Sunday, June 14, 2020

Sons of the South.

There is considerable controversy over the names of certain military bases in the American South.

Let me offer the following list of potential replacements, which would honor both the South and the idea of national reconciliation that some--but not all--of the Southern memorials--of the Late Unpleasantness embody.






All were Southern men who died in the uniforms of the United States.

The first's loyalty to the nation remained firm despite being a Southern slaveowner.

The second rebelled, but reconciled fully, leaping to the Stars and Stripes during the Spanish American War and capably commanding American troops in Cuba during that War.

The third is the first African American general in the U.S. Army and served in that rank in World War II, ensuring black units were well-equipped and fighting ready--unlike the near-total neglect of black divisions in the First World War. In the Second, this was not the case--they were ready and given the essential tools of war. As an important aside, his son was the first African-American to wear four stars, doing so for the United States Air Force.

The fourth and fifth were sons of Confederate soldiers, and their service in World War II was crucial to victory.

Thoughts? I know the woke mob have those who fought in WW2 in their sights, so there's no mollifying them, any more than there is the possibility of reasoning with a school of piranha. But maybe the dwindling number of people in the middle could agree to it.

3 comments:

  1. My suggestion is to not put blood on the water.

    ReplyDelete
  2. That's a defensible position--don't give the Year Zero types anything. Especially when they compare, with unblinking stupidity, the Confederate soldier to Nazis.

    But historically speaking, I wince at Benning and Bragg. Benning was an early hardcore secessionist and while a brave brigade commander, he remained as such during the War.

    Bragg...good Lord. His record of failure at critical moments makes me wonder if he subconsciously hated himself for renouncing the Union. And unlike Longstreet, Lee, Gordon, Breckenridge, Forrest (!) and several others, neither he nor Benning did anything to advance post-war reconciliation.

    ReplyDelete
  3. The problem is that this is always how it starts. They don't bother attacking where you're strong - they attack where you're the weakest.

    So today they attack the confederate, and nobody really wants to defend slave owners, do they? Well tomorrow they'll point out that a lot of the founding fathers were slave owners...

    If they didn't spare the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, who would they spare?

    ReplyDelete

Be reasonably civil. Ire alloyed with reason is fine. But slagging the host gets you the banhammer.

The Secret to Thriving during the Eastern Great Lent.

A couple secrets, actually. The first is Lebanese and Syrian cooking. At our new Melkite parish, the Divine Liturgy has been followed by Len...