Soldiers to Citizens
Whether they had been urban or rural residents, millions of World War
11’s GIs deeply absorbed values during their military service that
shaped their lives after the war. They learned discipline; discipline
day and night; discipline under fire, discipline in mud and snow;
discipline under the most dire and dangerous conditions. They learned,
no matter how impossible and threatening the situation, to achieve an
objective assigned by an Army authority: and this hard-earned learning
experience made all the difference in their subsequent lives.
So
thousands of them, especially those who had been educated/ disciplined
in the Army Specialized Training Program, a college program that was
later truncated, went on to towering achievements under the subsequent
GI Bill of Rights. Among those who served in World War 11 were two U.S.
Presidents, two U.S. Supreme Court justices, nine Senators, at least
six Representatives, as well as a raft of outstanding actors and
scholars.
I was among those who not only was once enrolled in
the ASTP but later thronged the colleges in the postwar period, during
the return of huge flocks of ex-GIs. And this book assiduosly seeks to
recount who those GIs were and what they did. But as earnest and
dedicated as this account by Suzanne Mettler seeks to be, it never gets
close to the real impact of military service on the returning GIs.
The
fact is that of the millions of American youths who joined or were
inducted into the military branches, most came out markedly disciplined
and directed. I cannot offer a more startling example of this
transformation than the fact that in Gen. George Patton’s Third Army,
all infantrymen wore ties in foxholes—yes even while artillery rained
down and their clothes were filthy rags. A commissioned or
non-commissioned officer’s word was law—even with a soldier’s life on
the line. Not that these young infantrymen didn’t bring intelligence
and talent into their military careers; but they learned the singular
lesson of being able to achieve under the most dire conditions—with all
hell bursting around them. So it could be expected that intelligent
survivors of such a menacing environment would feel privileged to have
survived, and so steered the rest of their lives with grit, direction,
as well as intelligence—and above all with dedication and discipline.
So
very few (much fewer than average) flunked out under the GI Bill, and
in fact hundreds of thousands went on to higher schooling, professional
careers as teachers, lawyers, engineers, journalists, and government
officials. This book deserves kudos for its unflagging scrutiny, for
its enlightened orientation, its earnest research, as well as for its
unpretentious scholarship. But the question that should have been put
by the author to the members of the Greatest Generation was
unfortunately never posed. It is: “What in your military career
contributed to your success in later life?”
Especially if they
were in the Third Army in World War II, especially if they served in
combat, and especially if they acquired skills that enabled them to
survive the war, the answer would have been encompassed in one word:
“discipline.” That word, and that concept, never appear in this
exhaustively researched and written book, and it is that flaw that
undermines its otherwise penetrating and informed inquiry into one of
the greatest government programs ever adopted.
(A combat
infantryman during World War 11, Mitchell Kaidy attended New York
UniversityAmerica.”) under the GI Bill of Rights. He has won several
awards and is listed in “Who’s Who in America"
20.01.2008. 17:45
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