On Self, Soul, and Scripture

The first Sunday of Lent has passed, and with it the usual gospel reading of Jesus being tempted in the desert. The parallels to the season are obvious: as Jesus fasted 40 days,  so should we; as Jesus rejected material comforts, worldly power, and (I think) the need for others to love him, so should we; as Jesus put his trust in God to feed him, to lead him to the right place (not dominion), to love him without necessarily showing it, so should we.

I wonder how many, hearing that passage, appreciate the 'temptations' part of it. I certainly don't. I hear about Jesus telling the devil, "no," to all the powers in the world, and I think it's faintly laughable, as if any right-minded person with an inkling of heaven would up and say, "why yes, Satan, I would like to sell you my soul for all the powers of the world." It's even a little melodramatic for me when the devil says, "for all of these [powers and principalities] have been handed over to me, and I may give them to whomever I wish." If that's true, part of me thinks, then where's God?

I think more appropriately the thought of giving up one's essential self is appalling to anyone, even the most die-hard atheist. Whether we believe in God or not, most of us recognize something important and separate about ourselves. I think it's unique, but even if one is not willing to go that far ("out of seven billion people, there's got to be somebody like me!"), then there still exists that thing about us that makes us different than others. And that, called 'the soul' or any other name, is something that nobody willingly surrenders.

Or maybe people surrender it all the time. Those who do, I think, are called 'company men' or 'brown-nosers' or more appropriately 'sell-outs;' we identify the same phenomena in 'gold-diggers' and prostitutes. Those people who inspire contempt because on some level they are obviously a little less than fully human in character--those people have surrendered their souls. Of course, probably not as efficiently as they would have to Satan, whether he exists or not. Jesus was offered all the powers in the world, and they only hope to gain a little more money at the cost of their self-respect. But the sad joke about those who sell their souls, for whatever, is that 'they' usually sell it cheaply.

It's good that Christianity has this season of renewal. Nearly every religion in the world practices some form of fasting and meditation, and while a common complaint of critics is that Christianity puts these things into manageable little boxes ("oh, you only have to do it once a year? well, that's not exactly a life change!"), it's meant more provide focus an education. Psychologists have noted that things like a certain amount of self-denial, and a form of meditation, and a feeling of being part of something bigger than oneself, all conduce to being happier, more fulfilled people. Turning to Christ requires all of those things, because frankly they are the building blocks of any good relationship: sacrificing for the other, paying attention to them in some way, and putting the relationship itself ('something bigger than either of members of the relationship') ahead of oneself.

Returning to the foundation of the relationship, once a year during this Lenten season, is a way of learning to re-appreciate the other member of the relationship. Like a husband and wife in a routine need a 'date night' (or a full-blown second honeymoon), like two friends growing apart need a good chat, like a person needs to occasionally return to his or her favorite pass-time, we all probably need a chance to rekindle our understanding of Christ's role in our life: how He modeled right behavior; how He loved us; how He suffered for us on the cross; and how we are called to honor Him in our behavior. After all, the Mass exists as a reminder of these things, but week after week is routine...until Lent shakes it up and points directly back to the foundation.

The Catholic Church has many connotations as an institution. Catholics tend to focus on the efficient and effective charity, on the almost miraculous maintenance of tradition, the excellent education and firm moral teaching, and its universality. Others (it seems) tend to focus on the sexual abuse scandal and the criminal way in which it was covered up, the undue influence it seems to have in contemporary American politics, the moralizing and proselytizing that seems cruel and judgmental, and the effective marginalization of women and condemnation of homosexuals. Both views are probably all too true, and I am often both proud and ashamed to be a Catholic. But both miss the mark.

The Apostolic Church existed began as a way to provide a tangible thing so that Christians could have a meaningful relationship with God--first through the apostles who knew Jesus, then through their successors. The sacraments are a tangible way to experience the love and sacrifice of Jesus. The ministry of the church should renew us the way Lent renews us: by bringing us closer to God (and providing a means to those scientifically proven benefits cited before). Ultimately, the Church isn't important for what it teaches so much--and truth be told, many so-called Church perspectives are merely opinions from Catholic humans who happen to be priests--but rather for what it does: minister. And Catholics have a responsibility for a personal relationship with God, as provided by the Church, and with all the obligations a real relationship imposes. Showing up, conversing, caring about the other, being the kind of person with whom the other wants a relationship in the first place.

Too often, I think, Christians end up surrendering their souls to their various Churches. Having opinions and doing what one is told is sadly always easier than a meaningful, give-and-take relationship that requires maintenance. Separating oneself into a special little church clique, with the mutual support of other people, is sadly always easier than pursuing a connection with something largely intangible (which is the definition of something 'larger than oneself'). Such easy surrenders are so because they provide self-importance. But real relationships have no room for self-importance, and neither does sainthood.

What I heard in the gospel about the temptation in the desert was Jesus rejecting all those things which would separate him from God. Material possessions, worldly influence, self-importance: these things pull us away from the other at the heart of a real relationship. Jesus' citing of scripture in his answer to the devil indicates that he does not reject the offers because of their source, but instead because he'd rather live on 'every word that proceeds from the mouth of God,' and that everyone worship God instead of him, and that God's love not be tested--because he is in a meaningful relationship with God and that's the most important thing. What brings us back to that model are the sacraments, the sacrifice, and the prayer that the Catholic Church directs at Lent - not as a means to control but as a way to to provide a tangible 'object' of the relationship.

It's a marvelous institution for this reason. All the posturing, the positions, the pride (however justified), and the sins (however appalling) are merely secondary.   

Cross Country Memories

I woke up today thinking of Phoenix. Perhaps it was the weak, pale February sun streaming in my windows, filtered through gossamer white cirrus clouds. Only in the winter, with the cold sucking humidity out of the air and the thick trees bare, does Virginia ever approach the sheer visibility of the Southwest. And on a morning such as this, my mind went back to the crisp clarity of a Friday evening, the sun all coppery on the darkling sand, when my pilot and I passed a Southwest 737 on the approach path into Phoenix Sky Harbor airport.

I've had some occasion of late to reflect on the past, and one of the things that stands out the most is my need to keep busy. Well, busy is not the right word--distracted, more like. It's stood me in good stead, actually. In college, when I was finally shamed enough about mediocre grades to put in some effort, it drove me to a respectable finish. And when I entered the fleet as a mighty, world-famous Green Knight, it put me up for a lot of working weekends.

Now, the reality of a fighter squadron is, literally, training. Training to kill, in the air and on the ground. In the Marine Corps, the latter is much more important and it is additionally required that fighters be able to kill on the ground only one side of the battle--the enemy--while leaving the friendlies unscathed. Considering the proudly stated mission of the Marine Rifle Squad is "to locate, close with, and destroy the enemy by fire and maneuver, or to repel the enemy assault by fire and by close combat," well, some degree of precision in this endeavor is required from us carefree airedales.

So there is a secondary reality, and that is flight hours. As Malcolm Gladwell put it, the path to proficiency lies in hours spent (10,000 hours being the minimum requirement for mastery, and while we all strive for that, who has that much time, I wonder?), and so our individual and collective ability to kill our enemies without fragging that closing and destroying Marine Rifle Squad relied on flight hours.

Flight hours, of course, are expensive. Not just in fuel (2,000 or so gallons of which we used each flight), but more tellingly in maintenance. For it is axiomatic in the realm of physics, whose laws are inexorable for us as those of death and taxes, that maneuvering such as is required to arrive quckly and safely in the right spot of the sky, oriented the correct way, in a slightly negative-G dive (which helps the bomb fall more closely aligned to the aircraft computer-extrapolated ballistic path) to deliver some hundreds of pounds of hate and discontent upon the enemy, accurately, puts some necessary and occasionally violent force on the jet. All the computers, and hydraulic pumps, and hinges and joins and bolts and generators, all the structural fuselage elements--all of them subject to sudden loading and unloading of gravitational forces as we airedales, with joy in our hearts and laughter in our voices (it's true) yank and bank our way up from the safety of terrain masking and roll in aggressively to "the chute," that wonderful and terrifying flight path from which said hate and discontent would shortly be dealt, but also a dangerous prison of principle, for in "the chute" one is "on government time," a nice way of saying we are required by divers oaths, spoken and unspoken, to deliver the fire support so desperately needed by our comrades regardless of personal safety, and a jet scribing a predictable straight path through the sky toward an intended target for some five to ten seconds makes a juicy target for the foes and their air defenses, doesn't it precious?

Which is all to say that the airplanes, designed as they are for the Newtonian toll by wonderful engineers at Boeing, undergo quite a beating in everyday flight. And they are not, therefore, always working.

Now, fear not. Being nothing less than a professional organization, American Naval Aviation has instituted many safeguards to ensure that broken aircraft are diagnosed and healed quickly (for machines so complicated, which carry life in their austere and purposeful cockpits, act more like living things than cold machinery). The fine Marines who crawl all over the jet and learn it's most secret places, in rain and cold and heat and long, deadly sunny days, they diligently diagnose all manner of little issues, and even more diligently repair them. They are Marines, of course, and are deeply invested in doing their job correctly - something to which I've alluded before. And they certainly won't certify a broken aircraft for us airedales to fly.

That means we only have so many aircraft at any one time, and as each aircraft can only fly so many times per day (three), we only have so many flights. And with a squadron of 34 aggressive, type A, red-blooded aviators all clamoring for flight hours (for to reach eventually that 10,000, though I've only ever heard of one gentlemen do it, and he wasn't flying the Hornet's ful 13 tons of twisted steel, sex appeal, fully articulating leading and trailing control surfaces, and hydraulic and electric circuits, so I'll spare him my envy for his piston-engined, single-control-surface monoplanes), and more importantly all 34 needing training for to kill accurately, space on that flight schedule gets pretty precious. When you start factoring in that maybe only 10 of the aviators are qualified tactical instructors, and one of them is needed for every flight with an unqualified aviator trying to get qualified for to become officially more accurate at killing, well, Flight Hours are very precious indeed, and you can probably forget Mr. Gladwell's 10,000.

But. A brilliant solution. The United States having a vast and reliable network of airfields left over from the days they also enjoyed a comfortable technological and economic advantage over the rest of the world, due largely to the vision and enterprise of men and women like that 10,000 flight hour earner (and where did all of that go, we wonder), and airedales being professionals, well, why don't you go seek your 10,000 hours on the weekend, young WSO? However, you must not under any circumstances come back to the home field until you are scheduled to do so. Therefore you must seek your fortune elsewhere--in Las Vegas, or Phoenix, or Long Beach, or Palo Alto. If you can show good reason, you may go farther afield: Seattle, Portland, Boise, Lake Tahoe, Albuquerque.

Well. Unspoken was the fact that I, like many of my fellow "road warriors," was single. And though some were vocal about the "double standard," I had no desire to pull my peers from their families on the weekend. Also, I was conscious of the fact that in the competitive world of fighter aviation, it was rather well looked-upon if one showed uncommon dedication to flying.  And there were real benefits, too. Places to see, bars to visit, new airfields to experience, all while earning per diem getting a free hotel stay. Plus the advantage of progressing in qualifications faster than my peers, if I could entice an instructor along. And I didn't have to go home to my sparsely furnished one-bedroom apartment (seriously, my wife still teases me about my life with only a bed, dresser, and desk) and wonder what to do with my weekends.

So I became a consummate road warrior--during one two-month stretch, I did nine weekend cross-countries. Yup, if you're counting--that's every weekend. Plenty of distraction. 

They were days of work and wonder--sitting, hot, in the pits of El Centro with the engines screaming at idle, poring over a chart and scratching fuel and time calculations on my kneeboard to see what sort of Bingo we'd set to safely arrive at our next destination (Bingo being the term for the minimum amount of fuel required to get to base, with a specified safety reserve) while the sweat beaded under my visor and made the mask slippery on my face; knocking off 20 minutes of dogfighting, breathless and panting from the G forces and the strain of keeping one's head turned around and locked on the other aircraft, and keeping my voice aviator cool on the radio with center as I asked for IFR to Phoenix; nervously asking for a lower altitude VFR over the Grand Canyon, and receiving permission, and descending lower into the layered red rock walls while a sparkling blue river winked out of the depths; calling hotels and 1-800-Wx-Brief to file the next flight from the deliciously cool FBO in Palm Springs, giddy with freedom after deciding with the other aircrew that we were NOT going to Long Beach tonight, that we wanted to go to Las Vegas instead, and spending a half an hour 'making it happen;' scrubbing clean an ancient whiteboard with paper towels and the damp sleeve in a crumbling base operations building, wallpapered with squadron stickers, in preparation for a full debrief; and best of all, the sudden quiet at sunset, when the radios magically stop squawking and the light fails and cockpit cools off and the horizons become brilliant streamers of red and pink and orange--when it was time to find a new place, a new hotel and restaurant and bar, and the work is over.

And I remember one winter afternoon, awash in coppery sunset light, when at 18 miles from the field we were directed to turn left and intercept the approach path for runway 07C ('zero-seven-center'), and asked to slow to 130 knots. These instructions are to be followed to the letter, now, because there are many airplanes at any given time trying to get into that small little cone of airspace around Phoenix Sky Harbor, and land--many of them filled with innocent passengers, at that. Having them all moving at more than 100 miles an hour, and climbing and descending on there way out and in, complicates the problem immensely. The hardworking controllers at airports like that deserve a beer next time you meet once in your local watering hole, maybe, and they certainly deserved the utmost professional courtesy from the likes of me, whose ego was often close to writing checks his body couldn't cash, and nor could his airplane, at least not without upsetting the smooth flight of 150 odd southwest passengers, but that fortunately didn't happen but once, and it's a story for another time.

In any case, it was with some trepidation that I tapped the foot pedal, and transmitted back to the controller, "Combat 41 unable. Minimum airspeed 150." Which was putting my pilot and the controller in a pickle, and no mistake. For the former, well, our 13 ton aircraft with two tons of fuel aboard did not like flying at 150 knots, oh no precious, what with finite lift available even with the wings totally reconfigured for maximum lift provision. It requires an exceedingly gentle touch, I'm told, and a high power setting, which the aircraft greatly desires to turn into speed for to gain more lift and stability. A hundred seventy-five knots being preferred. For the latter it became immediately evident why our speed was a problem. Several miles ahead of us, nearly blending in with the desert floor (at 18 miles one is barely seeing the southwestern suburbs of Phoenix below), was a trundling Southwest Airlines 737, placidly and gently gliding in at about 130 knots. Not being designed, see, for the speed of heat, or for eight Gs, or for accurate delivery of death to all comers in the air, on land, and at sea, the Boeing 737 has nice large rigid wings that are uncongenial to the lift or drag requirements of, as one pilot once undelicately put it, "flying through your own a**hole." It is therefore also much more stable at slow speeds.

My pilot answered my radio call over the Intra-Cockpit Communication System (ICS) with a four-letter word unprintable on this family website. The controller, after a pregnant silence, said uncertainly "Combat 41, roger, traffic twelve o'clock, three miles, seven-thirty-seven." Which meant, of course, that he heard me about the 150 knots, and oh by the way there was another aircraft off my nose at three miles. To which my pilot replied via ICS, "Tally," and I was able to say "Combat 41, Tally that traffic," and then quietly wonder whether we'd have to do a turn of holding before we landed.

But this controller was smart and helpful, which made a nice change from all the rude ones who question your omniscience and try to kill you by flying you into either an airplane or a hill, true story, and both also for another day. He hopefully asked over the radio, "Combat 41, can you land on the right?" which of course that Phoenix has two large runways, the right-most one being shorter when landing on runway 07, and perhaps we could land on a different runway than that tortoise of a 737 quite safely. So I hurriedly thumbed to my airfield diagram, saw that the right runway was 7,800 feet long, which was about 200 feet shorter than we'd like but technically quite long enough for the Hornet, and doing a quick calculation on how much I trusted my young pilot's ability to stop from running us off the end of the runway, and exiting the airplane ungraciously through the door that Martin Baker provides, and quickly tapped my foot pedal to transmit cooly, "Combat 41, affirm," and save the day. Which, of course, I did, because the controller happily replied "Roger Combat 41, maintain visual separation that traffic and continue your approach visually to zero-seven-right." It wasn't exactly kosher because under IFR traffic rules he has to give me a heading, but it was quite an expedient solution. My pilot accelerated to a much smoother 175 knots and swung right to offset from the Boeing and line up on the right runway, which looked rather short compared to the two other 10,300-foot-generous runways provided by Sky Harbor. And, having a pilot's generous dose of ego, he batted no eyes at my quick brief about the 7,800 foot runway earmarked for us.

So I found myself with the setting sun at my back, beauty before my eyes and relief in my heart, passing a Southwest Airlines airplane in my hornet. We touched down about 15 seconds before he did, and ended up having to wait a while on the taxiway, worse luck. But it sure made the beers taste good that evening.

Thursday Musings

Today is the first day of the rest of my life.

I have spoken that phrase to myself often in the past months. If used too often, I suppose, the impact lessens (and I risk a copyright infringement lawsuit from Tim Robbins and The Shawshank Redemption). But neither has occurred yet. And the phrase still resonates.

The clustering of struggles, or misfortunes, is a common experience. It never rains, but it pours. It’s always that day when you have two events to attend, each requiring a different uniform, a project due, and an official visitor that you discover your car’s gas tank is nearly empty. Or a co-worker gets hurt. Or a loved one needs support. Or a family member turns on you.

The phenomenon is not confined to single days, either. It’s always that month in which you have to travel, and there’s a period when your boss is gone, and work is very busy that you get sick. Or have to move. Or have a loved one needs extended support.

In tough periods, it takes a very strong person to hold it all together. Some cope by becoming reclusive. Others with alcohol or cigarettes or fast food. Nearly everyone cuts out the healthy habits that are hard to fit in our lives even at the best of times: exercise, leisure time with friends, some hobby truly enjoyed, meditation or religious practice. And you might find yourself desperately lonely, drowning, and numb.

Most of the time, we come through. There’s some growth, perhaps, and some accompanying regrets; there’s also a period of freedom and gratitude. Things are so much better now. The question asked millions of times by millions of people is, how? What changes? Is it the world--does ‘bad luck’ turn into good luck? Is it the person who effects an ‘attitude adjustment’? The staple of daytime talk shows and self-help books is the promise that if the author’s (or host’s) advice is followed, the dark times will disappear and happiness will endure forever. How nice. How unhuman.

Christianity teaches that such dark periods are opportunities. It’s hard to put into words without appalling, but according to Church teaching God allows us to be alone without him, whether due to our own choice (rejection of Him, which equals sin) or because our love of Him has room to grow. It’s easy to be cheerful, loving, and generous when life goes well--it requires much more cheer, love, and generosity when the world feels arrayed against you. This opens up quite the proverbial can of worms (Pandora’s box?), however. Why would God ever wish us to suffer if he’s so loving? Why have ‘dark periods’ at all?

I have no answer to that one. But the record shows it’s a part of life--if you believe such things, even Jesus went through dark periods as a human. Once, certainly during his 40-day temptation in the desert; once prior to his crucifixion in the garden of Gethsemane. St. Augustine’s Confessions admirably relates the development of a ‘dark period’ and his transition to happiness (the word ‘admirably’ captures even the reaction of non-Christians); St. John of the Cross wrote a famous Spanish poem about it that Spanish Literature majors like me study in college to this day; both St. Teresa of Ávila and Mother Teresa of Calcutta, 500 years apart, wrote movingly that despite their lauded closeness to God by fellow Christians, they underwent periods of almost crippling depression while they dealt with a dark period of their life.

But I digress. All we collectively know about these ‘dark periods’ is that we don’t collectively know how they come about, or recede. We just know that we experience them. And I feel as though I am finally emerging from a dark period myself, for no other reason than the simple details of this Thursday.

The sun was shining as I woke, rested, from the first complete nights’ sleep in weeks. It was shining--there’s no other word for it--gloriously. The quality of the light alone made me want to jump up and do something. The warm, windy conditions yesterday, with the heavy spitting rain, were redolent with memories of storms and tropics; they presented a figurative last hurdle and prophesied a moment in just such a sun. The wind breathed strongly but relaxingly through the freshly scrubbed air and trees in the brightness, and there was a fresh scent.

I also wrote an award. It’s hard to imagine that this extra little piece of administrative paperwork would bring such satisfaction, but sometimes I feel trussed and crushed by gratitude, the monstrous burden of having to be grateful all the time to those who have helped out here and there, or forgiven a blunder I’ve made, or even just done something nice for me. Guilt and gratitude are an unhappy couple. So when I feel some gratitude that’s not required, gratitude for something that had no effect on me, it causes simple joy. It’s the kind of gratitude that those pesky and cloyingly sentimental daytime talk show hosts sell you. And I figured out what it was today.

Now I sit, copper afternoon sun streaming through my office window, struggling to put down the welling emotions within me on this computer screen. I can only focus on the visuals--the gilded, white-framed, blue-purple clouds enhancing the light (always the light!), the bracing cold outside, the tidy office that is finally so after a month of physical upheaval. It’s tough giving context to unfiltered awe and wonder.

So while I meant to write some pedantic screed about pushing onward in the face of difficulty, because no swamp lasts forever, I refuse. I did keep moving forward in my recent dark period, despite sins and setbacks. But whatever effort I put in, whatever respect or consideration I earned--it doesn’t even come close to how I feel today. It doesn’t even belong in the same league. There’s some pride and austere, cold satisfaction in weathering a storm, but there’s grace in the sunlit, grateful glory of this day. There’s grace.

And suddenly I remember this quote with happy resolution:

We must say that the sun looks down on nothing half so good as a household laughing together over a meal, or two friends talking over a pint of beer, or a man alone reading a book that interests him; and that all economies, politics, laws, armies, and institutions, save insofar as they prolong and multiply such scenes, are a mere ploughing of the land and sowing of the ocean, a meaningless vanity and vexation of spirit.

The Virtues of Conformity

The idea of conformity has been pressing on my mind as of late, due to a recent conversation I had with a business executive. She had consented to let me train her and some of her peers ‘the Marine Way’ (and--self-aggrandizement warning--you can check it out here), and was nice enough to say that it was really good training.

I don’t know if she was being sincere, as we had engineered the event to make her cold, wet, tired, and hungry and then forced life-or-death decisions on her and finally berated her for the poor decisions she made, but well. Her professor for this part of the Executive MBA degree she was pursuing had offered it as part of his Ethics class, and she had, after all, volunteered.

And it was satisfying to see civilians who were cold, wet, tired and hungry (on a holiday weekend). For once.

But she seemed quite enthused about what happened to her. And as we spoke, she commented to the effect that she was surprised that an organization as rigid as the Marine Corps could produce independent-minded thinkers, or that individual Marines would seem so comfortable speaking their mind to each other (especially when rank was involved).

I answered her with my thoughts at the time. I told her that, in my experience Marines were more genuinely and truly themselves than people in other groups. That I thought the reason had to do precisely with the enforced conformity and rigidity, because those qualities suppress the individual’s ability to self-express on the superficial level. You know, with the brand of their clothes, or the style of their hair, or their hobbies. Once everyone looks the same, and falls under the same expectation, there’s a common language and experience and you immediately meet something closer to the real person when you meet a Marine.

She acted like she had received an epiphany, and told me that she often thought that many of her colleagues did just that--they self-defined with external things, such as their appearance, their tastes, their hobbies--and therefore those people were inauthentic.

Which is topsy-turvy.

I don’t disagree. I don’t mean to turn this into a rant against culture, media, or ‘kids these days’ (though as I age I find it’s increasingly easy to do so). Like many of my peers I have struggled with who I am, wondering why I was so inaccessible to myself. Who is the real me? was a question I had asked--continue to ask--over and over again. It would certainly seem that seeking things I enjoyed or admired might provide a clue to the answer, and so--again, like many of my peers--I spent adolescence and after ‘trying on’ new looks, personalities, life goals, and the like. Whichever ones ‘stuck,’ I reasoned, would be truly me.

Listen to how seductive that is.

There’s some evidence, I’m told, real scientific and psychological evidence, to suggest that such ‘fishing’ for personality traits and values is an essential part of adolescence. And like most of adolescence, it is at its heart quite selfish.

Oh, I’m not denigrating adolescents. A rather recent father myself (whose daughter, thankfully, is still far from that age), I’m beginning to understand how essential selfishness is to a kid’s survival and development. It’s not malicious or thoughtless, really--it’s just natural. It feels natural.  Maybe self-absorption is a better term, maybe that more accurately captures the need for children from toddlers to teenagers to focus on their consistently expanding knowledge, sensations, emotions, and the like. So I’m not saying that adolescents equal selfish. If that’s true at all, then it doesn’t even tell half the story about what adolescence is: the passion, the idealism, the joy at finding such a marvelous, multifaceted, and wonderful world as ours. Seriously.

But one thing that nearly every psychologist says about adolescents is their desire to fit in. And shopping around for something that’s ‘truly you’ is usually more accurately defined as trying to conform to some thing, some value, some culture in which you want to fit in. A teenager dying his hair black and wearing makeup may look weird and stand out, but he’s also fitting in to a specific group. A few weeks later, when he gets a crew cut and tries out for the soccer team, he’s again trying to fit in. Such attempts, whether by teenagers or by adolescent adults who should know better, and who haven’t ‘found themselves’ by their late twenties (I’m one of the latter, I’m afraid, and I’m already 30!), are based on the pervasive and alluring belief that image equals reality, and they are focused entirely on the self.

That’s why they don’t work: we blithely acknowledge that while a soft drink company may imply that drinking their product makes one beautiful and happy and puts one into a life of partying, it isn’t necessarily true; we all too often assume that if we change ourselves to conform to someone who looks to us like he or she is beautiful and happy, we will then become similarly beautiful and happy. Maybe that attribute, or that personality trait, or that job, or that ‘look,’ we say, maybe THAT’S what I’ve been missing all along. Maybe THAT’S truly me!

“What I’ve been missing.” “[What’s] truly me.” Focused on self. It’s really seductive, as I pointed out before. It brings with it the illusion of control (“I can change this”). It indulges the fantasies that prey on all of us, fantasies about being attractive and fulfilled and successful and always having fun. And if phrased as a search for authenticity, well, then it becomes admirable too. How often, readers-in-your-twenties-and-thirties, have you heard your friends say something like, “I’ve just decided to try some things out, to let go, to really explore/experience the world and find myself?” Maybe I’m the only one, but I’ve heard it a lot. I’ve said it a lot. And boy is it admirable. You can’t help but respond with some cocktail of envy and adulation and pride, “good for you! That’s great!”

And they will go off on their own. But to find what? Someone or something else they admire. Why do they admire it? Is there some immutable personality that must be unlocked in each of us? Perhaps. Christianity teaches us that we are all unique and created for love in a unique way. Two children, raised identically, will not be identical. Not even if they are identical twins. But when we start talking about ‘finding ourselves,’ we are looking for things that will inspire us. We are looking for people, and ideas, and values (and yes the superficial things too, such as looks or styles) with which we desire participation and closeness.

Participation and closeness to things means a relationship. All of those things which make up personality--“the set of enduring behavioral and mental traits that distinguish [individual] human beings” (thanks Wikipedia, though I think this originates in the DSM-IV)--are partially (mostly?) forged in and by relationships. We learn basic ideas of self from our parents (actually, we don’t even distinguish ourselves from our parents until we’re several years old). We learn initial values from parents and teachers and peers, and as we develop we continue to expand our number of relationships. I don’t deny that some behavioral and mental traits seem to be ingrained in us from birth, but there’s no doubt that even those supposedly immutable traits are modified by our relationship with people who give us role models, or who mentor us, or who shape and develop those original traits. All of our relationships, good and bad, have affected our personalities, have created a complex layer of emotions and ideas that shape our unconscious responses to stimuli ranging from how we greet a stranger to our behavior in an intimate relationship.

That is why it is foolish, and ultimately selfish, to embark on a solo quest to ‘find oneself.’ Without the relationship one is merely imitating the images he or she sees, and the self-development is essentially superficial. The relationship, the encounter, the challenge of ideas and the emotional investment that makes one care--that causes self-development.

Therefore conformity actually engenders relationships.

Wait, hear me out.

For people concerned with ‘finding themselves,’ all of those superficial distinguishers--the looks, the hobbies, the certain friends, the political positions, the opinions--those things are actually defense mechanisms. They are meant to declare, like the ‘emo’ teenager, I’m this way, and you’re not. They are meant to inhibit relationships, except with a select group of people who are deemed ‘worthy.’ And though they would say that relationships exist within their clique, they are actually all using each other to convince each other that they are ‘truly themselves.’ More accurately, each one of them is privately trying to believe that individually he or she has become the best version of him- or herself. In other words, they aren’t interested in relationships because they are too busy trying to feel good, on their own, for themselves.

They are brainwashed. They adhere so closely to an idea that they cannot see the beautiful reality of the other complex people around them. They are closed to wonder, because they’ll reject anything new that doesn’t enhance their opinion of themselves.

I feel pity, if that’s the case. I’ve certainly been there before, and it wasn’t because (I hope) I was then or am now a horrible, self-absorbed, malicious, narcissistic person. It was just that I was trying so hard to find my ‘true self’ that I couldn’t see that I was actually retreating into myself. I’m sure Freud would have a field day with me.

Conformity, though--conformity attempts to deny the luxury of outward appearances. It means one must interact with the person, not an impersonal collection of attributes. It means one can’t exist in a pleasant fantasy of self-actualization, half-way in the future; one must be in the present. And what I’ve found in the Marine Corps is that you see everyone’s real personality. What they really think, and want, and care about. That’s because you are personally close to them, and understanding fosters companionship, which is essential to teamwork.

Relationships create roles. We all play roles throughout life--son or daughter, sibling, friend, confidant, supporter, lover, taker, hero, employee, manager, customer, server, husband or wife, mother or father. Roles can change, if we want them to, to be sure. But roles are also comforting as well. They help us understand how to relate to others, and guide our behavior. We understand it’s inappropriate for a child to back-talk to a parent because we understand each of their roles in that relationship. The rigid rank structure of the military creates pre-defined roles, which also engenders relationships.

Conformity is such a bad word in today’s popular media. It carries connotations of stupidity cowardice, and contempt. ‘Be yourself!’ we are exhorted in songs, on billboards, on talk shows and late-night radio. Well, yes, I say, but ‘self’ is developed in relationship with others. That requires some conformity--at least a conformity to manners, if the relationship is to be friendly. In fact, the more I conform and develop a common visible connection between myself and another, the more I can understand and appreciate (for good or for bad) those behavioral and mental traits that constitute personality.

I suggest that conformity might require you to change the way you look, but it doesn’t change you. It actually lets your self out of its cage of appearances to encounter the world.

So, I told this lady. The conformity to which we submit as Marines actually brings us closer personally, and fosters a community. In a platoon, all are unbearably, undeniably individual. With just a look, or an epithet, or a terse opinion (respectfully voiced from lower ranks), one individual may change the course of the whole unit because there exists common respect and reliance. That’s what enables Marines to make good decisions in tough situations. In that sort of community, someone who is putting on a show, adopting superficial changes, that person is rejected. It’s a little bit like a family, actually, but then families conform to each other too.

Paradoxically, conformity seems to be (in some way) the key to individuality.

And except for the odd sociopath, individuality is a wonderful thing, because out of it springs true love, community, creativity, and knowledge (and probably a lot of other things that elude me now)--it produces all the things that make life worthwhile. But first you must have good relationships, and despite the negative connotations, good relationships mean conformity.

On Sports

The most popular entertainment in America. Controversial. Controlled violence, unparalleled grace, heroic effort, bullies and villains, powerhouses and underdogs, inspiring stories. Lovers and haters.

The tenuous connection between the players and the teams. The stars and the unsung workhorses. Brute effort and relentless dedication versus millions of dollars and flashy lifestyles. The tenuous connection between the teams and their followers--the question of whether the teams represent, or play for the impassioned fans of their cities.

Sports.

I watched my team, the Fighting Irish, lose completely to the Crimson Tide of Alabama in the College Football National Championship last week. What to say? That our undefeated regular season was something to be proud of? That it was an accomplishment to make it to the National Championship game? That it augurs well for next season?

No.

Those things are true. Such sentiments indicate the first great gift Sports has to give, hope. The promise of possibility. So I am not bitter--rather, I'm proud of my team for their accomplishments. And I tell them, thanks. Thanks for the work, the heart, the class.

But the game is over. No words can erase the loss, or mitigate it. I wouldn't want them to. There is something totally pure about Sports in that there is only one thing that matters, and it is now. This play. What happens in this moment. What actually happens may not be pure--it may be ungraceful, poorly executed, or unsportsmanlike. But that it, and only it, matters... That is pure.

Sports is about the eternal present on the field, in the play, among the players. It is authentically objective, even if the objective fact is obscured by the speed of execution. It is an allegory of the human experience, where the past may inspire or may goad, the future is the stuff of dreams and nightmares, but the present is all that matters. Is it positive or negative? Does it achieve or fail? Does it advance the cause or not? Whatever the answer, it matters.

This moment matters. This moment begs us, like each minute of play, in each sport, to rise to the occasion. Each moment is a chance to shine, to anticipate and focus, to do something that answers the call of that moment.

And now that game is in the books. A new moment is upon us. How do we respond to this moment?

Sports arouses us. Brings us in. Illustrates the manifest importance of each moment. We hope our sports avatars meet each moment well--perhaps perfectly. But they are just avatars. Their successes are not ours, and neither are their failures. They only represent what we want for ourselves.

So how do we meet our moments?

The Ol' College Try

The New Year has dawned, and the Month of Resolutions has begun. I don't know where the idea of the New Year's Resolution began, and it doesn't really matter. It ties in nicely with the idea of celebrating the good of the previous year--or it's end, depending on your perspective--and getting a 'clean slate' for the upcoming year. Of course, all this resolution is a mixed bag: I see friends complaining that the gyms will be more crowded, which seems to emphasize the difference between physical health and moral health. I mean, a crowded gym is inconvenient, but isn't better if all people are physically healthy and not just you? But between the jokes and the guilt, I wonder (as I always do) what my resolution(s) should be.

When I was young, idealistic, and vain, I resolved to develop six-pack abs or the ability to dunk a basketball. Now those who know me might argue that I'm still idealistic and vain, and I know that I can at least get to a point where I can dunk a basketball, given unlimited hours in the gym and perhaps a specialized strength and conditioning coach. But those kinds of goals simply don't seem all that important anymore. Frankly, I'm more interested in still being able to fit in my pants by the New Year in 2014, and perhaps avoid any more cavities. But those are sad little resolutions. I'm not sure I want to even dignify them as 'New Years Resolutions.' Such goals simply qualify as the right thing to do.

When I imagine how life could be better, I'm sorry to say that I wish I could spend more time with my wife, with my kid, with my books, and writing (while I'm on the subject, this piece you're reading is actually proving very hard to write. I'm nowhere near my main point yet, and I'm spitting out words in lurches. In fact, many of you have moved on to the next reddit link by now. But I have to give it the--wait for it--'ol' college try'). I'm sorry to say those things because I remember how I swore even five years ago that I would never be the boring person who would want schmaltzy, sentimental things for himself. I was going to be eager, exciting, and urbane forever, dammit, and no questions asked. But, providentially, I recently found this article from the New York Times. Apparently, my condition is fairly universal. I just find different things exciting these days--namely, my wife, kid, reading and writing.

Sorry if that sounds preachy. I really intended it to be more of an excuse, or at least an apologetic explanation.

And, as a side note, for any friends I may have who are getting tired of hints from their family that they (the friends) should 'settle down' and have a few kids, I'll tell you why this happens...it's because having kids is really a great deal of fun. The challenges make it more that fun, even: it's really rewarding. So are the diversions and accomplishments of the unencumbered life, certainly. But, you know, food for thought.

In any case, resolutions. The phrase, 'give it the ol' college try' pops into my head every time I think about all the resolutions hanging in the balance right now. And I wondered why that phrase came into existence. Because if you apply that to my college experience, the ol' college try would involve rather more brooding, melancholy relationships, video games, and Pabst Blue Ribbon ($1.00 per can at Corby's in those days. Yes) than is strictly consistent with an all-out effort at something.

And to answer the questions in your head, yes I do claim to have begun both the emo and hipster social perspectives way back in 2003. You're welcome, world.

Applied to many of my co-workers, the ol' college try means a lot of skipping classes, doing the minimum school work necessary, beer drinking, and seeking...ahem...companionship from the opposite sex than an effort at, well, anything. I don't mean to disparage them. They are all fantastic and dedicated Marine Officers at this point. But it's clear that the new college try means something a little different from the old.

Frankly I don't know if the blame here lies on the current generation (so you can stop wagging your fingers, baby boomers). After all, I think most young people go to college these days as a natural extension of grade and high school. Where you used to need a high school diploma to have a chance at a career, now everyone feels that you need a college diploma to have the same chance. So it is a requirement, and what most practical people do with 'requirements' is fulfill them. And I along with all of my peers fulfilled that requirement--the amount of beer consumed is irrelevant. Furthermore, with the exception of something like an engineering, biochemistry, accounting, or economics degree, the focus of study isn't really that important as well. You have an equal chance at employment with either a history or psychology degree, unless you are seeking employment in that particular field--in which case, you'll need a lot more education than is provided by an undergraduate degree.

And if the degree, not the means to getting it, is the important thing, it stands to reason that there isn't much value to the college education one receives these days. I know, I know! Before you all get angry at me, I know that it teaches independence, and I know it is a feeder into the professional world, and I know that a degree from Harvard is worth more than one from a community college (and boy, do you pay for it!). Certainly a student who is hard-working enough to get accepted to Harvard and graduate is probably more likely to be a hardworking employee than one who graduates from the nearest directional state school. But because the Ivy League and it's peers are such magnet schools, and are so expensive to attend, it's difficult to tell whether a graduate bought or earned his/her degree--I mean, when a student with the money can hire any tutor and re-take the SAT as often as he/she wants (not to mention have his/her lawyer parent lobby for higher grades from his/her exclusive prep school), it muddies the water significantly. And with a associated directional state school, it's likewise difficult to tell whether the degree was earned or given out like candy.

I have many more complaints with the university system in the United States. Some of the issues that need to be addressed you can find here, but I certainly don't endorse the article. I just offer it as a valuable perspective. But whatever the reason, I think the value of a university degree (at least one not technical in nature) has been devalued. And so the phrase 'the ol' college try' has become a lie. Although history shows that universities have nearly always been playgrounds for rich kids who need just a little more shelter from the world, the academic reputation of the university was generated in the understanding that to go there and be successful, you had to really put forth effort. In the 19th Century, Harvard degrees really meant that the graduate had some kind of character--the ability to think clearly and logically, the ethics to follow through on ideas and thoughts, and the determination to achieve the highest measure of success possible. State schools weren't really comparable--they taught technical skills (such as Agriculture and Mechanics, or A&M). But a graduate from those schools was known to be extremely proficient in their chosen skill, someone who could solve technical problems and oversee technical tasks. They had the same character of being a clear and logical in their approach to their profession, both ethical and dedicated in the application of their skill. That character was earned because Universities, whether academic or technical, were hard to attend and maintained high standards academically and morally of their students. To have graduated one of those institutions, well, it really put you in elite company. It meant that you could really do something. See here for more explanation.

Giving something 'the ol' college try' by that perspective meant pursuing it will all the character, ethics and determination of a college graduate. It meant giving it your all--not just effort, but initiative and intelligence as well. It meant that you were certain to succeed, for if you didn't (i.e. a college graduate wouldn't have succeeded in your place) then the task in question was impossible.

But alas, between the exponential growth of colleges and universities at the college and state level and the grade inflation permitted by institutions that prefer the extra money coming in with more students to their academic integrity, it just doesn't mean much to have attended college any more. It means you've done the minimum. Sure, if your degree is from an Ivy League School or the equivalent then it means more than a degree from a low-tier state school. But it certainly doesn't mean enough to make the phrase 'the ol' college try' mean what it used to.

So if I have one serious resolution this year, it's to give my life the real ol' college try. The one that involves doing things wholeheartedly. And I think if I can do that I will probably not only still fit into my pants come 1 January 2013, but I'll be closer to my family, better read, and writing a lot more.

That's exactly the kind of life I want.

Adaptation, self, and disturbing interests

Humans are adaptable creatures. I was reminded quite suddenly of that fact this afternoon, when I resurrected my iPad from it's sentinel on my desk and caught up on some Hulu television shows (ok, so far I'm sounding like a technological caricature of a person). I also checked my email inbox, where I was looking for some news...and whoops! there it was. A long-overlooked email from a former professor of mine.

This email in question was a response to a message I sent him on the occasion of receiving some literature from my former college. I was deployed at the time, and struggling with separation from my new family and the almost constant activity that attends military operations. The mailing was a both a wrench and a breath of fresh air: it recalled the second-happiest period of my life, my time at Notre Dame. And as I re-read that email, written two years ago from the sleepy agricultural Japanese village of Komatsu, I wondered at all that had changed.

Like many, I turn to the familiar when I encounter adversary. Actually, that's like all of us. One of the benefits of studying ethics under Dr. Steven Olsen is that I can understand some of the impulses that govern my behavior. And he has demonstrated in neurological studies that humans ALWAYS go to the familiar in some form or another when faced with adversity. Choosing the different requires opposition, either in the form of a person who says, "no! don't do that! do this instead!" But I digress. In any case, during the particular adversity of that deployment--which seemed to consist of equal parts missing my wife, struggling to keep up with our day-to-day flying and movement schedule, training flights, and hangovers--I found refuge in my old refuge, books.

If you've clicked the link, you know that the book in question was Moby Dick. It might have seemed a little odd to my squadron-mates that I would curl up in bland, minimalist, and weirdly overstuffed sitting area with my Kindle while they were more concerned about taking the new guys out to Karaoke as a means to forcing them to perform 'Paradise by the Dashboard Lights' and nicknaming them Meatloaf (perhaps the new Marine Corps order on hazing has a part in this discussion? I kid, I kid), but they were used to my oddness. After all, they found it endlessly entertaining that my college degree was in something so vaguely titled, "Great Books" and they marveled at my effortless use of words outside their vocabulary. And though they eventually knew me better, perhaps, that my reader here, they initially drew the same conclusion: namely that I was nerdy, affectedly academic, and pompous, and that I probably was homeschooled too. Actually, I was not.

It's just, well, I have always had an affinity for reading. A psychologist would no doubt have a field day delving into my past and figuring out why my childhood friends were books, rather than friends, but here I am and then, in adversity, I went straight back to a good book, and forewent the Karaoke (although in retrospect I'm sorry I did, except that maybe otherwise I wouldn't have written that email, or rediscovered it now, or sat down to write a rambling reflection on it).

And so as I revisited this old email, my adaptability presented itself in the subject of the last books I read: The Rise of the Wehrmacht: The German Armed Forces and World War II, Stormtroop Tactics: Innovation in the German Army, 1914-1918, and my current projects, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich and The Gathering Storm (Churchill's memoirs on World War II). Apart from maybe wondering if I've discovered some evil attraction in Hitler's awful regime (something some of my, er, acquaintances will no doubt say they knew already), the discerning reader will note the sharp shift from the pure artistic literature of Moby Dick and Paradise Lost (referenced in that old letter) to the very serious topic of European military history during the two world wars. So, I have adapted.

My wife sometimes tells me that I've assimilated too much into the 'Marine Culture.' I find this hard to believe, since I keep my hair as normal-looking as possible without pushing the boundary of stated grooming regulations and I don't have any tattoos on my body that say USMC, or depict an Eagle, Globe, and Anchor, or that announce my MOS (looking at you, grunts!). But then I realize that I have traded in that thing I really loved--a great story, artfully told, illustrating something True about life--for something more narrowly focused to my profession. She was right, and I have to say that while chagrined I am also grateful that she stood athwart my regress and told me to stop. I repeat: so, I have adapted.

Now I want to make it clear that I think it a very good thing that I read military history. After all, I chose to read these books on purpose. And no, Lakesiders (and casual Facebook visitors), it's not because I'm somehow contemplating Nazism (academically or otherwise). Having in some wise the education of young officers, who will shortly be leading young Americans into combat, in my charge, well I'd better be educating myself! But instruction is futile if it's not authentic, and the less authentic I become in my self-imposed mind-narrowing the poorer instruction I'll give.

I should have read the signs, of course. I was thrilled to discourse a bit on Aristotle when talking ethics to my own Alpha Company, 6th Platoon. I recently started listening intently to classical music in the car when driving to and from work. WETA, anyone? Today I dived into my iTunes collection of hymns. All tugging me back to that most enjoyable thing for me, encountering good stories and Truth. It's my hobby, the way some people enjoy conversation, or woodworking, or playing an instrument. I only wish my hobby were more social, but, well, I blame the homeschooling (or whatever gave me that aura), apologies to one recent student and all homeschooled readers. You're all probably smarter than the rest of us, by the way.

So, adaptability. Definitely a good thing. Allows us to bring our talents to bear in new pursuits. Brings us into conversation with 'the different' so we don't always end up reacting the same way. But it also can pull us away from whatever constitutes our favorite things about, well, life. I don't subscribe to the theory that there is some immutable 'me' inside every one of us (well, not 'me;' in your case it would 'you') that has existed since conception or birth and persists until death--humans are too complicated for that. We grow, and develop, and adapt, and usually find things than are more enjoyable that what was previously our favorite. And it's really only important that we gravitate to the things that make us happy. Unfortunately for my wife and my close friends, I now add 'history about the German Army of the two world wars' to that list of things that makes me happy.

And I will finish my two current books, because *hmpf* I am a father and it's important I set the example of finishing what I started, and then I'll move on to something a little broader in scope. I would welcome suggestions.

Thoughts on Boyd and Warfighting

The Marine Corps has, in my lifetime, always purported to be (in part) an intellectual organization. It has also purported to be a "dumb" organization of doers, not thinkers--encoded in Marine tradition is the encouraged image of a stoic, strong, dependable, and cunning team player. This curious dichotomy serves to point Marines at the desired result: physical leadership, endurance, and capability mixed with an intellectual passion for the pursuit of armed conflict. Marines are expected to perform well in the Combat Fitness Test, endure drudgery and deprivation, and read works listed on the Commandant's reading list all within the same career.

Nowhere is this mix more emphasized than at The Basic School, my current assignment and the cradle of Marine Corps virtue (with apologies, of course, to the recruit depots). The Basic School exists to teach officers leadership, the basic combat skills of an infantry leader, and Warfighting--the name given to the branch of knowledge (both art and science) concerned with winning wars. Within the cadre of instructors ideas bounce around amid the cheerful gossip about student buffoonery and always-flowing sea stories, ideas about the nature of warfare, the technicalia of conflict, and the best way to achieve a "product" which will ensure a continued line of Marine Corps victories in "every clime and place."

Some hold that instilling the proper mindset is the right product. As long as a lieutenant leaves with the initiative and determination both to solve any future battle problem and continue to educate himself, that is sufficient. Others argue that a collection of skills is the correct product. Lieutenants must have a basic set of infantry skills to graduate. The answer, acknowledged by all, is of course both. Fancy phrasing combining the two abounds: use the infantry skills as a "vehicle" to instill the correct mindset is the most compelling. But the real end result is to produce leadership that will maintain the Marine Corps as an aggressive, intelligent, creative armed force that is physically and morally ready to take on any kind of conflict, from the smallest insurrection to World War, and win.

Producing such leadership is the aim of the ideas bounced around from instructor to instructor. It is part of both the teaching and learning process, because eventually we instructors will re-enter the combat forces and--with the help of lieutenants--seek to transform and maintain the rest of the force along the same lines. But while it's all well and good to speak of "an aggressive, intelligent, creative armed force that is physically and morally ready to take on any kind of conflict, from the smallest insurrection to World War, and win," understanding what that means and making it happen is a complex and difficult task.

No man in the American military has so closely studied this problem, nor developed anything like a solution, as Col John R. Boyd of the U. S. Air Force. A brilliant, single-minded, and acerbic man along the lines of a Michelangelo, Col Boyd desired only one thing: to fight and win. His desire led him to revolutionize aircraft fighter tactics, then aircraft design as a whole, then general tactics and tactical thought, and finally overall strategy and force structures.

It was a conversation with a peer that introduced me to Col Boyd through his biography, Boyd. Our discussions have struck at the fundamental nature of conflict and victory, seen through Boyd's thought. Though I see his work as but through a mirror darkly, his work has engaged me singularly and I reproduce below an email I wrote back to my peer:

K------,

When you first asked what I thought about the F-22 and the F-35, I had very limited understanding of what Col Boyd's "fighter mafia" wanted to accomplish in developing an airplane back in the 1970s. The fact that the same group of people could produce the ungainly but powerful ground-attack A-10 and the elegant, nimble F-16 goes to show how they weren't "all or nothing" guys like you said; they were very acquainted with compromise. They wanted aircraft that would perform it's mission the best, no matter what compromises came along with such criteria.

The conventional "best," according to the authorities at the time, was traditionally that which could fly faster, higher, and farther while carrying more weapons. The swing-wing design such as is found in a B-1 accomplishes that perfectly--it permits extremely high speeds and high-altitude flight. Unfortunately the weight and mechanical complexity of a swing-wing design limit its flight ability in other regimes, such as low-altitude flight. A rough ground combat analogy would be an artillery system that could fire farther with heavier payloads, but which consequently took so long to transport or assemble that it was essentially useless.

Col Boyd's "fighter mafia" realized that the "best" from an engineering standpoint was almost certainly not the "best" in actual warfare--a conclusion stimulated and borne out by the dismal record of F-105s and F-4s over Vietnam. His developments allowed for a different kind of "best," as in, "best" fit for the job. His insistence, for example, of the F-16 having a 30% or greater fuel ratio ensured that it would have enough legs to be a viable aircraft--and because of his realization that it wasn't fuel capacity that determined range, but rather fuel capacity as compared with engine requirements, ended up with the F-16 having the longest legs of any Air Force fighter. More subtle distinctions are not identified in the book, but I think Boyd must have considered them. For example, the missiles of his day were very unreliable, and at some point in combat an aircraft would get in a dogfight. Hence, a true "fighter" had to be able to fire missiles and yet "turn" at the merge. So he insisted that the F-16 be able do both.

In the end, it was the compromises Boyd made that achieved his ideal. The F-16 is not as fast or high-flying as the F-15, and therefore cannot engage at as long a range. Yet it can effectively engage with missiles, because the fighter mafia wanted a high thrust-to-weight ratio, which assists fundamentally in acceleration and vertical maneuvers--but which also is critical when it comes to generating speed and altitude. The F-16 was a compromise between a lot of factors: fuel capacity, weight, engine power, armament, and ease of maintenance. In many of the above categories it was inferior to the F-15. But all together, it is (without any doubt) by far the superior fighter.

Where the F-16 excels, of course, is in maneuverability--what the book calls "fast transients." In fact, the "fast transients" piece set the YF-16 prototype far above it's immediate competitor, the YF-17. "Fast Transients" allowed a pilot to change his aircraft's regime of flight nearly instantly; for example a pilot might very quickly switch from a fast pursuit profile to a slow, tight-turn profile with a violent re-orientation of the aircraft or go from slow to fast by "firewalling" the throttle and taking advantage of a high thrust-to-weight ratio. The hat trick of "Forty-Second Boyd," where he could start a dogfight at the worst disadvantage and yet reverse the situation to kill his opponent within 40 seconds through such a quick, violent maneuver, proves the value of such ability in a turning fight. Certainly our own MCDP-1 indicates that a ground commander's ability to do the same thing with, say, a battalion actually generates the kind of fleeting opportunities and tactical advantage that allow one force to morally defeat another, even if it is numerically inferior ("morally", in this case, refers to the plane of conflict that occurs in the minds and souls of the combatants, and is concerned with morale will, instead of the physical or material plane which is concerned with weapons and numbers).

So, knowing that the Navy (and by extension, the Marine Corps) would be forced by Congress to by a lightweight fighter, you might reasonably ask why they didn't buy the F-16. The reasons are, I believe, the same reasons Boyd designed the F-16 in the first place. The Navy needed an ideal aircraft--one that would fit all its missions. But it only stumbled upon this realization by accident.

There is a legend that after losing the Lightweight Fighter competition, McDonnell-Douglas was in trouble. It had spent a great deal of money designing this aircraft, an aircraft that had the absolute best current aviation technology. But who would buy the aircraft if the U.S. Air Force had found it lacking? It could hope that by underbidding the F-16, foreign militaries would bite, but that wouldn't last for long. As the F-16 went into production, it's cost-per-unit would inevitably and inexorably decrease, quickly becoming a more affordable alternative. So they went wooing the Navy. And, pulling some strings, they achieved a demonstration for some top Navy brass. Now the Navy had already viewed the lightweight fighter competition, and so they knew the performance specifics and pilot feedback: the former nearly equal between the two airplanes, the latter much in favor of the F-16. So McDonnell-Douglass only demonstrated one thing. They showed a maintenance crew remove an engine from the YF-17 and replace it within 30 minutes. And the Navy was sold.

I don't know if that story is true, but it was the birth of another compromise that launched an immensely successful airplane. The Navy's needs are different from those of the Air Force: it doesn't have limitless hangar space to maintain aircraft, it doesn't have interior lines of communication on U.S. soil to guarantee quick and responsive logistical support, and it doesn't have two-mile runways on which aircraft can be babied during take-off and landing. Carrier aviation is brutal on equipment. The hangar deck is small, and there isn't much storage elsewhere for extra parts. The "runway" is 600 feet long, and aircraft are accelerated quickly to speed so they can get airborne then arrested sharply on landing, both of which require a much sturdier frame than usual. Navy pilots to a man prefer two-engine aircraft because there is usually no land beneath them while they fly, and so they'd rather a malfunction didn't condemn them to a long slow death of starvation, drowning, or shark attack. They also need an aircraft that is controllable at very low speeds to make landing on a carrier a reasonably safe proposition. And in the post-Vietnam years, I suspect the navy was getting tired of managing separate parts pipelines for their variegated fleet of F-14s, A-4s, A-6s, and A-7s.

What the apocryphal McDonnell-Douglass demonstration showed was that the Navy could meet its specific maintenance and aircraft requirements in a single airplane. And so the F-18 was born. It's two engines met the criteria for overwater flight. It's modular engine system made it easy to maintain, and additionally the redundancy that resulted made it an aircraft that could well sustain battle damage. Designed as Boyd's lightweight fighter, it had the ability to climb high and get fast to shoot missiles while also being able to slow quickly and maneuver in a close-in engagement. It also had sufficient power and size to carry about half the ordnance load-out of the existing A-6s and A-7s, making it a capable ground-attack aircraft. Knowing one of it's big missions was to support a Marine landing, Navy designers optimized the aircraft for low-altitude flight to further increase its ability as a CAS platform. It was a compromise, of course, from beginning to end. It is slightly worse as a fighter than the F-16, and slightly worse as an attack aircraft than the A-10. But it made the Navy more expeditionary and better able to accomplish it's assigned missions. The Air-to-Air, Air-to-Ground F-35C (unweighted by the lift fan), is a natural extension of this idea, but whether it's a better airplane than the F-18E/F (Super Hornet) is still up for debate. It lacks an internal gun, which would damn it completely in Boyd's eyes.

As an aside, the F-22 program adopted Boyd's approach, as far as I could tell: the contractor's mantra while developing the F-22 was "not a pound for air-to-ground." I suspect that installing two engines was a practical response to the stealth element's requirement for an internal weapons bay, which takes up a lot of space inside the airframe, as well as a way to maximize the thrust-to-weight ratio. But ultimately the F-22 achieved a perfect compromise: unassailable at a distance due to stealth and long-range missiles (made more so by the extreme altitude and speed available to the aircraft), unbeatable in a close fight because the large wings and thrust vectors make it incomparably maneuverable. The F-35, on the other hand, is exactly the compromise that Boyd hated: weighed down with air-to-ground gadgets and gizmos that provide (I predict) far too much information to really be of use to a ground commander, and in the case of the F-35B weighed down with a huge lift fan that drastically reduces fuel capacity and weapons carriage as well. In fact, one of the most contentious elements of the F-35 program is the contractor's inability to get the F-35B's weight within specs.

The story of the F-18 (and the F-35) has a great deal of applicability to the Marine Corps and Boyd's work on maneuver warfare. I don't yet fully understand the OODA cycle, but at the most superficial level it's merely a map of human experience. Applied to warfare as a discipline, it expands exponentially and speeds up. The "Observe-Orient" part is the most important, since both observation and orientation can be clouded by prejudice (leading to mistakes) or more readily understood by experience (leading to a faster cycle time). Hence we emphasize initiative and the freedom to make mistakes at TBS (and hopefully throughout the fleet) in order to gain experience. But the hard wall within the OODA cycle is the movement from "orient" to "decide." How often do you suppose that a commander orients and conceives of a bold move that will paralyze his enemy with confusion, only to to be stopped short by inability to realize his plan? Such inability can be the result of controlling commanders, or undisciplined units, or the limitations of equipment. Nevertheless I think we have to realize that as Marines we live in a system that puts a strong filter before the D in our OODA cycles.

I can't speak to the command limitation in our OODA cycles. It is composed, I think, of being collectively somewhat risk-adverse, careerist, and uncomfortable with decentralized execution (though much less so than our sister services). But the filter imposed by equipment is a big deal. Col A-----'s vision of a light-infantry force is a step towards fixing this problem. Focusing on a small logistics train and solid discipline--the kind that will bend a unit to its commander's will as a fighter is bent to its pilot's--would put the Marine Corps in company with Lee's Army of the Potomac, Rommel's Afrika Corps (and really the entire German Wehrmacht of the Second World War), and the Israeli Army's march to the canal in 1967. Equipment that complements this light-infantry mindset, such as the M777 or the IAR (it's usefulness pending) or even the EFV is to be desired. Such equipment will give a commander options. Options to cross the lake, rather than the expected river. Options to helibear lighter, fewer items to ground units in order to sustain a push. Options to maneuver around existing roads, options to disperse forces--ultimately options to Decide - Act in unexpected and decisive ways to morally defeat the enemy.

For Marine Corps fixed-wing aviation (and with apologies to Col Boyd), I think the F-18 literally provides this kind of flexibility best. It is expeditionary and capable and proven. I think, sadly, that it will be more flexible and more effective at all it's missions than the F-35 will be--especially if upgraded to the Super Hornet model, which incorporates some technical advancements, better fuel capacity, and more weapons load-out. On the macro level for the Corps, however, we must be able to protect our Marines from enemy air--even if our current enemy has none--and provide the close air support that will give our ground commanders options to deal with what will in the future almost certainly be a materially superior conventional enemy. Of course, to accept an aircraft that cannot depart and recover on a MEU means one has to accept certain other things--such as the need to depend on the Navy for carrier support, or the need to capture an airfield to support the operation, or the need to detail KC-130s for refueling support. But as the fighter mafia showed us, getting the ideal means making some compromises.

As Col Boyd demonstrated in "Patterns of Conflict," our job as military leaders is not to assemble a tinker-toy of statistical fillers and engines of war ready to be unleashed by the Pentagon wherever the president points his finger, but rather to build an "ideal" force for accomplishing our missions. This force will be focused, stripped of unnecessary capabilities, and responsive. It will be the F-16 (or perhaps with our expeditionary mentality, the F-18) of military forces. With such a force a commander may cycle through OODA fast enough to (as MCDP-1 teaches) "shatter the enemy’s cohesion through a variety of rapid, focused, and unexpected actions which create a turbulent and rapidly deteriorating situation with which the enemy cannot cope," and therefore win--just as we (along with Col Boyd) ardently desire.