Time's Person of the Year

Timber Loftis · 12-29-2003, 11:00 AM

They swept across Iraq and conquered it in 21 days. They stand guard on streets pot-holed with skepticism and rancor. They caught Saddam Hussein. They are the face of America, its might and good will, in a region unused to democracy. The U.S. G.I. is TIME's Person of the Year.

________________________________________________
Modern history has a way of being modest with its gifts and blunt with its reckonings. Good news comes like a breeze you feel but don't notice; the markets are up, the air is cleaner, we're beating heart disease. It is the bad news that comes with a blast or a crash, to stop us in midsentence to stare at the TV, and shudder.

Maybe that's why we are startled by gratitude in the season of peace. To have pulled Saddam Hussein from his hole in the ground brings the possibility of pulling an entire country out of the dark. In an exhausting year when we've been witness to battles well beyond the battlefields—in the streets, in our homes, with our allies—to share good news felt like breaking a long fast, all the better since it came by surprise. And who delivered this gift, against all odds and risks? The same citizens who share the duty of living with, and dying for, a country's most fateful decisions.

Scholars can debate whether the Bush Doctrine is the most muscular expression of national interest in a half-century; the generals may ponder whether warmaking or peacekeeping is the more fearsome assignment; civilians will remember a winter wrapped in yellow ribbons and duct tape. But in a year when it felt at times as if we had nothing in common anymore, we were united in this hope: that our men and women at arms might soon come safely home, because their job was done. They are the bright, sharp instrument of a blunt policy, and success or failure in a war unlike any in history ultimately rests with them.

For uncommon skills and service, for the choices each one of them has made and the ones still ahead, for the challenge of defending not only our freedoms but those barely stirring half a world away, the American soldier is TIME's Person of the Year.

TIME followed a single platoon from the army's 1st armored Division, to watch its life on the line and glimpse what the world's largest army can do while all the expectations for it are changing. There is no such thing as a typical platoon, but every one has a story to tell, about the costs of war and the price of peace and what you learn getting from one to the next.

It is worth remembering that our pilots and sailors and soldiers are, for starters, all volunteers, in contrast to most nations, which conscript those who serve in their armed forces. Ours are serving in 146 countries, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. The 1.4 million men and women on active duty make up the most diverse military in our history, and yet it is not exactly a mirror of the country it defends. It is better educated than the general population and overweighted with working-class kids and minorities. About 40% of the troops are Southern, 60% are white, 22% are black, and a disproportionate number come from empty states like Montana and Wyoming. When they arrive at the recruiter's door, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told TIME, "they have purple hair and an earring, and they've never walked with another person in step in their life. And suddenly they get this training, in a matter of weeks, and they become part of a unit, a team. They're all sizes and shapes, and they're different ages, and they're different races, and you cannot help when you work with them but come away feeling that that is really a special thing that this country has."
__________________________________________________ ____
Note that the soldier was apppreciated before by Time:

Excerpt from article, January 1951
_______________________________
The man of 1950 was not a statesman; Dean Acheson and his fellow diplomats of the free world had, in 1950, notably failed to stop the march of Communism. Nor was 1950's man a general; the best commander of the year, MacArthur, had blundered and been beaten. Nor a scientist, for science—so sure at the century's beginning that it had all the answers—now waited for the politicians (or anyone else) to find a way of controlling the terrible power that science had released. Nor an industrialist, for 1950, although it produced more goods than any other year in the world's history, was not preoccupied with goods, but with life & death. Nor a scholar, for the world of 1950 was surfeited with undigested facts, and sought its salvation not in the conquest of new knowledge but in what it could relearn from old old, old lessons. 1950's man might turn out to be the aging conspirator, Joseph Stalin but as the year closed, that dreadful prospect was far from certain; if he was winning the game and not just an inning, Stalin's historians would record that 1950—and all other years from the death of Lenin—belonged to him. Or 1950's man might turn out to be an unknown saint, quietly living above the clash of armies and ideas. Him, too, the future would have to find.

As the year ended, 1950's man seemed to be an American in the bitterly unwelcome role of the fighting-man. It was not a role the American had sought, either as an individual or as a nation. The U.S. fighting-man was not civilization's crusader, but destiny's draftee.

The Peculiar Soldier. Most of the men in U.S. uniform around the world had enlisted voluntarily, but few had taken to themselves the old, proud label of "regular," few had thought they would fight, and fewer still had foreseen the incredibly dirty and desperate war that waited for them. They hated it, as soldiers in all lands and times have hated wars, but the American had some special reasons for hating it. He was the most comfort- loving creature who had ever walked the earth—and he much preferred riding to walking. As well as comfort, he loved and expected order; he yearned, like other men, for a predictable world, and the fantastic fog and gamble of war struck him as a terrifying affront.

Yet he was rightly as well as inevitably cast for his role as fighting-man in the middle of the 20th Century. No matter how the issue was defined, whether he was said to be fighting for progress or freedom or faith or survival, the American's heritage and character were deeply bound up in the struggle. More specifically, it was inevitable that the American be in the forefront of this battle because it was the U.S. which had unleased gigantic forces of technology and organizational ideas. These had created the great 20th Century revolution. Communism was a reaction, an effort to turn the worldwide forces set free by U.S. progress back into the old channels of slavery.

The American fighting-man could not win this struggle without millions of allies—and it was the unfinished (almost unstarted) business of his government to find and mobilize those allies through U.N. and by all other means. But the allies would never be found unless the American fighting-man first took his post and did his duty. On June 27, 1950, he was ordered to his post. Since then, the world has watched how he went about doing his duty.

He has been called soft and tough, resourceful and unskilled, unbelievably brave and unbelievably timid, thoroughly disciplined and scornful of discipline. One way or another, all of these generalizations are valid. He is a peculiar soldier, product of a peculiar country. His two outstanding characteristics seem to be contradictory. He is more of an individualist than soldiers of other nations, and at the same time he is far more conscious of, and dependent on, teamwork. He fights as he lives, a part of a vast, complicated machine—but a thinking, deciding part, not an inert cog.

12-29-2003, 11:03 AM

Old news

I posted that on my first entry in the good news thread [img]smile.gif[/img] heheheh
Thanks for the article TL [img]smile.gif[/img]

Donut · 12-29-2003, 11:31 AM

I have heard of this award in the past. What criteria is it judged on?

12-29-2003, 12:18 PM

I'm thinking that this paragraph from the article might have been a small indicator of what they looked at.

TIME followed a single platoon from the army's 1st armored Division, to watch its life on the line and glimpse what the world's largest army can do while all the expectations for it are changing. There is no such thing as a typical platoon, but every one has a story to tell, about the costs of war and the price of peace and what you learn getting from one to the next.

That seems to summ up what they considered.

LordKathen · 12-29-2003, 12:33 PM

Great post Timber! [img]graemlins/awesomework.gif[/img] No matter what the opinion is about the war, these guys are loyal to our country, and the backbone of our freedom. [img]graemlins/awesomework.gif[/img]

The Hierophant · 12-29-2003, 10:49 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by LordKathen:
No matter what the opinion is about the war, these guys are loyal to our country, and the backbone of our freedom. [img]graemlins/awesomework.gif[/img]

They protect U.S civilians from enemy armies by engaging them in the field, but only YOU are the backbone of your freedom. Soldiers just perform ONE job within the social network, they are no more or less important than any other member of society. But hey, congrats on the award, soldiers of the U.S!

LordKathen · 12-30-2003, 04:10 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by The Hierophant:

quote:
Originally posted by LordKathen:
No matter what the opinion is about the war, these guys are loyal to our country, and the backbone of our freedom. [img]graemlins/awesomework.gif[/img]

They protect U.S civilians from enemy armies by engaging them in the field, but only YOU are the backbone of your freedom. Soldiers just perform ONE job within the social network, they are no more or less important than any other member of society. But hey, congrats on the award, soldiers of the U.S!
[/QUOTE]I would disagree. Speaking metaphoricaly, we are the flesh of freedom, living it everyday. Without the backbone to protect that freedom, it would be taken away. They are, in that regard, extremely important. Useing myself as an example, It would not matter much to the "social network" if I disapeared. Or any other joe shmoe, for that matter. But, A person who has the guts and pride and bravery to actually physically fight for my freedom, or any other joe shmoe for that matter, would and does matter a great deal more than me. IMHO.That is why I commend Time for making the soldier the person of the year.

The Hierophant · 12-30-2003, 04:59 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by LordKathen:
I would disagree. Speaking metaphoricaly, we are the flesh of freedom, living it everyday. Without the backbone to protect that freedom, it would be taken away. They are, in that regard, extremely important. Useing myself as an example, It would not matter much to the "social network" if I disapeared. Or any other joe shmoe, for that matter. But, A person who has the guts and pride and bravery to actually physically fight for my freedom, or any other joe shmoe for that matter, would and does matter a great deal more than me. IMHO.That is why I commend Time for making the soldier the person of the year.

and that's fine, I'm glad that you do disagree, it makes things more interesting. However, it all depends on your definition of a 'joe schmoe'. I would say that joe schmoes don't exist at all, but that's just me.
If you disappeared, it would matter to the people that would ordinarily have direct contact with you (your friends/family/cab patrons etc). They would be affected, and thus the people that they interact with would also be affected, albeit indirectly. Everything you do has its social flow-on effect.
Soldiers are employed to engage rival soldiers in combat and/or deter opposing armies from aggressive action. That is their specialist niche, and it certainly is important. But it is no more important than the niche of the farmer who grows the crops that feed them (and you), or the cab driver that drives the bureaucrat to work who signs the paperwork that authorizes the funding of the army. Etc etc. Everyone is interdependent.

I think it is nice that TIME magazine gave out this award to U.S. soldiers. They do need some recognition for the gruelling work that they are doing. But I wouldn't say that any U.S soldier is more important than you are LK. If it wern't for you, the soldiers would have nothing to defend, their purpose would cease to exist.

LordKathen · 12-30-2003, 05:35 AM

And in that regard, you have a point. I was thinking more along the lines of recognition that is due. I certainly am not laying my life down for someone else driving cab. At least not at the level they are risking. That is the diferance to me. But I do see your point, and it is duely taken. [img]smile.gif[/img]

The Hierophant · 12-30-2003, 05:49 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by LordKathen:
And in that regard, you have a point. I was thinking more along the lines of recognition that is due. I certainly am not laying my life down for someone else driving cab. At least not at the level they are risking. That is the diferance to me. But I do see your point, and it is duely taken. [img]smile.gif[/img]

Definately. Professional soldiers put their life on the line, and for that they should be respected and appreciated. And I guess respect and appreciation are what this TIME award is all about [img]smile.gif[/img]

12-29-2003, 11:00 AM	#1
Timber Loftis 40th Level Warrior Join Date: July 11, 2002 Location: Chicago, IL Posts: 11,916	They swept across Iraq and conquered it in 21 days. They stand guard on streets pot-holed with skepticism and rancor. They caught Saddam Hussein. They are the face of America, its might and good will, in a region unused to democracy. The U.S. G.I. is TIME's Person of the Year. ________________________________________________ Modern history has a way of being modest with its gifts and blunt with its reckonings. Good news comes like a breeze you feel but don't notice; the markets are up, the air is cleaner, we're beating heart disease. It is the bad news that comes with a blast or a crash, to stop us in midsentence to stare at the TV, and shudder. Maybe that's why we are startled by gratitude in the season of peace. To have pulled Saddam Hussein from his hole in the ground brings the possibility of pulling an entire country out of the dark. In an exhausting year when we've been witness to battles well beyond the battlefields—in the streets, in our homes, with our allies—to share good news felt like breaking a long fast, all the better since it came by surprise. And who delivered this gift, against all odds and risks? The same citizens who share the duty of living with, and dying for, a country's most fateful decisions. Scholars can debate whether the Bush Doctrine is the most muscular expression of national interest in a half-century; the generals may ponder whether warmaking or peacekeeping is the more fearsome assignment; civilians will remember a winter wrapped in yellow ribbons and duct tape. But in a year when it felt at times as if we had nothing in common anymore, we were united in this hope: that our men and women at arms might soon come safely home, because their job was done. They are the bright, sharp instrument of a blunt policy, and success or failure in a war unlike any in history ultimately rests with them. For uncommon skills and service, for the choices each one of them has made and the ones still ahead, for the challenge of defending not only our freedoms but those barely stirring half a world away, the American soldier is TIME's Person of the Year. TIME followed a single platoon from the army's 1st armored Division, to watch its life on the line and glimpse what the world's largest army can do while all the expectations for it are changing. There is no such thing as a typical platoon, but every one has a story to tell, about the costs of war and the price of peace and what you learn getting from one to the next. It is worth remembering that our pilots and sailors and soldiers are, for starters, all volunteers, in contrast to most nations, which conscript those who serve in their armed forces. Ours are serving in 146 countries, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. The 1.4 million men and women on active duty make up the most diverse military in our history, and yet it is not exactly a mirror of the country it defends. It is better educated than the general population and overweighted with working-class kids and minorities. About 40% of the troops are Southern, 60% are white, 22% are black, and a disproportionate number come from empty states like Montana and Wyoming. When they arrive at the recruiter's door, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld told TIME, "they have purple hair and an earring, and they've never walked with another person in step in their life. And suddenly they get this training, in a matter of weeks, and they become part of a unit, a team. They're all sizes and shapes, and they're different ages, and they're different races, and you cannot help when you work with them but come away feeling that that is really a special thing that this country has." __________________________________________________ ____ Note that the soldier was apppreciated before by Time: Excerpt from article, January 1951 _______________________________ The man of 1950 was not a statesman; Dean Acheson and his fellow diplomats of the free world had, in 1950, notably failed to stop the march of Communism. Nor was 1950's man a general; the best commander of the year, MacArthur, had blundered and been beaten. Nor a scientist, for science—so sure at the century's beginning that it had all the answers—now waited for the politicians (or anyone else) to find a way of controlling the terrible power that science had released. Nor an industrialist, for 1950, although it produced more goods than any other year in the world's history, was not preoccupied with goods, but with life & death. Nor a scholar, for the world of 1950 was surfeited with undigested facts, and sought its salvation not in the conquest of new knowledge but in what it could relearn from old old, old lessons. 1950's man might turn out to be the aging conspirator, Joseph Stalin but as the year closed, that dreadful prospect was far from certain; if he was winning the game and not just an inning, Stalin's historians would record that 1950—and all other years from the death of Lenin—belonged to him. Or 1950's man might turn out to be an unknown saint, quietly living above the clash of armies and ideas. Him, too, the future would have to find. As the year ended, 1950's man seemed to be an American in the bitterly unwelcome role of the fighting-man. It was not a role the American had sought, either as an individual or as a nation. The U.S. fighting-man was not civilization's crusader, but destiny's draftee. The Peculiar Soldier. Most of the men in U.S. uniform around the world had enlisted voluntarily, but few had taken to themselves the old, proud label of "regular," few had thought they would fight, and fewer still had foreseen the incredibly dirty and desperate war that waited for them. They hated it, as soldiers in all lands and times have hated wars, but the American had some special reasons for hating it. He was the most comfort- loving creature who had ever walked the earth—and he much preferred riding to walking. As well as comfort, he loved and expected order; he yearned, like other men, for a predictable world, and the fantastic fog and gamble of war struck him as a terrifying affront. Yet he was rightly as well as inevitably cast for his role as fighting-man in the middle of the 20th Century. No matter how the issue was defined, whether he was said to be fighting for progress or freedom or faith or survival, the American's heritage and character were deeply bound up in the struggle. More specifically, it was inevitable that the American be in the forefront of this battle because it was the U.S. which had unleased gigantic forces of technology and organizational ideas. These had created the great 20th Century revolution. Communism was a reaction, an effort to turn the worldwide forces set free by U.S. progress back into the old channels of slavery. The American fighting-man could not win this struggle without millions of allies—and it was the unfinished (almost unstarted) business of his government to find and mobilize those allies through U.N. and by all other means. But the allies would never be found unless the American fighting-man first took his post and did his duty. On June 27, 1950, he was ordered to his post. Since then, the world has watched how he went about doing his duty. He has been called soft and tough, resourceful and unskilled, unbelievably brave and unbelievably timid, thoroughly disciplined and scornful of discipline. One way or another, all of these generalizations are valid. He is a peculiar soldier, product of a peculiar country. His two outstanding characteristics seem to be contradictory. He is more of an individualist than soldiers of other nations, and at the same time he is far more conscious of, and dependent on, teamwork. He fights as he lives, a part of a vast, complicated machine—but a thinking, deciding part, not an inert cog. __________________

12-29-2003, 11:31 AM	#3
Donut Jack Burton Join Date: March 1, 2001 Location: Airstrip One Age: 40 Posts: 5,571	I have heard of this award in the past. What criteria is it judged on? __________________ [img]\"http://www.wheatsheaf.freeserve.co.uk/roastspurs.gif\" alt=\" - \" /> <br />Proud member of the Axis of Upheaval<br />Official Titterer of the Laughing Hyenas<br />Josiah Bartlet - the best President the US never had.<br />The 1st D in the D & D Show

12-29-2003, 12:33 PM	#5
LordKathen Ma'at - Goddess of Truth & Justice Join Date: September 15, 2002 Location: Kennewick, WA Age: 52 Posts: 3,166	Great post Timber! [img]graemlins/awesomework.gif[/img] No matter what the opinion is about the war, these guys are loyal to our country, and the backbone of our freedom. [img]graemlins/awesomework.gif[/img] __________________

12-30-2003, 05:35 AM	#9
LordKathen Ma'at - Goddess of Truth & Justice Join Date: September 15, 2002 Location: Kennewick, WA Age: 52 Posts: 3,166	And in that regard, you have a point. I was thinking more along the lines of recognition that is due. I certainly am not laying my life down for someone else driving cab. At least not at the level they are risking. That is the diferance to me. But I do see your point, and it is duely taken. [img]smile.gif[/img] __________________

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12-29-2003, 11:03 AM	#2
MagiK Guest Posts: n/a	Old news I posted that on my first entry in the good news thread [img]smile.gif[/img] heheheh Thanks for the article TL [img]smile.gif[/img]

12-29-2003, 12:18 PM	#4
MagiK Guest Posts: n/a	I'm thinking that this paragraph from the article might have been a small indicator of what they looked at. TIME followed a single platoon from the army's 1st armored Division, to watch its life on the line and glimpse what the world's largest army can do while all the expectations for it are changing. There is no such thing as a typical platoon, but every one has a story to tell, about the costs of war and the price of peace and what you learn getting from one to the next. That seems to summ up what they considered.

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