In World War I, a German intelligence report described a group of captured American Soldiers:
The troops are fresh and full of straightforward confidence. The remark of one of the prisoners is indicative of their spirit, “We kill or get killed.”
Though a prisoner, this American soldier understood that he still had a duty to fulfill, and a mission to accomplish. Being held captive was but one more battle for him to engage in. These American prisoners had “straightforward confidence” because they had the honor, courage, and commitment that Warriors bring to the fight, even in bondage, even in pain—regardless of the odds or the enemy they are facing.
It was the 8th of June, 1918. The young Marines pressed their bodies into the earth as German machine gun rounds rent the air and tore at the foliage just above their heads. Just minutes away, the platoon would be ordered to surge forward into the leaded fury of the German field of fire. At that moment, a hardened veteran of many previous battles emerged, exposing himself to the boiling cauldron of the battlefield. Turning to the reluctant souls still clinging to the ground of their last hope for survival, this mighty Warrior yelled, “For Christ’s sake, men—come on! Do you want to live forever?”
A TRUE WARRIOR is not his own god. He comes at life with enlightened energy that flows from his relationship to the one true God—The God who is there. He finds his identity in principles and values greater than his own life. He embraces a sense of destiny and nobility that empowers him to resist even the slightest notion that he is a weak and hapless victim, filled with fear, and unable to fight.
The fieldnotes and dispatches on these pages are about those United States Army doughboys in the First World War, who were captured in body, but fighting on in spirit. It is about First Sergeant Dan Daly, USMC, who was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, not once, but twice, in two wars. Sgt. Daly was the consummate fighting man who placed his honor and the cause for which he fought, above his safety and his life on a hot June day in a place called Belleau Wood.
The Warrior’s Notebook is about the spirit of these and countless other Warriors who stood in the gap against overwhelming odds. It is about those who followed the colors of their regiment into the fires of hell, facing down a ruthless and evil enemy. It is about divine mandates and human failings; it is about integrity and honor; it is about purpose and meaning; it is about why you matter; why you are at war; and why you need to stay in the fight. It is about instilling a perspective of hope—a confident view of life—regardless of the difficulties, the stresses, and the enemies arrayed against you. Finally, it is about keeping your spirit energized by the truth and in pursuit of God’s unique calling on your life.
In the poem Ulysses, by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1842), Ulysses describes his struggle to find meaning in life. Even though the years have taken their toll on him, Ulysses realizes that the Warrior must always strive for new challenges and new adventures—seeking to forge ahead alongside those of “heroic hearts”—because breathing is not living:
How dull it is to pause, to make an end,
To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!
As tho’ to breathe were life!”…
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
And not to yield. Hold that thought.
Col James R. Harper III, USMCR (Ret.)
