{"id":11956,"date":"2019-08-23T13:15:28","date_gmt":"2019-08-23T20:15:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=11956"},"modified":"2019-08-22T15:18:43","modified_gmt":"2019-08-22T22:18:43","slug":"with-the-old-breed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/with-the-old-breed\/","title":{"rendered":"With The Old Breed"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Claremont Review of Books<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>n the world of ancient Greece and Rome, collective reverence for the war dead helped explain why hoplites and legionaries fought so fiercely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The great themes of classical literature are often those of battlefield commemoration. Pericles\u2019 majestic Funeral Oration, the lyric poet Simonides\u2019 epitaph for the fallen at Thermopylae (\u201cGo tell the Spartans\u2026\u201d), Horace\u2019s&nbsp;<em>dulce et decorum est pro patria mori<\/em>&nbsp;(\u201cIt is sweet and proper to die for one\u2019s country\u201d), the hundreds of elegant casualty lists carefully carved on stone, and the glimpses of funerals for the fallen on red-figure vases\u2014all these remind us that without national commemoration and collective gratitude for the sacrifice of their youth, consensual societies of the past could not offer successful resistance against their more regimented or tribal enemies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) believes that proper commemoration still enhances civic responsibility. Accordingly, in&nbsp;<em>Sacred Duty: A Soldier\u2019s Tour at Arlington National Cemetery<\/em>&nbsp;he offers three narratives to emphasize how and why America has learned this ancient lesson of honoring the war dead. He relates a regimental motto of the 3rd United States Infantry Regiment, also known as The Old Guard: \u201csoldiers never die until they are forgotten.\u201d&nbsp;<em>Sacred Duty<\/em>, focused for the most part on Arlington National Cemetery, is a multifaceted primer in why America so dutifully commemorates her soldiers, and how such formal gratitude contributes to our civic sense of self and to \u00e9lan among our fighting forces. Or as Cotton, himself an Army veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, puts it in more personal terms: \u201cI\u2026knew that, if I died, my battle buddies would bring me home and the Army would look after my family. That mutual pledge shaped our identity as soldiers and our willingness to fight\u2014and, if necessary, to die\u2014for our country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.claremont.org\/crb\/article\/with-the-old-breed\/\">Read the full article here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Claremont Review of Books n the world of ancient Greece and Rome, collective reverence for the war dead helped explain why hoplites and legionaries fought so fiercely. The great themes of classical literature are often those of battlefield commemoration. Pericles\u2019 majestic Funeral Oration, the lyric poet Simonides\u2019 epitaph for the fallen [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-36Q","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11392,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/when-funerals-become-politics\/","url_meta":{"origin":11956,"position":0},"title":"When Funerals Become Politics","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 6, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness Using funerals for political purposes has a long, but not distinguished, tradition. In 44 B.C. eulogist Mark Antony claimed to Roman mourners that he came to bury Caesar. But his speech created a frenzy and ended up ensuring a death warrant for the once\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;McCain&quot;","block_context":{"text":"McCain","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/mccain\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5007,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/one-year-later\/","url_meta":{"origin":11956,"position":1},"title":"One Year Later","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 16, 2002","format":false,"excerpt":"The nature and means of commemoration. by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Magazine September 11 aroused Americans from a deep coma induced by a long and luxurious calm.On the anniversary of the attack, we should take stock of just how much the world has changed -- before we decide upon\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;September 2002&quot;","block_context":{"text":"September 2002","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2002\/september-2002\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10199,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/what-we-remember-on-memorial-day\/","url_meta":{"origin":11956,"position":2},"title":"What We Remember on Memorial Day","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 25, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The obligation to honor the war dead has often conflicted with the need to make distinctions among them and their causes. By Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ Wall Street Journal A few years ago I was honored to serve briefly on the American Battle Monuments Commission, whose chief duty is the custodianship\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Lincoln&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Lincoln","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/lincoln\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/PericlesFuneralOration-500x333.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":12523,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/where-are-the-new-heroes-of-the-revolution\/","url_meta":{"origin":11956,"position":3},"title":"Where Are the New Heroes of the Revolution?","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 29, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness Since late May, the United States has been convulsed by a cultural revolution unlike any seen in its recent history. Statues have been toppled, often without any logic or consistent grievance. Institutions have been renamed, again without coherent consistency. Christian iconography has been a\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3880,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/osamas-911-anniversary\/","url_meta":{"origin":11956,"position":4},"title":"Osama&#8217;s 9\/11 Anniversary","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 18, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services In speeches leading up to the fifth anniversary of Sept. 11, President Bush focused on the dangers of Islamic fascism and the efforts, both at home and abroad, to combat them. In response, his election-year rivals fired back that we are no safer\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;September 2006&quot;","block_context":{"text":"September 2006","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2006\/september-2006\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":12424,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/on-name-changing-and-statue-toppling\/","url_meta":{"origin":11956,"position":5},"title":"On Name Changing and Statue Toppling","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 12, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review General David Petraeus wrote an impassioned article in the\u00a0Atlantic\u00a0this week about the need to change the names of military bases that for over a century have been named after Confederate generals and to recalibrate iconic remembrances such as statues commemorating Robert E. 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