Say Not the Struggle Nought Availeth

By Arthur Hugh Clough

Say not the struggle nought availeth,

    The labour and the wounds are vain,

The enemy faints not, nor faileth,

    And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;

    It may be, in yon smoke concealed,

Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers,

    And, but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking

    Seem here no painful inch to gain,

Far back through creeks and inlets making,

    Came, silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,

     When daylight comes, comes in the light,

In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly,

     But westward, look, the land is bright.

Escaping Bad Luck: Friday the 13th

Today causes many people to worry.  It is the subject of much superstitious belief.  Today is Friday the thirteenth.  What many people don’t realize is how easy it is to avoid bad luck on such days as this.  Here are some practical suggestions as to how to increase your chances of having a good rest of today.

1:  Break your mirror so that you won’t have issues with bad hair days, not looking good in your outfit etc.

2:  Give every black cat you see a good rub down so they won’t follow you around, and get in your way.

3:  Try to shoot all the magpies in your yard because they make a mess and are incredibly obnoxious.

4:  Make sure you invite enough people at dinner to fill thirteen places at the table.  Thirteen is just he right number for good table discussion.

5:  Yawn without covering your mouth.  Contrary to popular opinion, ghosts are scared of nasty human teeth.

6:  Refuse to eat fish today.  All fish have an internal clock that tells them when Friday the thirteenth is and they release toxins onto their blood streams.

7:  Wash your sheets today.  I don’t know why.  It just seems like a good idea.

8:  Walk under as many ladders as possible.  The angled and slated design is excellent for shedding falling objects while still providing reasonable visibility.

The last and most important way to avoid having bad luck is to realize that “luck” doesn’t exist.  It is as impossible to not have something that doesn’t exist, as it is to have something that doesn’t exist.  (Or to have bad something that doesn’t exist, depending on how you look at it.)

Hope you find these helpful little tips to be useful and have a great rest of today, now that you’re safe from nothing.

 

~Wyatt Fairlead

Naturally Problematic

I saw this picture the other day and I couldn’t help but start to think. I laughed, but my wheels just started to spin. Why is this funny? Because we as humans can’t help what we think about, or dream about. There is part of us that we simply can’t control. Our nature, our essence, what we are. This is the part of us that we never had a say in, and that we still don’t. I began to think about human nature, how often the decisions we make have unintended and unfortunate consequences. How often we are blinded by our own ambitions and desires, not even realizing that we are hurting others in the process. There is something about human nature that tends toward trouble. Benjamin Franklin is reputed to have said, “if a man could have half of his wishes, he would double his troubles.” That is because we don’t know what is good for us. We are so focused on what we desire, that we loose the big picture. I realize that this is somewhat of a ramble, but I have been musing on this, and it had to come out.

~Wyatt Fairlead

College Graduation: My Experience.

Any of my faithful followers will know that I have been earning my Bachelor’s degree online for the last 2 1/2 years.  Well, now I am done.  If I could sing (which I can’t), and if I could dance (which I am only proficient at a small number of Civil War dances, and that really don’t seem to fit the bill), and if I could throw a party (oh, I am going to throw a party, anyway…) all those near me would be deafened by the Hallelujah Chorus and would perceive me as floating over the ground, as I would be dancing as hard as I could.

With an introduction like that, you would think I didn’t like college.  In a way, you would be right.  On the other hand, I greatly enjoyed my college experience, atypical though it may have been.  This is a milestone post for me.  This is my description of what I did, why I did it, and what I got out of it.  This is my unique college story.

 

I earned my Bachelors Degree in a manner considered unusual by the vast majority of the population.  I accumulated all but nine of the credit hours necessary to complete my degree through testing.  For any who may not be aware, there are multiple services that offer online examinations, which if passed, may be transferred to colleges or institutions as potential credits for that course equivalent.  For example, way back in 2010, (I guess that isn’t actually that long ago) I took a CLEP test for College Mathematics.  It was the very first college testing that I attempted.  (Worst first has always been my motto.)  By the grace of God, I passed and did not have to take an online course for math at the college I eventually enrolled in.  So that is how it works.  Two and a half years of sitting on the couch studying for tests.  All right, so that isn’t all I did.  I worked with a good friend of mine doing remodeling off and on as well as some yard work for some other family friends, but basically, it was study. (Ironically, I hate studying, because you never know when you have studied enough.  I like projects or assignments.  You work until it is done, and then you don’t have to think about it again.  With studying, you are never done studying until you pass the test.  There is always something that you will not remember, so naturally, I find myself doing two years of it.)

 

Before I continue with my story, I must explain my mindset going into college.  This mindset plays a very important part of why I did what I did.  So here it is:  Going into college, I did not want to go into college.  This mindset stemmed from two fundamental facts about me.

Fact #1:  I have problems being motivated to learn things that seem to be irrelevant to me.  My classic example of this is algebra.  I had a very hard time with algebra.  It wasn’t because it was too difficult for me per say, but I saw no point to it; no practical outworking.  Despite myself I built a wall in my mind and said, “This is not worth my time, I will not learn it!”  (Which of course works out great for getting through high school, as we all know.)

Fact #2:  I don’t know what I want to do with my life.  The purpose of college, in my mind, was (and to a certain extent still is) to prepare you for what you are going to do with your life.  If you have wanted to be a carpenter for as long as you can remember and at sixteen you could basically build a house because you had been working with your Dad for your entire life, then getting a Bachelors degree is not just a waste of money, it is a waste of time.  Your goals can be met without it, so why bother?  Conversely, if you don’t know what you want to be, why not wait until you do know what you want to do so that you don’t waste your time and money getting a degree that won’t help you?   That was my mindset.

 

Now that we have my wonderful frame of mind established, we shall continue with the story.  So here comes this unmotivated, grouchy person, all set to spend the next few years of his life studying, which he doesn’t like, subjects, which he finds irrelevant and uninteresting.  The Dali Lama would say that my parents have “Acquired Much Merit”, but I will simply state that they gave me, and my bad attitude, grace out the wazoo.  The scuffles and altercations over whether a college degree was worth the trauma of learning Sigmund Freud’s ideas on child development, etc. were for a time dramatic and regular.

 

Eventually, I came to the realization that I was doing this thing and there was no way out.  I could put my best foot forward and take the terrible torture of higher education like a man, or make everyone else as miserable as I thought that I was.  While I cannot say that during the study period I was ever completely and totally content, I found, much to my chagrin, that once I had resigned myself to the fate of learning, my eyes were opened to pools of knowledge that I was only barely aware of and never really interested in.  I actually began to enjoy it, in some small degree.  Now I could understand what was generally being discussed when a successful businessman friend spoke about the Federal Reserve’s management of inflation.  When my family took it’s annual trip to the Book Fair the classics section had new meaning.  New names stood out.  I recognized others besides Shakespeare, Dickens, Austin, and Twain.  I knew Collins, Irving, Malory and Johnson. (Perhaps that shows my terrible ignorance of literature.)  I’m not saying I’m a “Renaissance Man”, or anything like it.  I simply now have a slight appreciation for much more than I ever had before.  As it turns out, this is exactly what my parents had been telling me all along. (Strange how often that happens.)  I wasn’t getting the education because it was relevant.  I was getting the education so that more things might become relevant.

 

It is a common misconception of mine that because I don’t know about it, it’s not there.  Now before you go making too much fun of me for such an egocentric perspective, I think everyone suffers from it.  For example, have you ever tried to do something and found yourself saying that you didn’t expect it to be as hard as it was?  This is what I am referring to.  You didn’t know what all was involved, so you assumed that everything you had thought of was all that was involved.  All this to say, broadening my horizons and perspectives showed me how much more there was, which I had no idea about, in a very concrete and real way.  Of course if you had asked me before college, I knew that I only grasped a tiny bit about anything, but now I KNOW that I only know a tiny bit.

 

So, I went through test after test, and book after book.  While I had gotten past disliking the study for it’s own sake, it did eventually start to wear on me.  It was right about the time that I had had about as much studying and test taking that I could stand that I finally enrolled in Thomas Edison Sate College, which is primarily a distance learning college.  After such a long time operating with very few guides or benchmarks, the online classes allowed me to operate on an assignment basis.  (Imagine that!  Doing school assignments.  Novel concept.)  While the interface was somewhat new to me, and it took me a little while to get all my “T’s” crossed and my “I’s” dotted, I really started to enjoy my classes.

 

I took two classes, and found them both thoroughly engaging, but they were completely different, right down to the fact that one required interaction with other students and the other didn’t.  These classes are only just now finished and I thought that I would explain them a little and what they were about.

 

War and American Society:  This was the class which required no interaction with the other students.  I must say that this class was more intrinsically enjoyable for me.  There are several reasons for this, but before I give them to you, I will give my brief description of what the class was about.  War and American Society is a study of United States history through the lens of the wars we were involved in.  (If you have been following my blog at all, you have read most of my work for this class already.)  Ironically, there aren’t very many significant gaps in the timeline in this kind of study.  The subject material of this class was enjoyable for me because its whole purpose was to learn about American War history, which anyone who took a brief look at my personal library would attest is a passion of mine.  In addition to enjoying the reading assignments, all I had to do was write one or two short essays a week.  What? Write about something I enjoy?  Twist my arm!  Because there was no student interaction, the time involved for this class was minimal, relatively speaking, and I learned a great deal, enjoying every step of the way.   (Who knew Henry David Thoreau was a post modernist?  Anyone who had read him before?  Oh well; it was new to me anyway.)

 

Liberal Arts Capstone:  This class is a required course for all Thomas Edison State College graduates.  It was designed to be the culmination of your area of study.  Essentially, the course is simply a step-by-step process that takes you through writing a bachelor level (mini as I always called it) thesis paper.  You were supposed to select a topic that was relevant to your current occupation or area of study.  Mine, being history in general, with no specialization, was rather a large subject area.  Almost anything I wanted.  This class was much more of a challenge.  While I would not say that I necessarily enjoyed it, it gave me satisfaction.  I enjoyed certain aspects of it, and the challenge of doing something completely new and foreign to me was certainly a rewarding experience on many levels. The main feeling I have coming away from that particular class, however, is one of satisfaction with having completed, with significant help from a patient professor (AKA mentor, in Thomas Edison lingo), a project that would have been (or in reality was) very overwhelming to me.  Special thanks to Dr. Haydel for working with me, and to my fellow students, whose discussion posts and conversations I often greatly enjoyed, and whose feedback I found most interesting and helpful. (Particularly Miss… Hmm, perhaps she should remain anonymous… with whom I somehow managed to discuss such wide and varying topics as religion’s role in the founding of the U.S., the pro’s and con’s of our family business model, and the basis of laws in morality vs. individual persons beliefs.) (I think we strayed off topic the most.  Interesting conversations though.)

 

So, now it is all over.  I’m done and off to work.  In conclusion, I have decided that it was well worth the time and effort that was put into it.  I do not necessarily think that my approach is the best for everyone (clearly not in many cases such as doctors, etc.), and I am not even sure that college in general is the best course for everyone.  What I do know is that for me, it was the correct choice and that God drug me kicking and screaming, because it was the right thing to do.  I am only done today because he wasn’t going to let me quit, stall, or fail.  I can’t count the number of times I wasn’t sure if I was going to pass one of those infernal online tests; but somehow, God passed me on all but one.  (And I’m not sure I deserved to fail that one, but that is a whole other story.)  Finally, before I close, I want to thank my parents and my sister for all their support, understanding, and cattle prodding to get me to move along.  It has been a wonderful, if trial filled, experience for me.  I dare say it will help me in the future, even if I never have to worry about the law of diminishing returns, or what it was about Tintoretto that made him an important painter.

~Wyatt Fairlead

Poem: My Creed

The poem My Creed by Edgar A. Guest is one I just ran across.  I can say with all honesty that I would love to adopt this poem as a simplified measuring rod for myself.  I think this poem can be both convicting and inspiring to any person who is trying to live an upright life.  I can’t say that this is all I need for a creed or philosophy, but it is certainly a good start.  There is a lot here.

My Creed

                        -Edgar A. Guest

To live as gently as I can;

To be, no matter where, a man;

To take what comes of good or ill

And cling to faith and honor still;

To do my best, and let that stand

The record of my brain and hand;

And then, should failure come to me,

Still work and hope for victory.

To have no secret place wherein

I stoop unseen to shame and sin;

To be the same when I’m alone

As when my every deed is known;

To live undaunted, unafraid

Of any step that I have made;

To be without pretense or sham;

Exactly what men think I am.

To leave some simple mark behind

To keep my having lived in mind;

If enmity to aught I show,

To be an honest, generous foe,

To play my little part, nor whine

That greater honors are not mine.

This, I believe is all I need

For my philosophy and creed.

~Wyatt Fairlead

American Caribou, the Gun Control Debate

The debate over gun control is a topic that is extremely important to me.  I have strong opinions and about this subject, and if I am not careful, I can tend to overlook the fact that to so many, great suffering and emotional trauma is attached to such a debate.  After the recent failure of the gun control laws to pass in the U.S. Senate, many of the Newtown tragedy parents have vowed to continue to fight for more strict regulations.  This is a serious subject.

I believe that stories are a powerful medium. They make a point while distancing the point from the subject.  The concept is then grasped and hopefully applied by the individual instead of being forced upon the individual.  For this reason, I am presenting to you one of Wyatt’s Fables.

The Wolf and the Caribou

One day a wolf was wandering the plain in search of prey.  He was hungry, but didn’t really need food because he had eaten only yesterday.  Suddenly he spotted a caribou calf on the edge of a small glade.  “This defenseless gangly creature will make for a fine chase and good sport.” he thought as he stealthily approached.  Just as he was about to spring and begin the chase, there loomed out of the woods the mother caribou and a large bull with her.  The bull was strong with towering antlers, and the mother had long, powerful front legs with sharp hooves.  The wolf immediately began to flee.  No chase was worth the risk of those antlers and hooves.

Moral:  Predators avoid danger while the defenseless are vulnerable.

 This fable specifically is not the story that people need to hear, especially those who have suffered at the hands of violent crime.  The difficulty comes from the perspectives involved.  To those who have suffered, they see the weapon as the problem.  What could that man have done if he didn’t have a gun?  The realistic answer is that he could not have done what he did.  The missing link in this perspective is that regulations only matter to law abiding citizens and the man who did the murdering is in no way law abiding.  I am not arguing the Newtown tragedy specifically,(for example was that specific gun legal etc.) I am just stating that those hindered by regulations are not criminals.

I live in central Virginia and remember clearly the day that the Virginia Tech shooting occurred.  One of my school teachers had a daughter attending there at the time.  I was thinking once again about that terrible tragedy with its anniversary so recently past.  I asked myself, “What would have happened if the professor or any of the students in the several classrooms he entered had been armed?  Certainly several students would still have been killed, but would he have been able to make the parents of all 33 mourn?

My fable is completely inspired by this video.  I believe this man to be saying something that the U.S. government needs to hear, even if individuals need to be treated more gently.  As the governing body of the nation, the significance of the decisions they are making must be forced upon them.  I am not denigrating the feelings or motives of those who hold a position opposite to my own.  I simply feel that something is missing form their understanding.  Perhaps someone will be able to bring clarity and decisiveness to the debate over such a serious issue.

-Wyatt Fairlead

The Boston Bombings, Why We Appreciate Virtue

I am sitting in Dulles International Airport waiting for my mother and sister to arrive home from Romania.  They have been gone for two weeks.  Since they left, a lot has happened.  There have been explosions, terror attacks, and more.  The world is a dangerous place.

My heart goes out to the victims of the Boston Marathon Bombings.  It isn’t fair that so many should suffer for the wrongs of so few.  It is the dangerous world we live in.  And why is the world dangerous?  Why are there evil people, who would do such atrocious acts of violence?

Human nature has a natural propensity for evil.  That is what makes the positive virtues so valuable.  I was thinking the other day about courage.  I don’t know why I was contemplating it, but this thought occurred to me.  “Without fear, what is courage?”  It is the positive things that we appreciate, but why are they so precious?  Because there is an opposite.  There is evil.  And the choice makes the value.  If you have no choice, your decision has no value.  If you have a choice, your decision reflects on what you have decided, and it also reflects on you.

Think of this.  It is easier for the human to be cowardly.  Fear is the natural response.  The problem is that cowardice never saved anyone.  It takes courage to save.  To protect.  I think of the police in Boston, going from door to door.  Behind any one of those doors they walk up to could be waiting a dangerous man desperate to do anything to save himself.  It takes courage to go to that door.  Fear says stay away.  But the choice makes courage valuable.  We all know the high path, but invariably, our body wants the low one.  Our mind must fight the battle between these paths.

I do not know the reasons behind the attacks at Boston.  Perhaps no ones but the perpetrators do.  Perhaps they will be the only one who ever know.  But in the end, they fought a battle in their mind.  A battle between good and evil.  Their being was telling them to do the evil they committed.  Undoubtedly for a time, their mind resisted, for obvious reasons.  They chose evil.  The world suffers.  Without fear, what is courage?  Without suffering, what is joy?  Without strife and bondage, what is a savior?

~Wyatt Fairlead

Hard Knocks

Well, I thought I would post this poem by Edgar A. Guest, partly because it is really good, partly because I haven’t posted one in a while, but truth be told, mostly because I wanted to put something on, but I am not feeling very original at the moment.  So without further ado, here ‘tis.

 

Hard Knocks

            -Edgar A. Guest

I’m not the man to say that failure’s sweet,

Nor tell a chap to laugh when things go wrong;

I know it hurts to have to take defeat

An’ no one likes to loose before a throng;

It isn’t very pleasant not to win

When you have done the very best you could;

But if you’re down, get up and buckle in-

A lickin’ often does a fellow good.

I’ve seen some chaps who never knew their power

Until somebody knocked ‘em to the floor;

I’ve known men who discovered in an hour

A courage they had never shown before.

I’ve seen ‘em rise from failure to the top

By doin’ things they hadn’t understood

Before the day disaster made ‘em drop-

A lickin’ often does a fellow good.

Success is not the teacher, wise an’ true,

That gruff old failure is, remember that;

She’s much too apt to make a fool of you,

Which isn’t true of blows that knock you flat.

Hard knocks are painful things an’ hard to bear,

An’ most of us would dodge ‘em if we could;

There’s something mighty broadening in care-

A lickin’ often does a fellow good.

-Wyatt Fairlead

The Korean War (The First?)

Considering the modern events and the recent rise in tensions between the U.S. and North Korea, it is very interesting to have a general grasp of what the history is between our two nations.  This is a history of the Korean War, which occurred in the early 1950’s.  (For the record, I am not saying necessarily that I think that the modern tensions will escalate.  The post title was merely a nod to the current significance of this post.)

The Korean War

            The Korean War is one of the United States’ more recent wars and is unique in many ways.  Despite these facts, the Korean War is also one of the most forgotten wars in United States history.  The reason for this historical neglect is often attributed to what most Americans at the time, and even now in hindsight, considered the unsatisfactory ending of the war.  American perception of the war changed significantly over the course of the war, and this change in popularity still negatively affects our modern view of this important conflict.

The Korean War was unique and significant in many ways.  It was the first military conflict that was a result of the Cold War.  In many ways, this war was the precursor to the Vietnam War, and symbolized the way the Cold War would be handled for the years to come.  This war was also unique in that it was the first war in which the threat of atomic weapons was present throughout the entire course of hostilities.  Additionally, the Korean War saw the advent of the helicopter as a military asset, and the jet fighter slowly began to come into wide service.  Another difference that separates the Korean War from other wars, can be observed in that armored operations, as were executed and perfected in World War II, was not possible due to the mountainous terrain of the Korean Peninsula.  This was also the first limited war that America had fought since before the Civil War.  It was the first war conducted under the auspices of the United Nations, and the first war that the United States conducted under the authority of an outside organization.  Taking all these things into consideration, the war posed new challenges that American commanders were not accustomed to or prepared for.  These conditions are some of the factors that played into the way the war was conducted, and consequently affected the way that Americans perceived the war.  This perception of the war made it what it is today, a little known, and an even less appreciated conflict.

            The Korean War was a war of changing fortunes and extremes.  When the U.S. entered the fray in July 1950, it was intervening on behalf of the losing side.  More than this, by the time substantial American forces were available, South Korean forces and the American garrison troops previously deployed from Japan were pushed into a small pocket called the Pusan Perimeter, and were all but thrown into the sea in a matter of weeks.

However, a bold stroke was planned by General MacArthur, and the landing at Inchon Bay was conducted on September 15, 1950.  This amphibious attack changed the fortunes of the war completely in favor of the U.N. forces.  The North Korean Army was, in just as short a time as it had taken to force the South Koreans into the Pusan Perimeter, fleeing in great disorder back across the 38^th parallel.  Great changes in fortune were already evident.  Large swings had taken place in each direction.  The pendulum was swinging north, and the U.N. forces were following, ignoring Chinese warnings, and consequently unaware that gravity was already slowing down that same pendulum.  That gravity came in the form of 300,000 Chinese Troops already in the central mountains of North Korea.  When the Chinese counterattacked, the unprepared, and over extended U.N. forces were sent packing right back across the 38^th parallel, and farther, until Seoul, the South Korean capitol, was in the hands of the Communists for the second time in the war.  But the Chinese also over extended, and with the United States’ complete control over the skies, they could no longer sustain their forces in the South.  They to had to retreat northward, once again, and the war ground to a halt at the infamous 38^th parallel.  Each side was left there as the pendulum had come to a stop, hanging in the middle of the peninsula.

            During all this back and forth, all these changes in fortune, the American public was quite supportive of the war.  The seeds for the lack of support, however, were sown after the first northward pendulum swing when President Truman authorized the invasion of North Korea.  This move was in and of itself, not unpopular.  The problem it caused is that it broadened the scope of the war.  Before this change, the goal of the war was simply to push the North Korean Army out of South Korea and to prevent its return.  That goal had been accomplished.  The North Koreans were in no state to attempt another invasion.  However, once the invasion of the North and the unification of the country by elections was declared the goal, the old objective of maintaining the national boundaries was no longer adequate in the public eye.  This new goal was what success and failure must be measured against.

When the pendulum stopped swinging, Communist forces could not mount amphibious operations and therefore, could not get it going again.  The U.N. leaders were unwilling to try to restart it.  All they wanted was to end the war. They were willing to renounce the goal of unification and settle for the original goal by simply working out a treaty that would maintain the status quo.  Unfortunately, to the American public, this now looked like a compromise.  This was not viewed as a victory, which it would have been had the goal not been expanded to include unification.  The unwillingness of the U.N. leaders to pursue the goal of unification, after the involvement of the Chinese, and the long and seemingly fruitless negotiations ending in what appeared to the public as a compromise, and not victory, seriously undermined popular support for the war. The public view of the war as being unsuccessful is the most significant reason why the Korean War is often called the “Forgotten War”.  It was forgotten because it was not viewed as being won.

            Another important longstanding effect the Korean War had was the precedent it set for future conflicts with Communism.  The Korean War was Communism’s second test against of the Truman Doctrine, and the first test requiring armed conflict.  Many considered this to be the first true test of how far the Americans were willing to go to uphold their doctrine of containment.  In this sense, this war set the precedent for American involvement worldwide in the fight against the spread of Communism. Due in great part to this action, America would become involved in many different conflicts, both directly and indirectly.  Vietnam is the most common example of this, and it is this precedent that keeps troops in South-East Asia even today.

In conclusion, the Korean War was a landmark conflict in many ways.  It saw the use of new weapons and technology, while still greatly resembling the Pacific conflicts of World War II.  It was the first test of American will in regards to the practical outworking of the Truman Doctrine.  It was the first war fought under the supervision and direction of the United Nations.  It truly was a conflict that changed history.  Despite all these things, it remains unfamiliar to most Americans.  The Korean War is just another example of the many important things that we forget.

-Wyatt Fairlead

American Home Front

American Home Front

     During World War II, the American home front was nearly as important as the actual military fronts in the various theaters of combat.  If it were not for the home front and all the work in the factories, the military would not have been able to conduct the war as it had, or as successfully.  It is common sense that a soldier that isn’t well equipped can’t do his job properly.  The home front was one of the most integral parts of the successful Allied armies.

When America entered World War II in December 1941, it was totally unprepared.  Public opinion was almost universally opposed to entering the war until the attack on Pearl Harbor, and this stance of isolationism made it very difficult for President Roosevelt to prepare the nation for the impending conflict ahead of time.  His attempts to develop the American armaments industry went slowly and he could not get legislation for a standby draft passed until 1940. This sluggishness in being prepared for conflict is a direct result of the denial that almost all Americans were under, ignoring the fact that events in the world would affect them.  Being so far removed from all the effects of the war, and the bombings, lulled the Americans into the conviction that they could not be touched and that if they just kept out of the war, the war would leave them alone.  This sense of safety kept the American public from viewing the war objectively, and consequently, they acted as if it did not matter.

Then they were attacked.  The shock of the attack on Pearl Harbor destroyed the feeling of security felt by Americans even while the smoke was still clearing from the bomb blasts on Battleship Row.  The war had come to America, and suddenly, the giant that was America, was awake and bent on defending itself.  With the realization that safety was no longer a given came the understanding of America’s responsibility to face its enemies and defend itself against aggressors, as well as helping others to do the same.

Once war was declared, the United States began to mobilize the entire economy.  More than 12 million men were brought into the armed forces to conduct military operations, and the industrial capacity of the United States was revived to become the most formidable production machine ever known.  The population was mobilized like never before, with paper drives and victory gardens.  A ration card system was instituted.  People were encouraged to conserve on everything from gasoline to dairy products, sugar, oil, and many other commodities as well.  Tin and other metals were collected and melted for use.  War bond rallies were also used to help finance the war in ever increasing measures.  This was the first total war and complete mobilization that the entire country had ever known.

            The mobilized United States economy was a formidable machine that produced vast amounts of material.  The American arms industry literally buried the Axis powers in tanks, planes and ships.  For example, during the war, America produced 274, 979 aircraft between 1939 and 1944.  Germany, which was proud of its fine air force, built only 110,202 aircraft, and Japan only 67,757 during the same period.  These numbers are deceiving as well.  America built massive numbers of heavy bombers, which means that by weight, the United States built triple the amount of pounds of aircraft than both Germany and Japan combined. This is but one example of the way that American industry outstripped all of the other powers in dramatic ways during the war. 

             The incredible response of the American citizenry and the economy, to the declaration of war, and the war effort at home, is typical in American history.  Americans rise to the task set before them.  A brief overview of American history will show that Americans will sacrifice for something that is considered worthwhile.  In the Revolutionary War, Independence was considered worthwhile, and the sacrifices required of the colonies by that conflict were considerable for almost all, and tremendous for many.  Nevertheless, Americans sacrificed and won freedom.  The Civil War is another example.  Rightly or wrongly, the sacrifices made by the Southern States to gain what they considered to be worthwhile almost defy belief.  The colonization of the West is another example.  Those who went west for a new life were greeted with the prospect of nothing but a life of hard toil.  Nevertheless, people flooded west.  What is important to the American people is that they see the benefit to be gained by the trials they are going through.  No one sacrifices for the sake of sacrificing.

-Wyatt Fairlead