The Faith of the American Soldier

THE FAITH

AMERICAN

SOLDIER

THE FAITH

AMERICAN

SOLDIER

STEPHEN MANSFIELD

Jeremy P. Tarcher / Penguin

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Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

JEREMY P. TARCHER/PENGUIN

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First trade paperback edition 2006

Copyright © 2005 by Stephen Mansfield

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ISBN 1-58542-407-2

EISBN 978-1-1015-6281-9

Printed in the United States of America

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While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The author has, in most cases, witnessed the episodes recounted. In some instances, interviews with eyewitnesses have been used. Some of the individuals in this book are composites of real persons, and some names have been changed to protect an individual’s privacy or security. To avoid confusion to the reader, when the unit of a soldier is mentioned, the name used for him is his own. When the unit is not mentioned, that name has been changed at the soldier’s request.

TO THE CHAPLAINS,

HEROES OF FAITH

WHO TEND THE WARRIOR SOUL

ALSO BY STEPHEN MANSFIELD

Never Give In:

The Extraordinary Character of Winston Churchill

Faithful Volunteers:

The History of Religion in Tennessee

Then Darkness Fled:

The Liberating Wisdom of Booker T. Washington

More Than Dates and Dead People:

Recovering a Christian View of History

Forgotten Founding Father:

The Heroic Legacy of George Whitefield

The Faith of George W. Bush

Derek Prince: A Biography

CONTENTS

Prologue: The Vigil at Arms

Introduction

1  The New Generation at War

2  Shields of Strength

3  Men of Cloth and Steel

4  Anvil of the Warrior Code

5  Breaking Code

Epilogue

Notes

Bibliography

Acknowledgments

About the Author

PROLOGUE

THE VIGIL AT ARMS

There have always been rituals for welcoming men to the fellowship of arms. We read of them in Homer and Beowulf, in Cicero and the legends of King Arthur. Tacitus wrote of the Germans welcoming a young warrior to arms with the gift of a shield and a spear. Indeed, most every tribe and culture has had some ceremony that accompanied the belting of the sword.

By the latter Middle Ages, though, the heritage of these early traditions had merged with the liturgies and offices of the Christian church to fashion a new kind of warrior called the knight. He was intended to be the perfect merging of holy passion and military might, of spiritual devotion and martial skill. His calling was the defense of Christendom, a task he could only expect to fulfill with a pure heart and a holy life. His war, then, was as much to master himself as it was with the enemies of the realm. In fact, he believed he would never succeed in serving his king until he first succeeded in serving his God.

A man was never born to knighthood. It was something he had to prove himself to be. Knights were fashioned in battle, honed by mentors, and disciplined by hardship. Knights were molded in the holy fires of spiritual seeking. And when the time was right and a man was chosen for the call, he prepared himself for the moment of his ascendance with a ritual all knights underwent: the Vigil.

The Vigil was the final ceremony of cleansing, of meditation, and of sacrifice. It was a purifying and resolving of the hungers of the heart. It was the liturgy by which a man who was simply a warrior became a knight in the service of God.

The Vigil began early on the day before a man was to be knighted. He was first bathed, usually in rose water and usually in a wooden tub. This signified his baptism, his reenactment of the burial of Jesus Christ in the tomb, and His resurrection to life again. The knight-to-be understood from this that he was no longer his own, that his life had been bought by the death of the Lord he now followed. His sins were cleansed. His heart made new. His affections fixed to a new allegiance.

As a sign of shed vanity, the man’s hair was usually cut. In the Middle Ages, the sacrificing of one’s hair was seen as a sign of devotion to God. This meant that a knight often wore his hair in the same crudely cut manner as a monk, reminding him that he had entered a calling more than an army, a holy order more than just a soldier’s life.

The knight candidate was then given new clothes. He first received a red garment with long sleeves and a hood that was placed over a white tunic. It was the symbol that this man was ready to shed his blood in the service of God and his king. Afterward a tight-fitting black coat was placed over the white and the red to signify that the knight should never fear death, which for the man of God is but reward.

Now properly cleansed and clothed, the man was taken to a chapel and left alone with his weapons and his armor. He had already begun a fast. It was a means of purifying both soul and body, humbling himself into his humanity, and reminding him always to champion the weak and the poor. Now, as a man clean in body and spirit, the knight-to-be presented himself to God.

With his companions and sponsors waiting prayerfully outside, the man spread his weapons on the altar and stood watch. For no less than ten hours, he prayed the prayers of devotion and ran his heart over each tool of his trade: his sword, his mace, his lance, his gauntlet, perhaps even his saddle and the standard of his king. And he waited. For God to receive him. For the words that would form his call. For the grace to conquer his passions. For the boldness befitting his charge.

He also envisioned the next day. His companions would come for him and take him to the appointed place. A priest would say a mass, and then the knight candidate would kneel. The priest would bless him, and then, while his companions held them aloft, the priest would bless his weapons.

There would be a sermon and charges from the older knights about the price of the call. Perhaps a pair of spurs would be put upon his feet, symbols of the nobility and rank he had attained. Certainly his mentors would attest to the other nobles that he was properly prepared, that his training was complete. And they would kiss him, in welcome to the fellowship of the sword.

The sword. Finally, it would be time. The sword crafted uniquely for him would be brought forth and laid before him. He had dreamed of the moment all his life. The priest would then take the sword, and the others might place their hands upon it as well. Then would come the sacred words:

Bless this sword,

so that it may be a defense

for churches, widows, and orphans

and for all servants of God

against the fury of the heathen.

Then the king or the highest noble in attendance would administer the collée, the ceremonial blow to the head and neck with the sword. Later generations would remember this as a dubbing, a tapping on the shoulders and head. In truth, it was more dramatic, more violent; it was a chopping motion meant to remind the knight that he was under the sword, that he had already surrendered his life to a cause.

All this would come the next day. For now, though, the knight-to-be is in prayer, eager that he will never fail the holy trust he is about to receive. He is to be a knight: chosen, destined, anointed by his God. It is a sacred thing.

Lord, make me worthy, he prays and then, in the concluding silence, "Deus vult." God wills it.

It is literally true—there are no

atheists in foxholes—religion is

precious under fire.

—LIEUTENANT GENERAL

A. A. VANDERGRIFT

FORMER COMMANDANT

UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS

INTRODUCTION

Lance Corporal James Gault sits trembling on the edge of his bunk somewhere in Iraq. His wet, reddened face is pressed firmly into his rugged hands. From time to time, he runs his palms over the short, blond hair that covers his scalp, as though driving his tears to the back of his skull.

Between sobs, Gault tells the chaplain his story. Just two days ago, his platoon drove their Humvees into a nearby village. It was just routine. They had been to the village many times. Gault had even come to recognize the faces of the children who gathered around their vehicles.

This time, though, the platoon came under attack. Insurgents had apparently entered the village and were now shooting from every direction. The Marines returned fire. Gault gripped his .50 caliber machine gun and searched the rooftops for the source of the rounds that were pinging against the sides of his Humvee. Then he saw it. There was a man firing a Kalashnikov from a roof just a few buildings away. Foolishly, the man fired down on the Marines from a standing position, which left him almost completely exposed.

Gault raised his gun and pressed the trigger. The massive weapon roared. Though he had been in the field for months, Gault was stunned by what happened next. The fierce barrage of the .50 caliber cut the man in half almost exactly at the waist. The Kalashnikov fell from his hands to the street three stories below. Then—as Gault watched in shock—the man’s torso tilted forward, left his lower half, and fell to the street as well, not far from where Gault crouched in his vehicle. The man’s legs and mid-section still stood upright on the roof, just as they had when the man was alive.

For two days, the scene has refused to leave James Gault’s mind. He replays it again and again—and it forces him against the greater realities of his life. Gault is no coward. Nor is he the kind of easily shaken, sensitive soul who cannot endure the horrors of war. He has killed, and he will kill again. In fact, he believes "the bad guys have to die." To