XDA

All of us guys who were not subject to the draft or not drafted, even if we have the card, and didn't join during the last of the Vietnam War or after, always are giving moral ground to those who have served our country in its Armed Services, including the Coast Guard. I'm not saying that's not appropriate and I do appreciate our soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen and women, etc. more than the average American, I think.

But service in the Armed Forces, doesn't make you automatically a better historical analyst of current events. Indeed, specialization in one field can give you tunnel vision and destroy clear eyed assessment based on all the known factors.

Still, it's tough to get past the St. Crispin's Day speech in Henry V. Money quote:

He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.' T
hen will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.'
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words-
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester-
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

John Keegan in his book The Face of Battle adds some resonance to the King's speech with his analysis of the battle of Agincourt. The consensus that it was the longbow that was the decisive advantage is hooey according to Keegan, that was earlier in the Hundred Years War, at Poitiers and Crecy, for example. What doomed the French knights was their hubris and the well known French inability to queue properly. They overwhelmingly outnumbered the English and were between them and their escape through Calais, but the noble French knights all wanted to get into battle with the top guys on the English side, and they crowded each other, pinned arms against sides and chests and they got slaughtered by the English troops who had elbow room. So more men could have indeed doomed the English forces.

And you don't have to have been in the Armed Forces in the 20th Century to be able to see that.