Submitted by Don Carlson, May 6, 2008 08:45

Mr. Giddins skips lightly over the question of the reality of military glory--"the film has decisively undermined every illusion of military glory." Is every notion of military glory an illusion? In the beginning of this century we seem to be approaching the apex of conflict between those on the political left who tell us that patriotism is a phenomenon of the ignorant and fatuous, that to take seriously the responsibilities of citizenship is to be chauvinistic, and that, on the whole there is nothing worth going to war over--and those of us who value the original principles of American governance, who feel the urge to defend those principles even with our blood, and who take the responsibility citizenship to be a matter of life and death. Crimes are inevitable in war; the misuse of soldiers is almost sure to happen; heroes are often neglected and abused. If "Merrill's Marauders" demonstrates all these things, it yet does not follow that there is only an illusion of glory in defending this nation and its principles.

Only men who go to war discover its varied and awful realities, and they sometimes are broken by it or manage to grow to meet its terrible challenge. It would seem they are forever changed by the experience, for better or for worse, and saddened, too. Few can be persuaded to try to describe it--perhaps because they know they cannot and do not wish to misrepresent it.. But they are covered in glory nonetheless--if one believes they fought, died, and killed for something worth preserving. It maybe that most Americans now believe their nation's principles are sham, that a worthy life is an illusion, that sacrifice is a fool's choice. That is the view preached every day in the pulpits of the left, and only leavened with apologetic feints at "love of country" around voting time.

I should like to read Mr. Giddins's views more generously expressed, in order that the Sun's readership may decide if they are worthy. Don Carlson

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