The Face of Battle

...The country is large enough, and the constitutional integrity of the separate states is still strong enough that it is possible to emigrate, in effect, within the country, and escape from some of the problems that have bedeviled England...

...Christianity is not outside the world or separate from it, but within it...

...One cannot prove by reason the existence of God, yet belief in Christ and his teachings can have a profound influence in one's life...

...Battle fatigue and its handmaiden, the self-inflicted wound, are also addressed...

...It is obvious to this reviewer that Mr...

...It is a real adventure in learning more about a subject which, when it comes, has lasting effect on us all...

...Keegan's exploration into some of the side issues of armed conflict...

...Keegan is a competent teacher of battle and an excellent one at that...

...Institutionally, in other words, there is still the illusion of class rigidity, still the illusion of a hereditary system...

...Confidence in science and technology Paul Kurtz is editor of The Humanist and professor of philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo...

...The percentage of the U.S...

...and finally the terribly costly campaign of July 1916 along the Somme River in Northern France...

...American union members are quite different from their British counterparts in other respects...

...Waterloo--unquestionably one of the most significant battles in history--waged in June 1815...

...Using the tools of biblical criticism, he enunciates a demythologized Christianity...

...work force that is unionized has actually been decreasing since the 1950s (down from one-third of the work force then to one-fourth today...

...Paradoxically, at a time when liberalism in Protestantism has been weakened by evangelical fundamentalism, it is still blowing strong in Catholicism...

...His treatment of one of the great secrets of success in war, the will to advance, to close with and destroy--what I have often called 32 The Alternative: An American Spectator June/July 1977 one of the intangibles of soldiering--is to me the high point of his work...

...On the other hand, I do intend to discuss wounds and their treatment, the mechanics of being taken prisoner, the nature of leadership at the most junior level, the role of compulsion in getting men to stand their ground, the incidence of accidents as a cause of death in war and above all, the dimensions of the danger which different varieties of weapons offer to the soldier on the battlefield...

...He believes that Christianity provides the most potent hope for humankind, and this he spells out with considerable skill and audacity...

...As a nullifidian humanist, I find much in this book that I admire and can agree with...

...trade unionists do not enjoy a "special dispensation" and their power is if anything decreasing--witness the recent defeat of the common situs picketing bill on Capitol Hill...

...Although he has many objectives in the publication of this volume, a central mission is to try to tell the reader what it is like to be in battle...

...These units participated in large numbers in the British attacks during this tragic period on the Western Front--a campaign which practically eliminated a whole generation...

...He asks the question: "Why should one be a Christian...

...I agree with him that the current world crisis The Alternative: An American Spectator June/July 1977 33...

...It is a valuable antidote to the knownothing literal evangelicalism of American Babbittry...

...least believes that their chances of survival are slim...

...For that, he has incurred the displeasure of the Pope, and he has been warned by the Vatican of the dangers of heresy and error...

...Thus, it is my view that more than ever before, public opinion will alter the complexion of battle...

...If it applies to anyone in the U.S...

...The Face of Battle fills this description...

...Its effect was profound since those who were perhaps unacquainted with some of the more brutal aspects of armed combat suddenly became personally and directly involved...

...maintains that theistic religion can never be replaced and that, like art and poetry, it is an enduring feature of the human condition...

...Now we have a medium which depicts this brutality...

...It seems to me that this is the most important respect in which the "British Disease" is not catching on here...

...Thus there is no particular sympathy for unions...

...Q~mOi0Ul~gOoI044~i6Q0Qo0QO0QQ~m0mI0OI0O0Q~qgBQ8Qa6QQQ~Di~6I~i0O0B~OI~w0QgQ~g~qeoiQi000MI0BaO0QD~B0QOMoQOM0ggB9gg~O~MiMQ40qQ0D0oQ006QIIaOQ0QQQBgg9B~ BOOK REVIEW The Face of Battle JohnKeegan / Viking / $10.95 George S. Patton III Mr...

...Would that the automatic data processing experts understood it...

...I would be less than candid if I were not to mention it vis-/t-vis Vietnam...

...Most fortunately for this country, the British apparatus of class distinction does not exist here...

...It is a joy to quote further: Trade unionists today enjoy a special dispensation, a unique exculpatory glamor that takes much of the sting out of public criticism...

...Thus sympathy, and the influence of the "cultural legitimizers" are on the side of the unions...

...Mythologically speaking, they are still the underdogs, the underprivileged, with all the benefits that such a stares bestows in an age dedicated to the cause of social justice...

...BOOK REVIEW On Being A Chmstian Hans Kiing / Doubleday / 112.95 Paul Kurtz Ever since the days of Jonathan Edwards, America has undergone a "religious revival" every twenty years or so...

...This medium brought the war instantaneously from that tortured land into the living rooms of Mr...

...Our trade unionists are not in the position of appearing to belong to a different, "downtrodden" class, nor "do they in fact...

...So there is hope for us yet...

...Keegan draws certain conclusions for the reader's benefit...

...Kiing's erudition and scholarship is impressive...

...One might almost think that the modern world is at an end, that the scientific revolution which began in the 16th century has been overwhelmed, and that we are back to the Middle Ages...

...Kiing seeks to reinterpret Christianity and to reinvest it with new meaning and value for the contemporary context...

...I do not intend to offer a two-sided picture of events, since what happened to one side in any battle I describe will be enough to convey the futures I think are salient...

...It is a form of humanism, indeed a truly "radical humanism," for it relates itself directly to the problems of man in the world...

...In this book Kiing expresses what seems to be an essentially Protestant viewpoint...

...Whether we agree with them or not, and I do not personally agree with certain ones, they are well developed and thought-provoking...

...This last discussion is especially interesting in that it deals in some detail with the so-called Kitchener Divisions or "New Armies...

...Keegan's goal is best put in his own WO l ' d s ." I do not intend to write about generals or generalship, except to discuss how a commander's physical presence on the field may have influenced his subordinates' will to combat...

...He touches on the moral aspects of battle...

...For those who reject traditional religious sects, bizarre cults of psychotherapy have sprouted--with esoteric Asian gurus, swamis, or satanists promising salvation through transcendental meditation, yoga, exorcism, or other rites of initiation...

...Kiing is skeptical about much of the fictional legend of the historical .jesus, the reality of miracles, the Resurrection, the authenticity of the scriptures, revelation, the cult of Mary, the doctrine of the Trinity...

...He relies upon the concrete probing of religious response rooted in individual experience...

...In an earlier work he sharply criticized the doctrine of infallibility...

...When skeptics ask, "why ought one to be committed to Christianity, rather than the other world religions or humanisms...

...He is such an influential theologian, however, that there seems to be little else that the Church can do at present...

...To me, any work which produces thought through sincere and wholesome argument or debate is a good effort and well worth the time required to be spent upon it...

...There is in fact a good deal of social mobility in England today, but, as Worsthorne points out, the problem is that "the successful self-made man cannot avoid moving into a life that associates him with a past social system that was rooted in inherited privilege, since the pattern of life at the top dates from those days...

...In fact, such a measure would tend to isolate Congressmen from a// " special interests" and for that reason is to be deplored...

...They are resisted, if at all, "by nothing more impressive than the soft underbelly of the bourgeoisie, quivering with guilt...

...Kking replies that belief in Christianity rests on an act of faith and is a commitment of value...

...If Congress succeeds in passing legislation that provides federal funding of Congressional campaigns, then the power of the unions will decline even further...

...John Keegan's book is a "must" for the professional military and a "should" for any student of history...

...Hans Kiing, in a powerfully argued and lengthy book (720 pages...

...John Keegan's treatment of battle is uni~lue...

...Having spent fourteen years describing and analyzing battles to officer cadets in training at historic Sandhurst, the British counterpart of West Point, he was eminently qualified to put this fine study together...

...A liberal Catholic theologian from Tiibingen, Kiing has taken on the Vatican and the Papacy...

...The writings and analyses of S.L.A...

...and in the ability of human beings to solve the problems of the contemporary age has been undermined by the new religiosity: Whether this will mean a permanent shift in outlook and values is difficult to say...

...And finally, there is the "psychic" revolution, with its uncritical devotion to astral projection, telekinesis, ectoplasmic poltergeists, astrology, and other forms of para-normal nonsense...

...Yet I think that Kiing fails to make his case, even for his modified Christianity...

...In spite of devastating critiques by logicians, philosophers, and scientists, the most vulgar and anti-intellectual forms of superstitious religion seem as strong as ever...

...What feelings are generated by the all-prevailing fears of death, disability, maiming, or (and well pu 0 the fear of placing men in mortal danger as a combat commander when one knows or at Major General George S. Patton III is Commander of the Second Armored Division, United States Army, at Fort Hood, Texas...

...American unions favor economic growth, and are among the strongest opponents of environmentalism...

...Still, many have been badly shaken by the resurgence of this "new religiosity," for it was widely believed that with the growth of universal education and affluence, gullibility and nincompoopery would eventually disappear...

...He criticizes the legalism of the authoritarian and hierarchical Church, the subordinate role of women, the Church's historic anti-Semitism, its absolutistic moral doctrine, and its position on birth control and other issues...

...Brown, and Stephen Crane, all of whom this reviewer has been exposed to from an early age...

...He also maintains that scientific humanism has failed to satisfy the deeper hunger within the human soul for meaning and purpose...

...He then tries to develop answers to the all-important question--at least for those who practice my particular trade--how would I/you/he (or now she) behave in battle...

...This is especially true for Teamsters, who, one may recall, largely supported Nixon...

...To be a Christian, he believes, sustains a person...

...I am well aware of how absurd this is in present circumstances, since so many trade unionists are now the ~ouveaux riches and take home wage packets that make them the envy of professional people...

...The author draws liberally from such works as Junger's Storm of Steel, and such authors as Napier, Chandler, F.Y...

...No doubt Milton Friedman was exaggerating when he said that we were only ten years behind the British...

...This is surely an accurate diagnos!s, but what is interesting about it, in a way, is how plainly it does not apply to the United States...

...it is to the blacks...

...The truth of the matter is that from Agincourt and before, up to the present, battles have been pretty brutal events...

...and Mrs...

...Faith in.Jesus the Christ gives peace with God and with oneself...

...Television has influenced and will continue to influence the public's support of armed conflict...

...and he replies: "In order to be truly human...

...To understand the true meaning of Christianity, he argues, we must go back to Jesus' teaching unencumbered by Church doctrine...

...For example, he discusses where the generals are during the actual fighting...

...This has its counterpart for the Jews with the growth of orthodox Chasidism and for the Arabs of fanatic Mohammedanism...

...He is sensitive to the critics of Christianity and indeed concedes many of the objections that skeptics have offered of it...

...Today this revivalism assumes various forms: There has been a resurgence of primitive evangelical, Bible-thumping, faith-healing fundamentalism...

...Marshall also play a role within these pages...

...In pursuit of this g o a l , Mr...

...Worsthorne (who is associate editor of the London Sunday Telegraph) argues that the unions are on top in England today because they are the only group in the nation that enjoys high "class morale...

...In addition, we are still sufficiently unregulated economically to allow many opportunities for union members to shift over to managem e n t - t o go into business for themselves...

...We must be leery of hasty generalizations, of course: For all we know, the current flight from reason may simply be a media event to be replaced by still other fads and fashions, and like the New Left and the counterculture, will dissipate as quickly as it appeared...

...Kiing declined to go to Rome to answer an inquisition by the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith...

...Toward the close of this book Mr...

...Another interesting feature of this volume is Mr...

...They shun detente, and in fact are much more pro-capitalist than most of the quasi-intellectual elite to be found in government and at the universities...

...But still, there is no doubt that the Pox Britannica is a serious disease, much in need of the careful diagnosis that it is given in this book, even if the cure is neither prescribed nor readily apparent...

...They are "still allowed to enjoy the benefit of brazen historical propaganda, in which they always appear as David fighting Goliath...

...Whereas British union leaders (at least) are frequently pro-Communist, American ones tend to be antiCommunist...

...America...

...Keegan devotes the greater part of his book to Agincourt, fought in October 1415...

...One subject which the author might have touched on more heavily is the influence of public opinion on the future of battle...