“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.” —Robert A. Heinlein, Time Enough For Love
Tomorrow is Memorial Day in the United States. A time to reflect and honor military personnel who died in service to the nation.
Over my career I’ve known many individuals who made this ultimate sacrifice. Some I simply passed in the halls of a unit. Some were friends. Some I thought of as brothers.
There’s a passage from the first page of Mark Bowden’s classic Blackhawk Down where he talks about the closeness experienced after years of training together. I think he captures it very well:
“He knew their faces so well they were like brothers. The older guys on this crew, like Eversmann, a staff sergeant with five years in at age twenty-six, had lived and trained together for years. Some had come up together through basic training, jump school, and Ranger school. They had traveled the world, to Korea, Thailand, Central America…. They knew each other better than most brothers did. They’d been drunk together, gotten into fights, slept on forest floors, jumped out of airplanes, climbed mountains, shot down foaming rivers with their hearts in their throats, baked and frozen and starved together, passed countless bored hours, teased one another endlessly about girlfriends or lack of same, driven out in the middle of the night from Fort Benning to retrieve each other from some diner or strip club out on Victory Drive after getting drunk and falling asleep or pissing off some barkeep. Through all those things, they had been training for a moment like this.
Author Nassim Taleb talks about the concept of skin in the game— having a vested interest in the outcome of a given situation. Taleb is critical of those with no skin in the game, who make policy decisions in the corporate and political world with little impact to their own lives and fortunes.
But besides skin in the game and no skin in the game, there is a third state. A state Taleb calls soul in the game. Someone in this state has everything at stake—their performance, their conduct, their decisions—all can spell the end of their careers, or their lives.
Those we honor on Memorial day had soul in the game.
They died in service to the nation — in training, combat, or dealing with the aftermath of that service.
The idea of a nation is an imagined community. It’s a story we tell, to harmonize and accord ourselves to the world. A story many of us felt worth risking everything in service to, and still do.
This clip from Saving Private Ryan conveys something important. When Captain Miller (Tom Hanks) tells Private Ryan (Matt Damon) to “earn this”, he’s speaking to all of us.
When we as citizens stop believing in this idea of America — when we let financial and partisan desires overpower larger concerns for our community, environment, and the promise of our nation — we do the opposite of “earn this.”
America doesn’t always live up to her ideals. We fall on our face a good portion of the time. Like every human-made thing in this world, America has a shadow side.
But shadows are meant to be integrated — not ignored, minimized, or focused on to the exclusion of all the good.
It is a partisan moment, among many in our history.
It features a radioactive cesspool of bad political incentives, short-term thinking, and tribal allegiances.
But groups like Braver Angels, Veterans for Political Innovation, and Veterans Campaign are working in the breach of our contentious politics and point towards a better future.
Our children are watching.
The men and women we honor on Memorial day died for us.
They’re not here anymore, to tuck their kids into bed, to take their moms out to lunch, to surprise their spouses at work.
In their memory, the least, the very least we can do, is try to figure this mess out.
To keep this experiment going.
We have more in common than not.
If we want to honor the sacrifice of our fallen, let’s hold this thing together.
That’s just what we need, Adam - soul in the game. You nailed it. We need to show it, and be it, for those who came before and are no longer here, and those following in our footsteps.
I waited until this morning to read your article in full and glad I did. Appreciate you sharing some organizations that you see on the right path/with genuine intentions. Your opening quote might be one of my new favorites too! Great stuff as always brother