Courage

Into the Jaws of Death
(Source)

"Military folks don't put it all on the line for the flag or patriotism or Mom and apple pie. They do put their life on the line for their comrades. That defines honor for me." - Juvat

"If I had known those bastards had taken off, I'd have been leading the pack!" - Corporal Charlie Goodrich, U.S. Army, 63rd Infantry Division

What is courage?

One of the best definitions for courage that I've ever seen is this:

I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear. Nelson Mandela

That first quote is from a comment made by Juvat on his Monday post, the second was from my late uncle, an infantryman in World War II, something he said to me when I guess I had pestered him enough about his Bronze Star award.

According to what I recall of the citation, my uncle's outfit had been taken under fire by the Germans and apparently he drove the Germans off single-handedly after a protracted fight in which the rest of his unit had either fled or been hit. From what I remember, the citation specifically stated that he personally had killed or wounded twenty of the enemy, near the end of the fight, his own weapon being either disabled or out of ammunition, he used a German weapon to keep fighting.

I was rather amazed, to say the least, at this display of heroism. But as my uncle put it, when the fight started he just did what he had been trained to do. He kept fighting until there was no one left to fight. He did say that he was pretty startled to find himself alone on the field. Which led to that quote above. He just hadn't noticed that the other guys had retreated.

Heat of the moment perhaps? The training kicking in? Both are pretty likely in my estimation. Though I've never been in combat, I have been in a few rather sticky situations where I was too damned busy to notice that things could have easily "gone south" if I hadn't have kept my cool and focused on just getting the job done. (Most of those situations involved what I'll call, "automotive mishaps.")

Any sane person facing combat is scared. Though for inexperienced troops, who have never seen combat, that fear is more along the lines of nervousness, wondering how they'll stand up to the test of combat. A major factor in combat is small unit cohesion. You're not fighting for any ideals, you're doing your job so you don't let the other guys in your outfit down. There's nothing worse in the military than being held in low regard by one's peers.

A person who does not fear combat is probably quite mad.

“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one's safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he was sane and had to. Yossarian was moved very deeply by the absolute simplicity of this clause of Catch-22 and let out a respectful whistle. 

"That's some catch, that Catch-22," he observed. 

"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed.” - Catch 22, Joseph Heller