Our American Brothers in Arms (Thankfull Words from the French Army)

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Originally Posted by KukriKhan

Among those who serve or have served, regardless of age or gender, the conversation seldom judges whether war in general, or a particular war is right or wrong. Rather, they talk logistics: what it would take to achieve some military goal. What factor was overlooked in some previous conflict. That kind of thing. There seems an acceptance that armed conflict has been, is, and shall likely be, inevitable.

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Very true. I never thought of that before. And yes, the Army is a good barometer of the state of the U.S. The Marines are the same; crazy doesn't change. ~;p

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Originally Posted by Vladimir

The Marines are the same; crazy doesn't change. ~;p

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God Love them. Training to wade through the surf and run across an open beach AT a machinegun nest wearing nothing but a shirt and a whole lot of pride. Couldn't have done it myself.

It's a sad statement on humanity that we have a need for men to do such, but I am damn glad we have them.

“I mean, do guys 10 years older or 10 years younger generally feal different about war (in general) than you do?”.
I don’t know if it is due to age or experience of wars.
I am still convinced some wars have to be fought. I am a pacific man, not a pacifist. That is due to my education and culture.
I am not proud to be French because I did nothing for it. I have born French. The fact that Victor Hugo, Voltaire and Jaures (list is not exhaustive) were French have nothing to do with me, in my achievements.
But, somewhere I am proud to belong to France, to be part of the entity.
Strange but true I succeed the reconciliation this two feelings.
The Flag in the wind still move me, to present arms when the flag raised to the sky was always a source of pride and emotion, don’t ask why…

When I joined, I saw war like an adventure quite far in the horizon. I was hoping to go in French African interventions, Chad, Ivory Cost or other things, but not really a really open war against the Red.
Then I was trained to face a Red Invasion, Red Tempest from the East… The reality of war still didn’t occur to me, even with the attack on the paratroopers in Lebanon and the Falkland (against the British, but it made a European involvement in a war more real).

Then I went to war. Amazingly enough not as a soldier but working in Charities.
I enjoyed it. Shouldn’t say it, but I enjoyed the adrenaline rush, I enjoy to save lives, I enjoy to cross check points or to cross corridors under the permanent fear of attack.
Even what I saw there (and you don’t want to know what I saw. No you don’t), the fact that I went under shelling, bullets flying around me, misery and refugees didn’t really affect this feeling.
Then I went in a looted house. I saw the pictures on the floor. You know, these stupid pictures, I and my girlfriend in the sea, I and my mates in holidays, mum and dad, all these stupid pictures, not really well framed, colours fading away, spread on the floor. The notbook of a young teenager left open, of furniture broken, some papers burned on the floor, the smell of rotten blankets, the hole in the roof, and the cold, the freezing cold of Bosnia in winter…
And the reality of war is this. You can find another job, you can rebuild a house, you can even overcome the lost of your family, but the pictures of you when you were four are lost for ever.
These pictures came the symbol of war, the lost for ever of things.

Wars are done against real people. We kill and injure real people.
I saw the young soldiers who will live all their live on a bed because a bullet cut the wrong part of their body. Are they lucky to be alive?

So, I am more careful about war. I is not an adventure, it is a tragedy.
As I said, I still think some have to be fought, but as written in Louis the Fourteen cannons, Ultimo Ratio, the last resource of the king.

Have to go to work, not sure I will continue, but perhaps...

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Which reminds me of Dans la Tête.

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That is brilliant :2thumbsup:

Wonderful and moving post, Brenus. :bow:

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Originally Posted by Brenus

Have to go to work, not sure I will continue, but perhaps...

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You always say that, so I know that you will continue. Here or in another thread. It's what you always do. After a thousand posts, your ramblings here have turned into a veritable œuvre. A book.

You need to retire to your beloved Serbia. Get yourself that quiet house on a hillside, overlooking the Dinarides, have a wine at sunset, ponder the beauty of the land and the unhappiness of its history - the melancholic combination of which have a psychological link to you yourself in a way that I haven't yet figured out - and write it all down.

:2thumbsup:


Or wait for me to copy-past your posts into a book and get myself famous at your expense... :sneaky:

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Originally Posted by Seamus Fermanagh

It's a sad statement on humanity that we have a need for men to do such, but I am damn glad we have them.

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Sad? I rather think of it as a brilliant concession of human nature to admit, and to fulfill the need to have men like this. To suggest otherwise would be, in human or at the very least an admission of apathy toward the nature of men.

Of course Special Forces like army rangers, I couldnt agree more. :laugh4:

“You need to retire to your beloved Serbia. Get yourself that quiet house on a hillside, overlooking the Dinarides, have a wine at sunset, ponder the beauty of the land and the unhappiness of its history - the melancholic combination of which have a psychological link to you yourself in a way that I haven't yet figured out - and write it all down.”

Well, that is the plan. Buying a house near Novi Sad (Sarmatian’s town), enjoying the view on the Danube banks, (even with what did they do to the Strend? Sarmatian…!!!!!) dinking beers or/and white wine with my kum.

I did write the book. Never got published, I wrote the Serbian side and the Serbs were the bad guys. And nowadays, nobody in interested on what happened there. Especially the one who lied and lied and lied again…

I like Serbia for the Serbs. They like food, to talk politic, they have beautiful women and are proud. Err, they are French, somehow, the French of 50 years ago.
They welcome others (even I you are Croats/Turk/Bosnian etc).
Landscapes are not great. Nice pieces time to time but when you went in the Alps, Massif Central, Ardèche or other gorges du Verdon, well, you know what I mean…
No. I link with the Serbs because they are me, as you my dear French. Drink, food, women and politic…:2thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by Brenus

I did write the book. Never got published

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I just knew you had the urge to tell it all and write it all down. As another guess, I bet your book reads as a dissertation. Solid, factual, to the point and unreadable.

Be like me - always give centre stage to your inner idiot when writing something! Unlike with forum posts, where a press of the 'enter' key means one's blathering nonsense is unleashed to the world, there for all to read and for you to bitterly regret two days later, a book gives one the opportunity to polish and normalise the excesses of your writings when sanity resumes.
When writing something, never hold back. Let the stream of thought do its work, and polish it up upon re-reading.

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Well, that is the plan. Buying a house near Novi Sad (Sarmatian’s town), enjoying the view on the Danube banks, (even with what did they do to the Strend? Sarmatian…!!!!!) dinking beers or/and white wine with my kum.

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Well I hope some beers or white wine will help you and Sarmatian to 'kum' together one day.
[/Beavis and Butthead]

See? Even if I didn't quite nail it (unlike you and Sarmatian :sneaky:) just writing the first thing that popped to mind presented me with the opportunity of a joke, that, after careful polishing, should resemble a - pityful, doomed, but nevertheless present - attempt at humour.

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I wrote the Serbian side and the Serbs were the bad guys. And nowadays, nobody in interested on what happened there. Especially the one who lied and lied and lied again…

I like Serbia for the Serbs. They like food, to talk politic, they have beautiful women and are proud. Err, they are French, somehow, the French of 50 years ago.

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I know exactly what you mean and couldn't agree more. Even if I had never thought about it this way. Always the sign of a great argument. Like a gift that you've always wanted but never knew existed until you were given it.

Me, I am going to retire in Savannah, Georgia. Write a book that will make Tocqueville obsolete. Unlike Serbia, America is not the France of fifty years ago. It has instead forever been the future of France in fifty or fifteen years time. A dystopia and a promise. Should be good. Like all French works about foreign countries, it is, in the end, not about them, but about France. And what's written about France is, in the end, never about France but about the author. Aaah...the gift of being a total, utter, pigheadedly self-obsessed pompous twit. :2thumbsup: