The Gospel According to Paul
Lisa and Paul (8.26.11)[RangerAgainstWar is back from holiday. We're just gaining our traction, kind of like Wile E. Coyote, so we will begin at the end, with one of our final visits in Georgia to Ranger's friend and associate, Col. Paul Longgrear (ret'd).]
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We have written about Paul before as he was recently inducted into the Ranger hall of Fame, no small peanuts there. Paul is a humble man, and during our chat wondered aloud why he was chosen for this honor.
Col. Longgrear's name has popped up throughout our travels. Ranger's cousin John mentioned a History Channel program he'd just viewed on Lang Vei, the action in which Paul earned his Silver Star. "I don't see how those guys survived", said Cousin John, a former Marine. Paul's name also surfaced organic to a recent post @ Milpub. Lisa has a mad crush on him (and holds his straight-shooting wife Patty in equally high regard; it is always a pleasure to meet a couple who hold each other in such high esteem), so it just seems appropriate.
Col. Longgrear's name has popped up throughout our travels. Ranger's cousin John mentioned a History Channel program he'd just viewed on Lang Vei, the action in which Paul earned his Silver Star. "I don't see how those guys survived", said Cousin John, a former Marine. Paul's name also surfaced organic to a recent post @ Milpub. Lisa has a mad crush on him (and holds his straight-shooting wife Patty in equally high regard; it is always a pleasure to meet a couple who hold each other in such high esteem), so it just seems appropriate.
Paul is a representative of his generation, as iconic as LT. Dick Winters in the film Band of Brothers. He was just that kind of soldier and leader, representing another generation that answered the call to arms. Paul is well-chosen as our symbolic representative.
We discussed how we've now passed into history, and how Vietnam is now become a "big thing". Paul shared that he had delivered the eulogy at the funeral of Lang Vei combat medic James Leslie Moreland earlier this month. (Moreland's remains were positively identified in Vietnam 43 years after the action in which Longgrear had commanded him.)
How to describe an era which still cannot be adequately summated? Ranger has known Vietnam Medal of Honor winners Bob Howard, drunk with Franklin "Doug" Miller and associated with Jon Caviani, and in his estimation, Paul walks as tall as any of those heroes.
Heroism is a trait which runs through the thread of a man, and Paul has demonstrated it repeatedly and characteristically throughout his life, both as a soldier and as a man of God. He is an inspiration. For all the men we as a nation have left behind in our forced march of life, it is a good thing that men like Paul have led the way.
Paul and his family will return to Vietnam after Christmas holidays to participate in a documentary which will cover the spiritual effects of that conflict upon those involved. Honorable soldiering, humanity and genuine humility -- these traits describe Paul Longgrear, and can even affect a cynical friend like Ranger.
The day we came through his neck of the woods he had just returned from celebrating his mother's 90th birthday with her. Ranger raises his cup to you, Paul, and wishes you many happy returns,
Humbly signed,
Not-a-snowball's-chance-in-hell Ranger Hall of Famer,
--RAW
--Something you don't see every day
posted by rangeragainstwar at 11:11 AM
9 Comments:
a happy post !
G.D.,
Yes, we've got a few more up our sleeve ... it's just that this whole war thing is such a bummer, y'see ...
embrace the suk or how i learned to relax n' danse with the dead
G.D.,
Thanks for reminding me of The Cranberries! (I was explaining Flogging Molly and Black 47 to a friend the other day, and did not remember them!)
Y'know, there is truth here: The violence is in our head, without being naive re. the actualities. We can only manifest what we can envision, and so we do.
That saintly old traitor Bobbie Lee is supposed to have said "It is well that war is so terrible for else we would grow to love it too much."
For a man or woman to grow "great" he or she must face terrible challenges. Sadly, the hairless monkey often doesn't find this in, say, working with the sick or poor, building community, or caring for the dying. But war often finds out what is in the very heart of us. And some, like Ranger Longyear, find something truly decent, brave and honorable.
I have nothing but respect for such a man - and I suspect that he would be that which he is had he spent a lifetime sorting mail or digging ditches - but it seems very sad and wasteful to me that the qualities that make him what he has had to be tempered in the fire of war.
FDC,
So true about the crucible of war (or any trying thing.)
I cannot speak of war save on the personal level, but it seems the privations that need suffered often wreak a terrible toll in terms of eroding one's faith and belief. Innocence becomes naivete and hope becomes inevitable doom.
Some very resilient ones retain the ability to see life anew; generally, as far as I've seen, the transmutation is not for the better.
Lisa: I think it was Tony Herbert in his book "Soldier" who talked about war and courage.
He said that every man and woman has a well of endurance, fortitude, composure, courage...call it what you will, it's what helps us face every day with hope and believe that we'll both be alive at the end of it and in the living succeed in what we'll do.
And that every day in war the man or woman must go to the well. Some of us have no more than a dipperful, while others' seem to have an inexhaustible reservoir. But that, some time, some day - unless you were a conscienceless psychopath - that you would go to the well and it would be dry.
And that you would never be the same again. And that that breaking would be no shame, but the certain fate of those of us drained by war.
Chief,
This Herbert thing was also Churchills belief.Montgomery said the same at Normandy.
jim
FDC,
Thank you for sharing Herbert's apt metaphor.
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