Marines Study Poetry as They Prepare for Battle

Reuters via YahooNews ^ | October 31 | Claudia Parsons

[2Trievers]

Marines ... anger management ... poetry?

BAHHHHHHRRRAAAAAAHHHAAAAAAAAA.

[Angel#3]

Anger management??? I don't want their anger managed. I want them mad as hell.

[jjbrouwer]

Perhaps they are looking for New Age guys.

[NewLand]

"U.S. marines poised for battle are taking time off between keeping fit and cleaning their guns to study anger management..."

A few film clips of the WTC attacks ought to keep their anger "managed" properly...

[2Trievers]

Can you believe this? We've gone to hell in a new age, touchy feely handbasket. Pardon me while I see if there's any tofu left over for breakfast ... I have to get my strength for another day of clap trap.

[jjbrouwer]

I prefer cheesecake for my brekkie.

[Junior]

Sounds very zen to me. It's high-time we realized that there is more to war than just the physical aspects of killing people and breaking things; the guys doing the killing and breaking are human beings with all the thoughts and emotions pertaining thereto. Anyone who has ever read the WWI poetry this article talks about realizes this.

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow,
Amid the crosses, row on row ...

[RaceBannon]

Kipling is Kewel!! We're not talking Yeats!!!

[MayflowerMadam]

Ridiculous! They need to be stoked up and mad as hell. This is just another way to disarm our military.

[RaceBannon]

Time on ship is stressful. Waiting for something to happen, having to live in close quarters with NO WAY OUT, the smell, the fights between each other, it is a life you never saw. Marines have nothing to do except eat, sleep at night only, read, and Physical Train, and believe me, that leaves plenty of time in the day you have to fill. The closed in feeling, no privacy, less than boot camp if you can imagine.

People's personality change, you get short tempered, and it is against the people who you need to depend on the most. Just imagine being locked up in a huge room with 3500 people, people you cannot get away from ALL DAY. At work, you get to go home. Not on ship.

[RaceBannon]

I spent 6 months at sea twice, it is a character builder, for sure. Floating off Iran both times, in 1980,we were ready for war. 81 we were ready for the next liberty port. It gets claustrophobic, you cannot get away from people ALL DAY, the grey walls with NOTHING TO DO!!!

If you have a job to do, the time passes, but Grunts DO NOT have a job while on board, they are bored stiff. You can only run so many times in a circle on that flight deck or do P.T. in the hanger deck. The rest of the time is spent...WAITING FOR THE WORD.

What word? The word to go, the word to sleep, the word to wait, the word to eat, the word to make a head call...just waiting. Waiting can drive you nuts, especially when you know fighting is going on, and you aren't in it.

[jjbrouwer]

They need to be stoked up and mad as hell...

Perhaps they should listen to Iron Maiden, rather than the genteel poetry.

[RaceBannon]

Oh, by the way, they ARE mad as hell, and scared to death, too. But, Trust me, they are ready to go, they aren't reading anything romantic, they are reading stories of death and honor and commitment on the battlefield, all the required reading off the officer corps in the academies for the last CENTURY.

[ccmay]

the Peleliu is a stressful place

I bet it's really stressful for a marine-ette poetry teacher floating around in the middle of the ocean with 2,200 Marines. How long before she gets knocked up and sent home?

WTF were our nation's leaders thinking when they put women on warships?

-ccm

[RaceBannon]

I would bet Kid Rock is more popular, and Lee Greenwood, too.

[RaceBannon]

I missed that, maybe they are taking the class because she is the only woman on board??? That's a healthy sign to me!!

[tonycavanagh]

During duty of North Ireland because of the nature of the tour, you were confined to the block houses, the facilities were not the best, just bunk beds and lockers for kit, a few showers, you were either on patrol or waiting to go on patrol or waiting as a quick reaction force to any emergency.

The place was airless and cramped, not many ways to let of steam, the incidents of fights between the lads increased, if some one pissed you of there was no escape.

It was the more intellectual challenges that helped holdback the boredom and the stress of doing nothing in between patrols, and helped reduce fights, Chess tournaments, studying a foreign language and yes even a few time poetry, it was on such a tour that I heard of Wilfred Owen.

Tony

[jjbrouwer]

Yes American Badass would be a rallying anthem.

[RaceBannon]

I have only heard of Wilfred Owen through a documentary seen over here. He spent time in the asylum for shell shock, but they did mention he was a poet, and thatwas why they covered him. He had a brother, too in the war, lost him early? Also, didnt wilfred Owen die on almost the last day?

[RaceBannon]

I used to blare Rory Gallagher before football games, that or Double-Live Gonzo, but our C.O like "Nobody does it better" for some reason....