemy. I remember sitting in class at college and hearing our honorable military enlistees saying that the Palestinians and Iraqis are more or less sub-human and we should just nuke them all.
“The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.”
―G.K. Chesterton
Thanks Luke! Glad you enjoy the blog. And I'm always glad to hear my readers thoughts on these topics!
DeleteYes, I suppose you're right that a gun is just a tool. Humans use their superior intellect given by God to create tools that give us an advantage. And I guess that's really a big point of military strategy, gaining the advantage over the enemy, whether through superior weapons, technology, tactics, high ground, etc. You're completely right, obviously you can't expect to win if it's a completely fair fight--if you and your opponent are evenly matched, then no one will win! So there will always be some advantage on the winning side. I just feel that hand-to-hand weapons help even the playing field, so to speak, and make it less of an unfair advantage. They give the individual soldier more of a chance. This being said, I've never fought in any war, whether with swords or guns, so I cannot claim to speak from experience!
That is an excellent point--all too frequently atrocities in war are the result of immoral decisions made by the leaders. And you hit the nail on the head about dehumanizing the enemy. So many Americans fall for that time and again, and thus have no problem carrying out atrocities such as the fire bombing of Dresden and other German civilian cities, the nuclear bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the expulsion (and in some cases extinction) of the Indians, war crimes against the Palestinians and Iraqis... A result of our godless culture.
Excellent quote by Chesterton! I remember this great novel about St. George. In the novel, before he became a soldier in the Roman legions, he was wrestling with being both a soldier and a Christian, and his kind old parish priest reminded him that we respect soldiers not because they kill the enemy but because they are willing to die for us.
I likewise have not any personal experience in these matters, but it is an interesting topic. I see what you mean about leveling out the playing field. A man must be focused and exerting his energy on one target at a time in a sword fight, whereas in a gun battle it is a more detached form of hide-and-seek. It is more noble to face opponents face to face, matching man against man, than cowering in trenches and muddy foxholes trading bullets with each other, hoping a sharpshooter hasn't penetrated your lines.
DeleteAh yes, the atrocities of war... that deserves a rant of it's own! good stuff keep it coming.
It definitely is intriguing. I think you hit the nail on the head; when you face a single oppenent and match your strength and skill directly against his, you somewhat get to know him and you have to take direct responsibility for taking his life if you win. When you shoot down a random enemy with a gun from 500 yards, you're more detached from the reality of the fact that you've just ended someone's life.
DeleteHaha, perhaps I will indeed use that as the topic for another post. We'll see.