Outnumbering the Lexington militia nearly ten to one, the British easily won the skirmish. But, symbolically, they lost. For at the moment the first Lexingtonian died, the American Republic was born. British Major Pitcarne took six companies of an advance team to scout out Lexington, Massachusetts, early morning, April 19, 1775. Behind him marched nearly [...]
The Rhine River was the line of no return—once the paratroopers of the 17th Airborne crossed it, they’d be over enemy territory. Some pretended to sleep while others smoked or just stared into space. No one spoke. The roar of the engines and the rattling of the airframe made conversation impossible, which was just fine. [...]
Unlimited power in the hands of limited people always leads to cruelty. If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. —from [...]
Might certainly does not make right, but it does not make wrong either. There are times to reject the allure of power, especially when it involves dominating others, and there are times when the right course is to take up arms and fight unreservedly against the forces of darkness. Indeed, Tolkien suggests, there are times [...]
Under what conditions is an aggressive war justified as punishment for a violation of the international order or as a redress for an injury suffered? Defensive war offers fewer problems. We have already pointed out that the justice of the cause of war must be certain for the public authority. Hence, the other party, in the dispute is [...]
"Stalag 17," set in a German prisoner of war camp during World War II, is a genuine Christmas movie, albeit a complex one: at once a mystery, a comedy, a war story, and a morality play, all wrapped in barbed wire. Die Hard changed the definition of a “Christmas movie,” mostly providing dads an excuse [...]
The Great War destroyed much the Inklings had held true, personally and culturally. Each lost friends, and each felt the guilt that any survivor of a war feels. Many of them refused to talk about their own experiences, for good or ill. J.R.R. Tolkien, perhaps, provides the best example. Though not the best-known Inkling, Adam [...]
For most of our veterans, it should go without saying that military discipline and experience give them a moral authority. It is a recognition—once universal—that is too often forgotten in an age when patriotism itself seems suspect to many. On this day when we honor our veterans, it’s good to recollect both the debt of [...]
As we approach Remembrance Sunday I am reposting this sonnet about the two minutes silence, which was first published in my book Sounding the Seasons. I'm posting it early so that any one who wishes to, can use it in services or events on this Remembrance Sunday. So here is how it came to be [...]
The poet’s career doesn’t end once he dies. The soldier’s career arguably does. The poet-soldier, then, has died physically, but what remains of him is his art. Both Edward Thomas and Francis Ledwidge managed to create something that transcended their persons and lasted long after being killed in war. When we think of English poetry, [...]
The year 1989 may well be seen by future historians as one of those rare pivotal years of this past millennium—like 1066, 1492, 1793, and 1914—that profoundly altered the direction of Western Civilization. It is, of course, still too early to say for certain that we as a society set ourselves on a dangerous collision [...]
The question of the purpose of peace has troubled humanity from the time an ancient hand was first raised in anger. It is one thing to win a war and impose peace on a vanquished enemy, and altogether another thing to cultivate one’s own victorious city or nation once the wolf has been held at [...]
Great literature does not pass away, nor does it lose its relevance, because, like the wise virgins of Scripture, it remains loyal to the Bridegroom and the unchanging truth that He teaches and the unchanging truth that He is. Like the saints, the Great Books are alive. Gertrud von le Fort's "The Wedding of Magdeburg" [...]
Augustine passed on to us, and all posterity, prescient words of wisdom: that even in the most disconcerting and dark of times, beauty, compassion, truth, love, and happiness abound. When the Visigoths sacked Rome in 410, the city that had taken the world captive had fallen into captivity. The event was a transformative moment in [...]