Hi Folks,

I thought I would throw out some thoughts re military terminology and see what remains when you guys finish shredding.

I find that the use of certain words, both within the military and in critique of the military, is based on a misplaced sense of machismo. For example, it seems whenever you go on a U.S. operation it someone feels compelled to give things tough-sounding names like "Objective Hammer," "Phase Line Vengeance", "Assembly Area Doom" and so forth. I think I remember Herbert complaining about this in his book "Soldier."

In comparison, the French Foreign Legion at Dien Bien Phu named their outposts after women. The commander's mistresses, as the story goes - to include Katharine and Emily if memory serves. Whatever you want to say about the FFL losing at DBP, they were some very tough troops and didn't seem to need call it "Outpost Bonecrusher" or something "tough." Sure wouldn't have helped if they had!...

I'm not saying this isn't machismo (or sexist), you understand, just not a misplaced sense of it. And I'm certainly not advocating adopting the practices of the French at Dien Bien Phu. Nor am I suggesting we should be fighting toward "Objective Daffodil" or to take "Honeybunny Hill."

It's just that to me, using "tough" language in this fashion seems the opposite of tough. This kind of "tough" Army talk just never made me think the item with the "tough" name was more worthwhile. It seems to be some bureaucrat's idea of how to be tough while sitting in his office, knowing full well he's never going to get near any kind of a fight, fobbed off on unspecting guys in the field.

In my experience, the "toughest" guys are fairly soft-spoken. Most of the VN era folks Ranger folks on this listserver read as fairly low-key and soft-spoken, almost clinical, when describing events which can only be characterized as pretty fucking tough and sometimes border on horrific.

This is not to take away from the value of drill sergeant and Ranger Batt fire team leader types acting "tough," or good descriptive story-telling, but I would venture that "You devil dogs will grab your battle buddies and fight like warhounds!" would draw snickers no matter in how fierce a tone or desperate a situation it was delivered.

However, the use of language in our military seems to ignore this psychology, and has made me wonder on more than one occasion if some tough-talking guy wasn't talking tough to hide his own insecurity - or even an effeminate streak! We've seen this phenomenon outside the military often enought - look at J. Edgar Hoover, he talked plenty tough, and now we hear he was probably wearing nylons all along - and it wasn't for any roadmarches!

Anyway, I think this tendency to hollow, unsupported "tough" military language should be resisted, and that the military should instead use words which are neutral, descriptive and accurate. One example of this might be naming objectives "Black" and "Gold" instead of, say, "Havoc" and "Wrath."

Let's take a look at the use of the word "battle" in the Army. You see it everywhere as an adjective. I guess the thinking is that battles are pretty rough things and you must have to be pretty tough to be in a battle - therefore associating the word "battle" with something will make them sound tougher. So now we see "Battle Books," "battle drills" and "battle buddies."

A "Battle Book" is basically just a list of tasks you've trained at. A lot of them have nothing to do with fighting a battle. So why the name? 'cause it sounds tough. "Training Checklist" doesn't have the same tough ring to it. To me, a "battle book" if anything would be a list of batttles you've actually been in! Maybe even a list of after-action reviews of field operations. But are you going to whip out your "Battle Book" in a real firefight and say, "OK... looks we're not so hot at flanking, but we're well trained on bounding; frontal assault it is!"

Same with "battle drills." Used to be we called these "immediate action drills," but I guess that wasn't tough enough. Plus a "battle" implies a moderate-size element in a geographically contained area, and "battle drills" are not linked to any particular element or conflict size, but are aimed at smaller units. So these "battle" drills aren't necessarily "battle" drills. They could be "skirmish" drills or "firefight" drills or "big war" drills even "false alarm" drills! I think we should just go with "combat" drills and have done with it.

And "battle buddies?" What the hell? This sounds like some kind of toy you find next to Barney and Battle Barbie. So, what, you're only buddies for the battle, then you'll hang out with someone else? I think this is to keep anyone from getting any funny ideas about what kind of buddies you are... Rangers have "Ranger" buddies, but everyone else has to add the word "battle" to avoid having someone snicker at them. Here I submit that "tough" guys are not worried about other people miscontruing their masculinity and should have another term at their disposal. What about "training buddies" or "Operations other than War buddies?" You'll never hear it - so "battle" doesn't work either. Maybe we could go with "fighting buddy." Hell, I don't know. "Sparring partner?"

Another word I have a problem with is "warrior." COL Hackworth seems to be a big proponent of this word, and I suppose it's the right idea, but the particular word doesn't quite sit right. Essentially a "warrior" is anyone who is not a cheesedick useless careerist rear echelon deadbeat motherfucker. So you have "total warriors," "true warriors," "warrior leaders," etc. etc.

I see four problems with the word "warrior." First, it is a pre-industrial age word. To me, it conjures up images of Apaches with bows attacking cavalry with repeating rifles, or Zulus charging British Gatling guns. The problem with such fantastic warriors is that they got SLAUGHTERED! This is primarily because their own military conservativism forced them to stick to their tactics which had become synonymous with their concept of honor and sense of warrior identity, and didn't allow much adjustment for an opponent's technological superiority.

Another problem with the word "warrior" is that it's hard to pronounce. Even Hackworth pronounces it "woyers." So you have all these guys trying to talk about tough guys and sounding like Elmer Fudd.

Three, "warrior" has a connotation that you WANT to fight. This is not necessarily the case, even with the most capable soldiers. The more experienced the soldier, the less idealistic he is about throwing himself into a combat situation and getting maimed, even if he is capable of operating in such a situation with ruthless efficiency.

Plus "warrior" sounds like someone who is actually doing the fighting. I think Hackworth's use of the word is really attempting to describe people who are positively motivated, try to serve their country over themselves, attend to their duty, and so on. But "that is one helluva warrior driving that truck" makes me think that someone screwed up and made a good infantry man into a truck driver, not that you've got a hooah truck driver, so the word falls short.

What else can we use? This is a tough one. "Fighters" indicates the willingness and ability to prosecute combat, but also sounds overmacho - try "what a logistics fighter he is" - and brings in the image of a punch-drunk couldabeenacontenda. Same with "shooter" - closer, but there are plenty of competent, aggressive people in uniform out there who fuel planes and drive ships and so forth and won't shoot at anyone. "Operator" is an SF term and most people outside the community think it refers to At&T. And anyone from Ranger batt who has heard what the regular Army has done to "hooah" just has to cringe at any further broadening of its use. "Grunt" has class overtones - the word was generated by generally upper-class people disparaging the role of the generally lower-class infantryman, although "grunt" has over time been imbued with a sort of workman's pride... further, it is job-specific and doesn't have the universality we need.

Personally I think we should rehabilitate the word "soldier." I think one of the highest compliments is to say that a person is a "good soldier." Call the non good-soldier types "slugs" or "politicians" or "baggage."

So there you go. Mayve we could take on "warfighter" in the future.

Conversely, I do wonder why we renamed things "softer" names, like turning a good 'ole chow hall into a "dining facilty." You'd think we'd have a "battle sustainment fueling hall" or something.

Maybe there are competing "soft" and "hard" groups - or just a bickering husband and wife team - somewhere in the Pentagon, renaming things as fast as they can - "oh, yeah? You wanna call it a 'dining facility'? Well, fine, motherfucker, try out my Battle Salad!"

Look forward to your comments.