Today, Friday, the 11th of December, the year of our Lord 2009, I signed and submitted my forms. In a few weeks, I shall be a member of Her Majesty's Canadian Forces. If all goes well, in a few months I shall enter the Royal Military College, holding the Queen's commission as an officer-cadet. A few years after that, if all goes well again, I shall exit with two university degrees, as an infantry officer. An officer of the line, as I might've been called in the days of lace-ruffles, perukes and brocade.However, those days are long passed, and I shall fight not against an honourable enemy a few dozen yards away, but against a ruthless foe that fights with ambushes and roadside bombs and the cruelty of rusty knives. For Afghanistan is where I will go, if it isn't sorted out in four years (and I suspect that it won't be). Off to the Big Show, as my great-grandfather would've said back in the golden summer of 1914. Now, as then, the motivation for the men of my family to join the Army and fight for God, Queen and Country is noblesse oblige. I have lived all my life in comfort and privilege, and it is time that I earned it.
Gentlemen, sharing my thoughts and musings with you in this place has been a true honour. I will still try to write here, as often as I can, relating my progress in the Forces when I can. I raise my glass in toast to all you fine gentlemen, and as a soon-to-be officer and gentleman, I salute you all.
God save the Queen and Heaven bless the Maple Leaf Forever!
Gladstone
God Speed
ReplyDeleteI echo Kipling, and if you would be so kind as to keep us updated, I would be more than thankful; I am hoping to take the same path in a year or two myself, but the procedure is still shrouded in mists for me, and the more I can dispel before I make a move, the better it is for all.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, may you have the most success possible.
Congratulations!Montjoie Our Lady! Montjoie St George!
ReplyDeleteGod Speed.
ReplyDeleteGod Speed..
ReplyDeleteGood luck, young man.
ReplyDeleteMany moons ago, I ventured the same course. While I have absolutely no regrets, I would not wish to do it all again.
Remember the Queen's Commission is something that is earned, you do not obtain that scroll until you graduate. A Gentleman Cadet is precisely that - a cadet - not a commissioned officer, though I do not doubt that you will get there in four years time.
In the meantime, suggest you learn the hallowed names of the Old 18 before you go. Things will be that much easier when you arrive.
Happy warrioring!
"Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier, or not having been at sea."
ReplyDeleteMay the God of Battles protect and lead you in all learning and warfare.
Gladstone,
ReplyDeleteSoldier have rarely (if ever) fought an "honourable" enemy - war is a boxcing match! May I direct you to the final stanza of Kipling's poem "The Young British Soldier":
When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
So-oldier of the Queen!
Good luck with the commissioning course (I certainly would want to re-do mine! I only have one piece of advice, remember that the commissioning course is only a means to an end, and not an end in of itself.
Mac
Quo Fas et Gloria Ducunt
God speed and good luck!
ReplyDelete`Soldier, I wish you well`
ReplyDeleteI just wish your Victorian dreams of glory get smashed by the mud, blood and true madness of an actual war.
ReplyDeleteIf you truly believe the Summer of 1914 was indead "golden", the your are a fool. And it's fools like you get young men and women killed. For vanity.
Mr. Rambo, I have no delusions as to the nature of war. And 'golden summer' was referring to how the whole affair must have seemed to those young men who went off in that summer. They thought it would be a great adventure, and they were tragically wrong, and the Old World died in the flames they stoked.
ReplyDeleteIt is a muddy, disgusting, bloody, soul-crushing business, war. Mr. Rambo, do not think I signed my papers with a light heart or a head full of dreams.
What, pray tell, is your argument with the Afghans? Are they not also God fearing people, as you are? Should not our argument be with our overlords, the Princes of Darkness?
ReplyDeleteAs a former soldier and airman, now sailor in the armed forces of the U.S., I wish you good luck and God Speed. Never let the narrow-minded crush your ideals, read Waugh as a solace, and surrender not an inch to the Hoopers you will find in the military.
ReplyDeleteAnd Mr. "Rambo": it was a year and a half in Iraq that made me a monarchist. Honor and dreams of glory, Victorian or otherwise, temper the otherwise unrestrained ferocity of war, and without them, war, already grotesque, would be horrific beyond your imagining.
As a French Canadian living in Paris, pretty far from Canada and the former empire, I wish you all the best and I salute your courage and your loyalty to our country and to our Queen!
ReplyDeleteGod Speed!
Marchmain
May God bless you and all the brave Canadians.
ReplyDeleteSir,
ReplyDeleteThough I do very much suppor your decision, be aware of this: Don't think it's anything like what it was nintey years ago: The army is no place for aristocratic ideals.
Best of Luck to You.
As a former US Marine and current reseve sailor, I'd like to offer my congratulations for choosing a noble path. Remember your ideals and take care of those who serve under you. I enjoy reading your posts and have turned on several of my colleagues in the UK to it as well. Keep up the hard work.
ReplyDeleteGod save the Queen!
God bless and protect you, Sir.
ReplyDeleteBest of luck to you, from 18808. I'm with Beaverbrook: get as fit as you possibly can before you go to Basic Officer Training in St. Jean (it's no Chilliwack, but it's still a test, I'm told), and learn the names of the Old 18:
ReplyDelete1. AFF Wurtele
2. HC Freer
3. HE Wise
4. WM Davis
5. TL Reed
6. SJA Denison
7. LH Irving
8. F Davis
9. CA DesBrisay
10. VS Rivers
11. J Spelman
12. CO Fairbank
13. AB Perry
14. JB Cochrane
15. FJ Dixon
16. GE Perley
17. HW Keefer
18. D MacPherson
Even better: be a good bud and teach it to your BOTC mates before you ever march through the Arch on to the RMC grounds.
Gladstone,
ReplyDeleteI first read this when I returned from Afghanistan in December 2009.
I wanted to wish you the most heartfelt best of luck and admiration for what you are about to embark upon. Your choice to serve is noble and worthy. I'm a hyphenated Yank (Canadian-American) and only in the last decade have I come to realize what I have missed in not being raised in my country of birth.
I won't dispense advice here but if you have any questions or just want to talk I served 20 years in the USMC. Since then I've worked in the security/training/mentoring field in Iraq, Afghanistan and select countries in Africa.
Again, best of luck and God Speed!
Travelfiend
boudred@students.wwu.edu