Col. Jack Jacobs on “Moral Courage”
I get a lot of books thrown my way, and I read most of them, eventually. About a months ago, my good friend retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Perry Smith, former CNN Military Analyst, gave me a copy of “If Not Now When?” a memoir written by Jack Jacobs that’s irreverent, insightful, and irresistibly entertaining. The book is peppered with wry observations and self-deprecating humor, along some sage advice on life and war.
And if you want to know how Jacobs came to be awarded his Medal of Honor, you’ll have to flip to the end of the book to read his official citation. The description in the book, while as riveting a tale of combat I’ve read, plays down his heroism. To mark Memorial Day, I asked, and received permission to reprint a small portion of the book, which I highly recommend to anyone who wants a better understanding of war, and warriors. Plus it’s a really great read.
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On Moral Courage
By Col. Jack Jacobs, USA, (Ret.)
The recognition of valor is an arbitrary intellectual construct. In the heat of the battle, soldiers do not think of valor, do not rate acts of brotherhood or compassion or soldierly virtue. Gallantry in the midst of almost certain death is not an act of physical courage, either. To be sure, physical courage can be encountered often in all walks of life, but in strenuous circumstances, it is moral courage that makes the difference. It is moral courage that drives the great events of our lives. Starved and weak, the valiant defenders of the Warsaw Ghetto had few weapons and very little physical strength. But they still possessed the courage the hold the Wehrmacht at bay longer than did the entire French army. Moral courage was the only weapon tiny Rosa Parks had, and she used it to change the face of America. Moral courage is not a complicated concept, really, for in it’s undistilled form it is merely the act of doing the right thing when it is much easier to do otherwise.
Click to hear Jack Jacobs on Moral Courage
What is it that motivates soldiers to keep fighting when the situation is difficult or even hopeless? Why would anyone persist in moving forward to destroy enemy positions when the chances of success and survival are vanishingly small? An action like this is almost never the result of brilliant tactical analysis. In a crisis thoughts are processed slowly, incompletely, or not at all. When the will triumphs, there is no physical reason for it, really, no explanation that makes sense to those who have not experienced abject fear, sickening horror, and incalculable loss.
The freedom that we enjoy today has been purchased with the blood and sacrifice of countless men and women who were simply doing the right thing, what they were supposed to do, when they needed to do it. Valor is the common currency of war, and this is the reality of combat: for every decorated warrior, there are thousands who receive no recognition for their gallantry and their selfless sacrifice. For every person who has been recognized, there are countless others who have not, legions who performed extraordinary acts under fire with nobody surviving to witness them. Soldiers act not for the accolade but for the lives of their comrades, and every action that is cited for its extraordinary heroism is merely proxy for all those lost forever in the mist of the battlefield. Medals worn by the living are testaments to the beloved fallen.
So the great irony is that individual effort in battle is not the act of logic but an act of love. You follow your instincts and your training, to be sure, but mostly you follow your heart. Soldiers fight for each other, safe in the conviction that the love of comrades trumps the fear of death, that the pain of one’s wound is nothing compared to the unendurable agony of failing one’s friends.
FROM: “If Not Now, When? Duty and Sacrifice in America’s Time of Need.” Col. Jack Jacobs (Ret.) and Douglas Century. ©2008, Used by permission of Berkley Caliber, an imprint of Penguin Group USA.
Tags: If Not Now, Jack Jacobs, Medal of Honor, Moral Courage, When?
