There are military technicians, air support and the know-how of scientists and engineers who want to, who are anxious, to help our soldiers in the field, but they can, and will help only through the male and female soldiers themselves – it is our soldiers, the body of a man or woman, that, ultimately, are the jettison of victory, and they are the action of war itself and the victory in war.

Our scientists are God sent in this case in the instruments they provide, but just as the rays of the sun passing through a scientific instrument are able to work greater wonders than they ordinarily do, it is the ordinary soldier that is in fact the ray passing through that instrument, it is the life of man. In the turmoil and winds of war, just as in this war, the movement and the outcome, this wind is the soldier, not the instruments, the soldiers are the collective wind passing through a mill, and it is the wind of their souls that grind the corn, without the wind the grinding stone stands still.

War means grinding down. Usually, it takes time. We need to treasure our troops, in every case. Of course, everyone knows that. In the battlefield, no one is poor, no one is rich, no one is exceptionally more learned than the other in letters, though experience counts in war more than letters. And it is our soldiers that determine the outcome, in the end. Unless they decide to finish it, any fool can assure you the corn will rise again if the seeds are not ground.

It is obvious to everyone, our very feelings before we move into Baghdad, as "modern" man watches on television, and instinctively it is obvious, the soldier is the war, and in war, the soldier and the support both know – there are no fixed or rigid ideas.

It’s first one day at a time, then one hour at a time, then one minute at a time.

The outskirts of Baghdad are there now. Baghdad, so approximate to Babylon, where man first built some of the very first cities, and planted food. In those thousands of years ago, they defeated the swamp people because they had to defend this new idea called the city, but the swamp is now very dry, the swamp which now is very dry and our troops occupy.

Our soldiers will probably be going into Babylon very soon, now. When it starts, one cannot waft in the least, do not tarry in the least, do not stagnate for even a moment. No one will sleep. So, just before, not the day before, not two days before, but perhaps three days before, the soldiers need to stand down and sleep. Let the scientists continue. The bombs can drop. Now it’s time for the soldiers to pair off into shifts, and let each other have 10 hours to sleep. To drink hard liquor, and wake up with a hangover.

To sleep. 10 hours would do them good. Let the others feed the peasants, or whatever they want to do. Our soldiers are now our Gods. There is one God. But before we enter Baghdad, they are our Gods. War isn’t applied knowledge. Our soldiers, they are our war. And even Gods sleep.

CLAN CAMERON ARCHIVES

Killiecrankie
by William Edmondston Aytoun
circa 1857

On the heights of Killiecrankie
Yester-morn our army lay:
Slowly rose the mist in columns
From the river's broken way;
Hoarsely roared the swollen torrent,
And the pass was wrapped in gloom,
When the clansmen rose together
From their lair amidst the broom.
Then we belted on our tartans,
And our bonnets down we drew,
And we felt our broadswords' edges,
And we proved then keen and true;
And we prayed the prayer of soldiers,
And we yelled the gathering-cry,
And we clasped the hands of kinsmen,
And we swore to do or die!
Then our leader rose before us
On his war-horse black as night -
Well the Cameronian rebels
Knew that charger in the fight! -
And a cry of exultation
From the bearded warriors rose;
For we loved the house of Claver'se,
And we thought of good Montrose.
But he raised his hand for silence:
'Soldiers! I have sworn a vow -
Ere the evening star shall glisten
On Schehallion's lofty brow,
Either we shall rest in triumph,
Or another of the Graemes
Shall have died in battle-harness
For his Country and King James!
Strike this day as if the anvil
Lay beneath your blows the while,
Be they covenanting traitors,
Or the brood of false Argyle!
Strike! And drive the trembling rebels
Backwards o'er the stormy Forth;
Let them tell their pale Convention
How they fared within the North.
Let them tell that Highland honour
Is not to be bought nor sold,
That we scorn their prince's anger
As we loathe his foreign gold.
Strike! And when the fight is over,
If ye look in vain for me,
Where the dead are lying thickest,
Search for him that was Dundee!'

Through the scattered wood of birches,
O'er the broken ground and heath,
Wound the long battalion slowly,
Till they gained the field beneath;
Then we bounded from our covert:
Judge how looked the Saxons then,
When they saw the rugged mountain
Start to life with armed men!
Like a tempest down the ridges
Swept the hurricane of steel,
Rose the slogan of MacDonald -
Flashed the broadsword of Lochiel!
Vainly sped the withering volley
'Mongst the foremost of our band -
On we poured until we met them,
Foot to foot, and hand to hand.
Horse and man went down like drift-wood
When the floods are black at Yule,
And their carcasses were whirling
In the Garry's deepest pool,
Horse and man went down before us -
Living foe there tarried none
On the field of Kiliecrankie,
When that stubborn fight was done!
And the evening star was shining
On Schehallion's distant head,
When we wiped our bloody broadswords,
And returned to count the dead.
There we found him gashed and gory,
Stretched upon the cumbered plain,
As he told us where to seek him,
In the thickest of the slain.
And a smile was on his visage,
For within his dying ear
Pealed the joyful note of triumph,
And the clansmen's clamorous cheer:
So, amidst the battle's thunder,
Shot, and steel, and scorching flame,
In the glory of his manhood
Passed the spirit of the Graeme!

Open wide the vaults of Atholl,
Where the bones of heroes rest -
Open wide the hallowed portals
To receive another guest!
Last of Scots, and last of freemen -
Last of all that dauntless race
Who would rather die unsullied
Than outlive the land's disgrace!

Editor's Note: Either from Aytoun's 1849 "Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers & Other Poems" or his 1857/8 "The Ballads of Scotland."

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