Captains of the Soul Michael Evans

Naval War College Review Volume 64 Article 4 Number 1 Winter

2011 Captains of the Soul Michael Evans

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CAPTAINS OF THE SOUL Stoic Philos o phy and the Western Profes sion of Arms in the Twenty-first Cen tury

Mi chael Ev ans

To meet life as a pow erful con queror, No fumes, no ennui, no more complaints or scorn ful crit icisms, To these proud laws of the air, the water, and the ground, Prov ing my in te rior soul im preg na ble, And nothing exte rior shall ever take com mand of me. WALT WHITMAN, “A SONG OF JOYS” (1860)

n the new mil lennium West ern mil i tar ies are spend ing a great deal of their re - Isources on train ing and arming uniformed pro fession als for the in stru mental rig ors of op era tional ser vice. Most mod ern armed forces equip their person nel with the latest body armor, the best protected ve hi cles, and the most sophis ti - cated counterexplosive elec tron ics, ac quir ing as well the most ad vanced med ical ser vices for those physi cally wounded or maimed. Much less time is de voted to pro vid ing mil i tary per son nel with ex is ten tial or in ner ar ma ments—with the men tal ar mor and philo soph i cal pro tec tion—that is nec es sary to con front an asymmet ric en emy who abides by a dif ferent set of cul tural rules. Much is also made in to day’s Western polit i cal and mili tary circles about the need to re learn counter insur gency, with its central tenet of winning “hearts and minds” among con tested pop u la tions. Yet com par a tively lit tle is done to pro vide West ern mil i- tary pro fes sionals with suffi cient moral philos o phy to protect their own hearts and minds against the rig ors of contem po rary warfare in Iraq and Afghan i stan. It is true that all Eng lish-speak ing Western mil i tar ies possess codes of be hav - ior that govern the ethi cal conduct of their mem bers. These codes tend to cover the law of armed con flict, just-war the ory, and the im por tance of up hold ing hu mani tar ian values. However, such guides, while essen tial, tend to be rooted in so cial sci ence, law, and psychol ogy rather than in moral phi loso phy, with its ground ing in the great hu mani ties. 1 Moreover, while mod ern ethi cal codes em - phasize insti tu tional rules of be havior, moral philos o phy puts in the fore ground

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the de vel op ment of per sonal char ac ter and the rec on cil i a tion of the in di vid ual to the social en vi ronment in which he or she op erates. Ethics need, there fore, to be comple mented by a stron ger focus on philos o phy that per mits the profes - sional mil i tary to be come fully a self-con scious moral commu nity commit ted to maintain ing tradi tions essen tial to the in teg rity of its peo ple and the discharge of its re spon si bil i ties.2 This ar ti cle an a lyzes the im por tance of teach ing Stoic moral phi los o phy within to day’s armed forces, cov er ing three ar eas. First, the ar ti cle exam ines the challenge to the war rior ethos em anat ing from the in creasing postmodern instrumentalism of warfare. Second, it exam ines the case for uphold ing in the profes sional mil i tary a moral philos o phy that is based on adapting what the Brit ish philos o pher Bertrand Rus sell once called the vir tues of “Stoic self- com mand.”3 Third, the ar ti cle dis cusses the extent to which philo sophi cal values based on Sto icism might serve as moral guides to to day’s mil itary pro fession als, by draw ing on lessons and choices from Western liter a ture, poli tics, and history.

THE CHAL LENGE TO THE WESTERN MILI TARY ETHOS: POSTMODERNITY, TECH NO LOG I CAL INSTRUMENTALISM, AND HONOR Charles C. Moskos, John Allen Wil liams, and David R. Segal, the edi tors of an in- fluen tial 2000 work, argued that advanced Western armed forces were un dergo - ing an uneven, but clearly discern ible, tran sition from modern to postmodern sta tus.4 This tran sition, they suggested, was challeng ing to the pro fessional mili - tary ethos, for two over arching reasons. First, a loos en ing of ties to both so ci ety and state was oc cur ring, sym bolized by the rise of a moral rela tiv ism in which “there is a shrink ing con sensus about what val ues consti tute the public good, and lit tle con fi dence that we know how, by the use of rea son, to deter mine what the public good might be.”5 Sec ond, the rise of “rev olu tion in mili tary affairs” tech nol o gies based on the in stru men tal tech nol ogy of pre ci sion and stealth pit- ted, they suggested, the ethos of pro fession al ism against a grow ing oc cupa tional out look.6 John Allen Wil liams, in his contri bu tion to their volume, went so far as to con clude that “mil i tary cul ture is chal lenged by a rel a tiv is tic ci vil ian ethos from without and by the in creasing civilianization of mili tary functions and per son nel ori en ta tion from within.”7 Over the last decade, Chris topher Coker, per haps the world’s lead ing phi loso - pher of contem po rary war, has in a series of im por tant studies fur ther an alyzed the im pli cations for the mili tary profes sion of the onset of postmodernity.8 For Coker, much of the contem po rary West to day is domi nated by what he calls an “eth ics with out mo ral ity,” in which the ex is ten tial and meta phys i cal ide als that have tra di tion ally un der pinned a life ded i cated to mil i tary pro fes sion al ism seem https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 2 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 33

in creas ingly ob so les cent.9 De spite the long wars in Iraq and Afghan i stan, Coker be lieves, postmodern trends in op era tional prac tice and advanced technol ogy are now so deeply entrenched in contem po rary modes of warfare “that in the future there will be no place for the war rior ideal.”10 In a pessi mis tic tone he writes: Even the profes sional sol dier who volun teers to fight sees war increas ingly as a trade rather than as a voca tion, a job like any other, even if it differs from every other in the fear and anx i ety it gen er ates. Even if that is not true of ev ery sol dier (and we pro duce a few warriors still), war in the early twenty-first century does indeed seem to the rest of us rather barren, bereft of that [ex isten tial] dimen sion that made the warrior a human type as Hegel un der stood the term, a man who through war per ceives his own hu man ity.11 Other ob serv ers have writ ten on how postmodern trends have led through - out contem po rary soci ety to an alleged de cline of public honor that im pacts upon the West ern mil i tary’s pro fessional ethos and its insti tu tional notions of duty and sac ri fice.12 This de velop ment, it is contended, has had the effect of making Western mili tar ies’ inter nal codes of honor less re flections of wider so - cial be liefs than spe cies of sub cul ture. Writers such as Akbar S. Ahmed and James Bowman have charged that one of the major weaknesses in the contem po - rary West’s waging of wars is that its nations do so as “post-honor so ci eties.” 13 In their view, a gulf has grown be tween the honor codes of vol un teer mili tary pro - fession als and par ent so ciet ies, the latter of which are in creasingly gov erned by the more rela tiv ist mores of postmodernity. This gulf, it is sug gested, puts West- ern democ ra cies at a disad vantage when fighting op po nents who are impelled by abso lut ist cul tural imper atives based on older codes of honor.14 As Coker reflects, “the West is en gaged with an [Islamist] adver sary that is the product of one of the world’s great unre con structed and unre formed honour cultures at a time when the fortunes of the West’s own honour culture are at a low ebb.”15

MORAL PHILOS O PHY FOR MILI TARY PROFES SION ALS: THE CASE FOR RE VIVING STO ICISM How does one, then, counter the rise of an instru mental vision of war and with it the growth of occu pational ide als that re flect Coker’s “eth ics with out mo ral ity”? If there is a growing incom pat i bil ity between the norms of an evolving, postmodern era based on instru mental ratio nal ity and the val ues of a pro fessional mili tary ethos based on exis ten tial meaning, we clearly need to re inforce the philosoph i cal in ner selves of men and women in the West’s armed forces. This arti cle ar gues that one of the most ef fec tive philo soph i cal tra di tions for those in mil i tary uni form is that of Stoicism. The moral phi loso phy of the an - cient Greek and Roman Sto ics as taught by such great think ers as Epictetus, Sen - eca, Cicero, and Marcus Aurelius offers an effec tive path for those who seek to

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un derstand the exis ten tial char ac ter of the profes sion of arms. Yet Stoic phi los o- phy runs against all postmodern philosoph i cal trends and is thus un fash ionable today. As Tad Brennan comments in a 2007 book, those who seek to adhere to Stoic phi loso phy are likely to be seen as out of touch with their age, seek ing only to cling to a jumbled-up “mixture of tough-guy bravado, hypoc risy and heart - less ness [that is] nei ther per son ally com pel ling nor philo soph i cally in ter est- ing.”16 Why should an an cient Hel lenis tic philos o phy noted for its harsh pre - scriptions and de signed for life in preindustrial agrarian city-states be of any use to mil i tary profes sionals who have been reared in the so cial and ma terial sophis - ti cation of a postindustrial elec - As the an cient Stoic think ers teach us, what tronic age? The answer lies in the truly counts is the na ture of life it self as an un - unchang ing human dimen sion of end ing form of war fare that must be con - the mil i tary profes sion, and it is fronted and mas tered if one is to overcome this dimen sion—with its focus on fortune and fate. strength of char ac ter—that links the Greek hoplites on the fields of Attica to to day’s Western soldiers in the mountains of Afghan i stan. What is most attrac tive about the Stoic school of philos o phy is its central notion that char ac ter is fate. The ideas of Stoicism infuse much of the edi fice of Western civi li za tion, and this debt is evi dent in the writings of such tower ing intel lec tual figures as Montaigne, Pascal, Spinoza, Descartes, Kant, and Hume. More over, Stoicism in some form infuses much of Chris tian the ology, from St. Au gus tine through Thomas à Kempis to the Flemish philos o pher Justus Lipsius, as symbol ized by the fa mous Seren ity Prayer: “God grant me the se ren ity to ac - cept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wis dom to know the dif fer ence.” Indeed, the phi los opher Charles Tay lor has writ ten of how a Christianized Sto icism, or neo-Sto icism, de veloped by Lipsius in the sixteenth century influ enced the evolu tion of mod ern Cal vin ism, Lutheranism, and Cathol i cism—with Cal vin be gin ning his life of re ligious ac - tivism by pub lish ing a study of Sen eca.17 Promi nent later adher ents of Stoicism have in cluded the great Prussian general Fred er ick the Great, the Holo caust phi- loso pher Viktor E. Frankl, the Rus sian writer and dis si dent Aleksandr Solzhe- nitsyn, and the South Afri can statesman Nelson Mandela.18 It is often ar gued that mem bers of the armed ser vices are nat u ral Sto ics, capable of re pel ling the psychic shock of combat through in grained mental tough - ness. Such a be lief is highly mis lead ing, as the fre quent in ci dence of post– trau matic stress dis or der in mod ern mil i tary es tab lish ments in re cent years at tests. As the Amer i can scholar Nancy Sherman em phasizes in a 2005 study, “cat a strophic, ex ter nal cir cum stance can de rail the best-lived life.”19 In 2008 the RAND Cor po ration found that nearly 20 per cent of U.S. mili tary ser vice https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 4 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 35

members re turning from Iraq and Afghan i stan re ported symptoms of post– trau matic stress disor der and de pression—what it called the “invis i ble wounds of war.”20 To what ex tent a philos o phy of Stoicism can assist those in uniform to pre vent or mit i gate mod ern neu ro psy chi at ric dis or ders re mains a mat ter of de - bate. As RAND re searchers have pointed out, there remain “funda men tal gaps” in our knowl edge of the causal links be tween indi vid ual ed u cational back- grounds, col lec tive mil i tary train ing, and op er a tional de ploy ment, and the in ci- dence of men tal health problems. 21 None theless, as one lead ing Amer ican sol dier, Bri ga dier Gen eral H. R. McMaster, U.S. Army, has ob served, culti va tion of Stoic-like re silience and forti tude for self-control is likely to be of value in re - ducing combat stress. In McMaster’s words, “Soldiers must view war as a challenge and as their duty, not as trauma.”22 This view is shared by Coker, who writes that as piring warriors must seek “to be true to what [Ralph Waldo] Emer - son calls ‘the great sto ical doc trine—obey thy self.’ Noth ing is more true of the warrior ethos than this doc trine.”23 For the most part, contem po rary mili tary notions of Stoicism tend to be based on sec ond hand plat i tudes and com mon ste reo types about man li ness, “stiff upper lips,” and “can do” willing ness. Popu lar Stoic stereo types include the emo tionless Mr. Spock in the tele vision series Star Trek and Rus sell Crowe’s “strength and honor” Roman soldier, Maximus, in the 1999 movie Glad i a tor. Of course, there is much more to Stoic philos o phy than popu lar culture allows. Sto - icism is a school of an cient philos o phy founded by the fourth cen tury BCE by the Greek thinker Zeno of Citium and system atized by his succes sors Cleanthes and Chrysippus in the third century BCE. Since Zeno’s orig inal follow ers met in a _ public por tico in Athens known as the “Painted Porch” (Stoa Poikil e), they came to be known as Stoics, or “men of the Porch.” The Stoic doc trines that have been be queathed to the mod ern world rep resent a power ful method of reason ing in - volv ing the rig or ous cul ti va tion of self-com mand, self-re li ance, and moral au - tonomy, a system in which an indi vid ual seeks to de velop char ac ter on the ba sis of the four cardi nal virtues of courage, justice, temper ance, and wis dom.24 Rig or ously stud ied and prop erly ap plied, Stoic phi los o phy de liv ers pro found insights into the challenges of mili tary life. Pe ter Ryan, an Austra lian hero of the Sec ond World War and au thor of the cele brated 1959 memoir Fear Drive My Feet, has writ ten of the im pact of the writ ings of Marcus Aurelius on his own mili tary conduct. In it Ryan de scribes himself as, when coming under Japa nese fire for the first time, “a shudder ing mess of demor alised ter ror” un til he re calls the teachings of Stoicism: Then I thought of Marcus Aurelius. Had n’t he taught me that, when Fate ap - proached, there was no escape, but that a man would keep his grim ap pointment

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with dignity and calm? The ef fect was in stant; cer tainly I still felt great fear, but I was no longer abject. It was this recov ery of self-control and self-respect . . . that pre- served me through all the test ing months in the [New Guinea] bush that lay ahead in 1942 and 1943.25 In re cent years, the most promi nent and system atic ad vo cate of mili tary Sto - icism was the dis tin guished U.S. na val offi cer, Medal of Honor re cipi ent, and 1992 vice presi den tial contender Vice Admi ral James Bond Stockdale, who died in 2005. Stockdale’s 1995 book Thoughts of a Philo soph i cal Fighter Pi lot is one of the finest intro duc tions to Sto icism and its meaning for the pro fession of arms.26 Stock dale’s per sonal embrace of Stoicism helped him to survive seven and a half years of system atic tor ture and soli tary con finement, from 1965 until 1972, as a pris oner of the North Viet namese in the dreaded “Hanoi Hilton.” In the late 1970s, as Presi dent of the U.S. Na val War College, Stock dale intro duced at New - port an inno vative course, “Founda tions of Moral Obli ga tion” (widely known as “the Stock dale Course”), which was heavily in flu enced by Stoic thought. More than any other war rior-scholar in the Eng lish-speak ing West, Stock dale dis sem i - nated the value of Stoic philos o phy within the Ameri can and allied mili tary es- tab lishments, even influ enc ing the work of such lit erary figures as Tom Wolfe.27 In partic u lar, Stock dale did much to ele vate the writings of the Stoic slave- philos o pher Epictetus over those of Marcus Aurelius, by re veal ing the for - mer’s Stoic teachings in his En chi rid ion (Hand book) as what Stockdale called “a manual for combat offi cers.” As Stock dale puts it, in the pages of the En chi rid - ion “I had found the proper phi loso phy for the mil i tary arts as I prac ticed them. The Ro man Stoics coined the for mula Vivere militare—‘Life is being a soldier.’” 28 Stockdale’s writ ings remain highly rel e vant today; among the purposes of this ar ti cle are to sa lute his leg acy and extend it into the new millen nium. What are the central ten ets of Stoicism, and how do they fit into the cosmol - ogy of the twenty-first-century mil itary pro fessional? As a philos o phy, Sto icism teaches that life is un fair and that there is no moral econ omy in the hu man uni - verse. Mar tyrs and honest men may die poor; swin dlers and dishon est men may die rich. In this respect, the fate of both the Old Tes tament’s Job, God’s good ser - vant, and of Shake speare’s King Lear, the ex emplary fa ther, are remind ers of what we must endure from a life that fits the Stoic creed. The spirit of Sto icism as an unre lenting struggle for vir tuous charac ter in a world de void of fairness is hauntingly cap tured by the Greek playwright Aeschy lus in his Ag a mem non: “He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop on the heart un til, in our own de spair, against our will, co mes wisdom through the awful grace of God.”29 The absence of a moral economy outside of the work ings of our inner selves means that in the Stoic cat e chism there is no such cate gory as “victimhood.” https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 6 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 37

Stoicism is thus about empow er ment by percep tion—a culti va tion of an invin - ci bil ity of the will by min i miz ing per sonal vul ner a bil ity through a mix ture of Socratic self-exam i na tion and control of the emotions. Stoicism teaches con - centra tion on what indi vid u als can control—what French scholar Pierre Hadot, in his study of Marcus Aurelius’s Med i ta tions, calls the cul tiva tion of the “inner cit adel” of the soul.30 Stoicism’s four great teachings may be summa rized as the quest for vir tue, as rep re senting the sole hu man good; the under stand ing that exter nal goods do not equate to hu man hap piness; the belief that a good life strives to control emotions to enhance reason; and the con vic tion that vir tue consists in know ing what is in one’s control and what is not.31 The Quest for Vir tue as the Sole Human Good For the Stoic, charac ter is formed by free dom of personal choice. Stoicism is thus a for mula for main taining self-re spect and dig nity through the con scious pur - suit of virtue and the avoidance of vice, in times of ei ther adver sity or prosper ity. The real i ties of pov erty and wealth mat ter only in sofar as they are used to shape the es sen tial goodness of our charac ter. As Epictetus puts it in the En chi rid ion, true wealth stems from righteous ness, honor, and decency, viewed collec tively as abso lute vir tue. Such vir tue is wholly indif fer ent to all matters of mere for tune, includ ing health and ill ness, wealth and pov erty, even life and death. It is a message of wisdom that has echoed across the centu ries. In the twenti eth century, the French philos o pher Simone Weil echoed Epictetus when she wrote that au - thentic hu man greatness is always found in virtue and honor mani fested in a “desire for the truth, ceaseless effort to achieve it, and obe dience to one’s calling.”32 Sto ics firmly re ject the no tion of collec tive or social guilt as a force in shaping vir tue. For the Stoic, collec tive guilt is an impos si ble prop osi tion, simply because guilt is al ways about indi vid ual choice and personal wrongdo ing, “even in dreams, in drunk enness and in mel ancholy madness.” 33 No one can ever be guilty for the act of another, and no soci ety can be held ac countable for the actions of in di vid u als of a pre vi ous gen er a tion. Ex ter nals Do Not Amount to Hap pi ness In his Enchiridion, Epictetus teaches us that every in divid ual has a fun damen tal choice—whether to live by inner or outer values. This choice is summed up by his famous doc trine, “Of things some are in our power and others are not. In our power, are opinion, movement towards a thing [aim], desire, aversion (turning from a thing); and in a word, whatever are our own acts; not in our power are the body, prop erty, repu ta tion, offices (mag iste rial power) and, in a word, what ever are not our own acts.”34 Epictetus goes on to warn that as long as a person occu pies him self with ex- ternals, he will ne glect the in ner self. Since one cannot con trol exter nal is sues,

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they must become “indifferents”—that is, they are outside our will. As Epictetus puts it, “The things in our power are by nature free, not subject to re straint nor hindrance: but the things not in our power are weak, slav ish, subject to re straint and in the power of others.” The Stoic pur sues only that which is his own, within his power, and seeks a ra tional, self-suffi cient exis tence moti vated by the disci - pline of personal virtue. 35 Such an unre lenting concen tra tion on the inner self at the ex pense of a life in soci ety may strike some read ers as a harsh doc trine. However, it is im por tant to note that the Stoic phi loso phers never suggest that an in divid ual should not par - take of “the game of life,” the search for public suc cess or worldly goods. They only warn that one should not become caught up in the game to the extent that it reduces indi vid ual freedom of choice and constrains the pursuit of vir tue. Stoics are not un worldly. It must be re membered that two of the most im portant Ro- man Sto ics, Cicero and Sen eca, were wealthy pol i ti cians, while Marcus Aurelius was at once emperor, sol dier, and phi los opher. 36 A true Stoic is a par tic ipant in human af fairs who un derstands the harsh re al i ties of the world only too well. It is not for nothing that Epictetus compares the Stoic’s life to that of the dis charge of mil i tary ser vice to the highest stan dards: “Do you not know that life is a sol - dier’s ser vice? . . . So too it is in the world; each man’s life is a campaign, and a long and var ied one. It is for you to play the soldier’s part—do ev ery thing at the General’s bidding, divin ing his wishes, if it be possi ble.” 37 It is because of Sto ics’ un derstand ing of life that they will never be dismayed by hap penings outside their spans of control; Nil admirari is their motto—“Be aston ished at nothing.” In Stoic cosmol ogy, true free dom lies in the form of how much au tonomy can be gained by an indi vid ual in or der to live a vir tuous exis - tence, de spite the pressures of profes sional duties and social obli ga tions. 38 One of the most funda men tal of Stoic at ti tudes, then, is what Pierre Hadot, in his anal y sis of Marcus Aurelius’s thought, de scribes as “the de limi ta tion of our own sphere of liberty as an impreg na ble islet of auton omy, in the midst of the vast river of events and of Destiny.” 39 Striv ing to Con trol Emo tions Is the Es sence of Ratio nal Ac tiv ity The ancient Stoics believed that all moral pur pose must be grounded in reason, not emotion. Conse quently, emotions such as de sire, pleasure, fear, and dejec - tion must be transformed into acts of free will. For exam ple, one suffers fear only if one de cides to fear—for as Epictetus ob serves, ev ery thing in life is connected to “what lies within our will,” or in Admi ral Stockdale’s inter pre tation, “deci - sions of the will.”40 For the Stoic, the unhap piest peo ple are those preoc cu pied in divid u als who, as Seneca puts it, have the de sires of im mor tals combined with the fears of mortals. Such unfor tu nates allow emotion ally based fears

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con cern ing their bod ies, worldly pos ses sions, and re la tion ships to as sail and over come them.41 Those who are un happy are always “obliv i ous of the past, neg - li gent of the pres ent, [and] fear ful of the fu ture.” They ex emplify the truth that “the least concern of the pre-oc cupied man is life; it is the hard est science of all.”42 For Seneca, prosper ity can come to the vul gar and to ordi nary talents, but tri - umphing over the disas ters and ter rors of life takes a spe cial prowess that is “the privi lege of the great man.”43 The Stoic must mas ter the emo tions of Fate, for “you do not shine outwardly be cause all your goods are turned inward. So does our [Stoic] world scorn what lies without and re joice in the contem pla tion of it- self. Your whole good I have be stowed within yourselves: your good for tune is not to need good for tune.” 44 The central ideal of the Stoic will is thus to master all con - flict ing emotions in fa vor of the power of reason and so cre ate an inner self that is, in Cicero’s words, “safe, impreg na ble, fenced and forti fied”—a harmony of mind and soul that is capa ble of func tioning both in isola tion and yet is also in com rade ship with other vir tu ous minds.45 Vir tue Comes from Know ing What Is in One’s Control and What Is Not As we have seen, in the inner cita del of the Stoic soul it is im por tant to distin - guish between the things that de pend on hu man ac tiv ity and the things that do not, for as Seneca notes, “it is in the power of any person to de spise all things but in the power of no person to possess all things.”46 The true meaning of personal free dom is summed up by Epictetus in the En chi rid ion: “Who ever then wishes to be free, let him neither wish for anything nor avoid anything which de pends on oth ers: if he does not observe this rule, he must be a slave.”47 More over, in order to maxi mize the realm of per sonal free dom, a Stoic competes with oth ers only as a matter of moral choice, when vir tue and self-knowl edge are at stake. Epictetus warns against exter nal ap pearances, since the na ture of good is al ways within. As he puts it, “You can be invin ci ble if you enter no contest in which it is not in your power to conquer.” 48 Ul ti mately, Sto icism, while chal leng ing to mod ern mil i tary sen si bil i ties, is not an impos si ble creed. As Nancy Sherman has argued, it should not be inter - preted as a nar row philos o phy aimed at cre ating a race of iron men, divorced from cos mo pol i tan con cerns of fel low ship and so cial com mu nity.49 Rather, Stoicism is about foster ing a spirit of invin ci bil ity only in the sense of a will- ingness to endure and overcome life’s inev i ta ble challenges, diffi cul ties, and trage dies. More over, the Stoic who seeks such invin ci ble reso lu tion should not be viewed as in search of moral per fection but rather as seeking con stant moral prog ress within a social context. It is this inter pre tation of Sto icism—one de fined by the Ro man philos o pher Panaetius of Rhodes as rep re senting a

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“progres sion to wards vir tue”—that is most useful as a creed for twenty-first- cen tury mil i tary pro fes sion als.50 Ac cording to Cicero, this is a Sto icism that up holds public ser vice un der taken in “a spirit of hu manity and mutual consid eration” as the su preme good. For Cicero, in his var ious writ ings, includ ing On Du ties, the ex emplar of such service was the great soldier and man of letters Scipio Africanus the Elder. 51 In Cicero’s “The Dream of Scipio,” Africanus appears in a dream to his adoptive grandson Scipio Africanus the Younger and re veals to him the essence of public duty.52 The elder Africanus, conqueror of Hannibal and epit ome of Ro man grandeur, teaches the younger, “Every man who has pre served or helped his country, or has made its greatness even greater, is re served a special place in heaven, where he may enjoy eternal hap piness.” The key to an honor able life is found not in private affairs but in public service: “The very best deeds are those which serve your coun try.”53 Viewed in terms of moral progres sion, then, the Stoic life is a profoundly hu - man quest for knowl edge and as such is a philo sophi cal journey, never a desti nation—an arche type to be approx i mated, never an ideal to be achieved. The Stoic over comes the playground of the Fu ries that life rep re sents by de velop ing an en - dur ance marked by the culti va tion of reason and the prac tice of willpow er —both born out of a life long pursuit of good charac ter.54

STOIC LES SONS AND CHOICES FOR TWENTY-FIRST-CEN TURY MIL I TARY PRO FES SION ALS How can so demand ing a personal philos o phy work within the param e ters of the twenty-first-century West ern mil itary pro fession? Eight moral les sons and seven moral choices that re flect the in fluence of Stoicism emerge from the an - nals of West ern philos o phy, lit era ture, and history. They may as sist uni formed mili tary per sonnel in the arming of the inner selves as they pursue their jour neys of pro fes sional de vel op ment. Eight Moral Les sons from Stoicism A first lesson concerns the need to de velop an un der stand ing of the mean ing of a hu man life, assailed from three di rec tions—the body, the ex ter nal world, and personal rela tion ships. The writ ings of Seneca and Marcus Aurelius argue that life often re sembles a storm-tossed sea, not a tran quil ocean, and that one should seek to nav igate its shoals and cur rents ac cording to a moral philos o phy. As Sen - eca says in his letter “The Happy Life,” the road to meaning ful life lies not in the senses but in the pur suit of vir tue and honor based on “self-suffi ciency and abiding tranquil lity.” Together, these quali ties pro duce a constancy that in turn confers “the gift of greatness of soul”—a gift that consum mates ever last ing good and tran scends the brevity of hu man exis tence. 55 https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 10 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 41

It is also use ful to re call Marcus Aurelius’s in junc tion in his Med i ta tions on the need for a philos o phy of life. The Med i ta tions, composed as it was in cam - paign tents in innu mer a ble frontier wars against Teu tonic bar bari ans, has an ob - vious res onance for members of the profes sion of arms to day: Of man’s life, his time is a point, his ex is tence a flux, his sen sa tion clouded, his body’s entire compo si tion cor ruptible, his vital spirit an eddy of breath, his fortune hard to predict, his fame uncer tain. Briefly, all the things of the body, a river; all the things of the spirit, dream and delir ium; his life is a warfare and a sojourn in a strange land, his af ter-fame oblivion. What then can be his escort through life? One thing and one thing only, Phi los o phy.56 For many Stoics, meaning ful living is fur ther symbol ized by Xenophon’s story about Hercu les’s choice. On the eve of manhood, Hercu les re tires to the desert to re flect on his future. He is soon visited by two goddesses, Aret (Virtue) and Hdon (Plea sure), who offer him different paths in life. Aret offers Her cu - les an ardu ous path with much pain, labor, and tu mult but also true meaning, moral pur pose, and endur ing honor. In contrast, Hdon offers him a plea sur - able path of sensual ease, re pose, and sumptu ous living but with out lasting sig - _ nif i cance. Her cu les, with philo soph i cal wis dom, chooses arete and a life of strug gle but one de fined by righteous ac tion, fidel ity, honor, and de cency.57 A sec ond lesson from the Stoic canon concerns the question of how a mil itary profes sional should face his day, and again one can draw upon Marcus Aurelius’s Med i ta tions. Marcus believed that “a man should stand upright, not be held up - right.”58 A virtu ous soul must always seek moral auton omy, be cause it is en gaged in a personal jour ney to eternity. An indi vid ual’s true power comes from the in - ner strength aris ing from a self-mas tery that is honed to over come the ebb and flow of frus tra tion and failure. For the Ro man sol dier-em peror, then, daily moral life was about hon orable ac tion ir re spec tive of the circum stances that an indi vid ual must face and to this end he offered the fol lowing sage advice: Say to your self in the early morn ing: I shall meet today inquis i tive, ungrate ful, vi o - lent, treach er ous, en vi ous, un char i ta ble men. All these things have come upon them through ig no rance of real good and ill. But I, because I have seen that the na ture of good is the right and of ill the wrong, and that the nature of the man him self who does wrong is akin to my own (not of the same blood and seed, but partak ing with me in mind, that is in a portion of di vinity), I can neither be harmed by any of them, for no man will in volve me in wrong, nor can I be angry with my kinsman or hate him; for we have come into the world to live to gether.59 For Marcus, those who be have badly do so be cause they lack Stoic char ac ter and value the exter nal “indifferents” in life; theirs is a ratio nal ity that remains un tu- tored by the quest for virtue. In contrast, the Stoic, aside from neces sary

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co op era tion with oth ers for the common good, will al ways remain person ally aloof from those who possess “igno rant and un learned” souls.60 A third lesson of great value im parts the cen tral tenet of Stoicism, namely, know ing what one can con trol and what one can not con trol. Here a mil i tary pro - fes sional can take to heart Epictetus’s ad vice in the En chi rid ion to the effect that we always have a choice about the char ac ter of our in ner lives and that try ing to control or change what we cannot only re sults in anguish and tor ment. As Epictetus puts it, “If you de sire any thing which is not in our power, you must be un for tunate; but of the things in our power, and which it is good to de sire, noth - ing is yet before you”; there fore, A gulf has grown be tween the honor codes of “Pursue nothing that is outside vol un teer mil i tary pro fes sion als and par ent us, nothing that is not our own.”61 so ci et ies. This tenet does not translate to mere passiv ity in the storm of events. On the contrary, the Stoic inte rior charac ter can ex ert its own will in a duel with ex ter nal events with the power with which a mag net draws iron. How an in di vid ual mil i tary pro fes sional ex erts his will on an ex ter nal sit u a - tion is il lumi nated by Charles de Gaulle’s pre–World War II re flec tions on philos o phy and mili tary self-re liance in the opening chapters of his 1932 book The Edge of the Sword. Influ enced by Cicero’s notion that charac ter exhib its the su- preme value of self-re liance and that “great men of action have al ways been of the medi tative type,” the French soldier and future statesman wrote that when faced with the chal lenge of events, the man of char ac ter has re course to him self, for “it is char ac ter that supplies the es sen tial ele ment, the cre ative touch, the di- vine spark, in other words, the basic fact of initia tive.” 62 The instinc tive re sponse of the man of charac ter “is to leave his mark on action, to take re sponsi bil ity for it, to make it his own busi ness.” Such an indi vid ual “finds an espe cial attrac tive- ness in diffi culty, since it is only by coming to grips with diffi culty that he can realise his poten ti al i ties.” 63 After France’s disas trous defeat of 1940, de Gaulle lived these tenets first as leader in exile of the Free French and later, after 1958, as pres i dent of his coun try, in the cauldron of coun ter rev o lu tion ary war fare in Al ge ria. A power ful fourth les son deals with how hap pi ness can be found only within, and again a mili tary profes sional can make use of Epictetus’s and Marcus Aurelius’s writings—this time in the form of their teaching that maxi miz ing in- divid ual free dom is the only worthy goal in life. Happi ness born out of such a sense of free dom de pends on the inter ac tion of three spheres of personal ac tiv - ity: the dis cipline of de sire (con trol of emo tions), the dis cipline of as sent (the ex er - cise of judgment based on reason), and the disci pline of ac tion (the pursuit of

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hon or able ser vice).64 Here one can learn from the great sev enteenth-cen tury French thinker René Des cartes, whose moral phi los ophy has been de scribed as a form of neo-Stoicism. 65 In his “Discourse on Method,” Descartes writes that the path to hu man hap piness is to be found in the disci plines of Stoic thought. Des- cartes described the “third maxim” of his system of morals as follows: My third maxim was al ways to conquer myself rather than fortune, and to alter my de - sires rather than change the order of the world, and gener ally to ac custom myself to believe that there is noth ing en tirely within our power but our own thoughts: so that af ter we have done our best in re gard to the things that are with out us, our ill-suc cess can not pos si bly be fail ure on our part.66 Al though such an ap proach re quired great self-disci pline and “long ex er cise and medi ta tion often re peated,” in it, concludes Descartes, “is to be found the secret of those philos o phers who, in ancient times, were able to free themselves from the empire of fortune, or de spite suffer ing or poverty, to rival their gods in their hap pi ness.”67 The fifth lesson sug gests that events do not nec es sar ily hurt us, but our views of them can. In this respect, the Sto ics urge the use of reason to ensure cor rect per - ception, since if we cannot always choose our exter nal circum stances, we can al - ways choose how we shall re spond to them. The Stoic view of life as a val iant re sponse to a fate that must be borne is immor tal ized in the poem “Invictus” (In vin cible), writ ten in 1875 by Wil liam Ernest Henley, an Eng lish man who en- dured a lifetime of de bil itat ing illness and infir mity. De spite his great suffer ing, Henley chose to remain undi min ished, and the uncon quer able spirit he rep re - sented is enshrined in the lines of what is re garded by many to day as the person i - fica tion of the Stoic creed:

Out of the night that covers me, Black as the Pit from pole to pole, I thank whatever gods may be For my un con quer able soul.

In the fell clutches of circum stance I have not winced nor cried aloud. Under the bludgeonings of chance My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears Looms but the horror of the shade, And yet the menace of the years Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

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It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punish ment the scroll. I am the mas ter of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.68

Henley’s Captain of the Soul is un flinching and unyield ing, not least in the face of the ul ti mate ad versity—death. Here, we should note the Stoic teaching that death is ev ery one’s fate and should not be un duly feared. As Marcus Aurelius dryly observes, “An unsci en tific but none the less a help ful sup port to disdain of death is to re view those who have clung tena ciously to life.” Simi larly, Seneca writes that because life is brief and per ishable, “ev ery thing must there - fore be borne with forti tude, be cause events do not, as we suppose, happen but ar rive by ap point ment.”69 From a mili tary per spec tive, per haps the ul ti mate Stoic view of how to master the spec tre of death can be found in the works of the for mer World War II combat in fan try man and writer James Jones, the au thor of From Here to Eter nity and The Thin Red Line. Jones has been de scribed as “the Tolstoy of the foot soldiers,” a “mid–twen ti eth century Ameri can stoic, akin to Marcus Aurelius in his long ap prentice ship to war, suffer ing, and the effort to bear it all.”70 De test ing those who, from afar, glo ri fied war, Jones loved the Amer ican fight ing man; his es say “Evolu tion of a Sol dier,” from his 1975 book WW II, is a bracing Stoic text for mil i tary profes sionals fac ing the test of combat. With sear ing hon esty, Jones writes that the most success ful combat soldier makes a “final full ac cep tance of the fact that his name is already writ ten down in the rolls of the already dead”:71 Ev ery com bat sol dier, if he fol lows far enough along the path that began with his in- duction, must, I think, be led inex o rably to that awareness. He must make a compact with him self or with Fate that he is lost. Only then can he function as he ought to function, under fire. He knows and accepts be forehand that he’s dead. . . . That soldier you have walking around there with this awareness in him is the final end prod - uct of the EVO LUTION OF A SOLDIER. 72 Jones ad mits that this is a grim and hard phi los ophy, but he argues that those who ac cept the status of the “liv ing dead” para dox i cally find their fa tal ism vi - brant and life affirm ing, since “the accep tance and the giv ing up of hope cre ate and reinstill hope in a kind of re verse-pro cess photo-neg ative func tion.” In ac - cepting a Stoic doc trine that “suffi cient unto the day is the ex istence thereof,” many soldiers ironi cally increase their chances of battle field effec tive ness and per sonal sur vival. They learn to hate war and yet also to love the drama, ex cite- ment, and comrade ship as aids in over coming the dread of death in combat. Still others learn through expe ri ence to ra tional ize and mas ter war’s harsh purpose and rigor ous demands and make it their lives’ great pro fessional calling. 73 Jones’s https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 14 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 45

per ceptive Sto i cal medi ta tions on how a soldier can re spond to the exter nal cir - cumstances of bat tle, which are be yond his personal control, are among the most re alis tic writ ings ever penned on mod ern war. They rep re sent a time less testament for all those in uniform who seek to be Henley’s Captains of the Soul. A sixth les son upholds the great Stoic truth that char ac ter mat ters more than rep u ta tion. Echoing Charles de Gaulle, Gen eral George C. Mar shall once ob - served those who are called to lead men in bat tle must be judged less on tech ni - cal abil ity than on char ac ter, on a rep uta tion for fair ness, patri otic pur pose, and self less de ter mi na tion.74 A good way of re inforc ing this message is to read Howard Spring’s 1940 novel Fame Is the Spur, the tale of the rise of an ide alis tic Brit ish work ing-class polit i cal leader, Hamer Radshaw, who in pur suit of high office be comes cor rupted, renounc ing ev ery prin ciple he ever espoused and ev - ery person who ever placed faith in him.75 Mak ing a cav alry sa bre his honor sym - bol, he gradu ally allows its blade to lie un used. In a memo rable scene in the 1947 film of Spring’s book, Radshaw at the end of his life, re splendent with accu mu- lated honors and a peerage, tries to draw the sword, only to find that the blade has rusted in its scabbard. The scene is a meta phor of a career in which Radshaw’s soul has rusted in his body and his moral prin ciples have withered in the face of unre lent ing personal ambi tion. 76 A sev enth lesson is that in the Stoic world, ef fec tive lead er ship and good conduct are always de pend ent on a will ing ness to play the role that is as signed. For those who as pire to be mili tary Stoics, mastery of the “three dis ci plines” of desire, assent, and ac tion is all-im por tant.77 At every stage of his mil i tary career, no matter what the personal discom fort, the profes sional of fi cer must seek to be- have correctly. As Epictetus puts it, life is like a play, and “it is your duty to act well the part that is given to you; but to select the part be longs to another.” 78 Par tic u larly rel e vant to the mil i tary pro fes sional is the Stoic’s “dis ci pline of action,” the need for honor able and “ap pro pri ate actions” when serv ing the greater good. A use ful reminder of what can hap pen when such appro pri ate ac - tions are ignored is James Kennaway’s Tunes of Glory, a concise and power ful 1956 study of mil i tary char ac ter.79 Set in an unnamed peace time Scottish High- land regi ment in the early post–Second World War era, the novel ex plores what happens when an act ing bat tal ion com mander re fuses to give his loyalty to an ap pointed suc cessor. The passed-over offi cer, the extro vert Major Jock Sinclair, is an up-from-the-ranks hero of El Alamein whose char is matic war time leader - ship and natu ral aggres sion have in peace time condi tions been re duced to a resi - due of pro fessional soldier ing bolstered by hard drink ing and boorish behav ior mas quer ad ing as manli ness. Sinclair is re placed by a po lar op posite, the culti - vated but sen si tive Lieu ten ant Col o nel Ba sil Bar row, a grad u ate of Eton,

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Sand hurst, and Oxford, a former pris oner of war of the Japa nese and “Spe cial Du ties” of fi cer. In a mixture of aggres sive spirit, hurt pride, and class re sentment, Sinclair re - fuses to accept his loss of command for the good of the reg i ment. The wily Sinclair constantly criti cizes and under mines the new command ing offi cer, and his psy cho log i cal and phys i cal sub ver sions con fuse and di vide the bat tal ion’s offi cers and non com mis sioned of fi cers.80 A court-martial brings a crisis that even - tually implodes into a double tragedy in the form of Bar row’s sui cide and Sinclair’s men tal col lapse from a be lated sense of guilt for the le thal conse - quences of his coarse egocentrism. As a study of mil i tary charac ter, Tunes of Glory is a compel ling reminder of the need for Stoic self-disci pline and of the demands of duty and obli ga tion irre spec tive of indi vid ual feelings. As a study of charac ter, the book can be usefully supple mented by the masterly Brit ish film made un der the same title in 1960.81 An eighth and final Stoic lesson concerns the question of suf fering and where the line of good ness may be found in life. For the mil i tary pro fes sional, suf fer ing is an in es capable part of duty, and here one can do no better than study Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s reflec tions, in his monu men tal The Gulag Ar chi pel ago, on how the col li sion between “the soul and barbed wire” may yet be come a transformative force for good. Solzhenitsyn’s chap ter “The Ascent”—one of the great est pieces of twenti eth-century writing—is about nour ishment of the soul in the midst of despair and hardship. The Russian dissi dent writes of how misfor tune may become the raw mate rial from which the soul “rip ens from suffer ing.”82 In “The Ascent” Solzhenitsyn, de spite years of de hu maniza tion in the So viet prison system, reaches a Stoic conscious ness about the essen tial indi vid ual nature of good and evil and the power of personal rev e lation. 83 He accepts that while it is im pos - si ble to ex pel evil from the world in its en tirety, “it is possi ble to constrict it within each person” by an awaken ing of omni science, from a self-knowl edge of good that is born out of suffer ing:84 It was only when I lay there on the rot ting prison straw that I sensed within my self the first stirrings of good. Grad ually it was dis closed to me that the line sep a rat ing good and evil passes not between states nor between classes nor be tween po lit i cal par ties but right through ev ery hu man heart, through all hu man hearts. . . . Since then I have come to under stand the truth of all the reli gions of the world: They struggle with the evil inside a human being (in side ev ery hu man be ing).85 Prison had nour ished Solzhenitsyn’s soul in the pursuit of vir tue, allow ing him to write, “I turn back to the years of my impris onment and say, some times to the as tonish ment of those about me. . . . Bless you prison, for hav ing been in my life!”86

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Solzhenitsyn’s world is that inhab ited ear lier by other Stoics denied human free dom, includ ing the great Spanish writer Miguel de Cer vantes, Amer ica’s James Stock dale, and South Af rica’s Nel son Mandela. All of these ex traor di nary fig ures un der went a form of Solzhenitsyn’s ascent of the soul and reached Stoic tran scen dence through suf fer ing. Their ex pe ri ences and their sub se quent lives echo Seneca’s wise teaching that “disas ter is virtue’s oppor tu nity,” for true char- acter can never be re vealed without a strug gle with ad versity—just as “gold is tried by fire, brave men [are tested] by mis fortune.” 87 Seven Moral Choices from Stoicism All mem bers of the pro fes sion of arms face a ca reer in which moral choices are in es cap able. Sto icism may as sist in di vid u als in ap ply ing judg ments born out of the culti va tion of good charac ter. The follow ing seven moral choices, all drawn from Western liter a ture and history, are offered as a framework for the moral de - ci sion mak ing of mil i tary pro fes sion als. The first of these choices—de cid ing the kind of mil i tary pro fes sional you want to be—is drawn from Anton Myrer’s 1968 novel Once an Ea gle, about the Amer i - can pro fession of arms between the First World War and the be gin nings of Viet - nam. Al though the setting of the book is firmly Ameri can in style and tone, Myrer’s tale is a univer sal one.88 In it two of fi cer arche types are con trasted. The first arche type is the duti ful and Stoic Sam Damon, a moral warrior and an ex - emplar of all that is best in the profes sion of arms. The second is the Epi cu rean and bril liantly cyni cal career ist Courtney Massengale, an offi cer of many social con nec tions but whose moral compass is as cor rupt as that of Lord Henry Wotton in Oscar Wilde’s The Pic ture of Dorian Gray. Damon and Massengale both rise to be come gener als, but their careers are in stark contrast. The Stoic Damon, a straight-talk ing “mustang” (i.e., up from the ranks) with a bril liant World War I combat re cord, is no match for the silken malice of Massengale, es pe cially in the flick-knife polit i cal world of the U.S. Army staff in Washing ton. As a re sult, over the years Damon, the complete mil i - tary pro fes sional, is per pet u ally out ranked and out ma neu vered by Massengale’s un scru pu lous careerism—a careerism sym bol ized by in sou ci ant charm and great ver bal fa cil ity and pro pelled by an “as ton ish ing in tel lec tual prow ess like some jew eled sword.”89 As Damon’s su perior offi cer dur ing World War II in the Pacific and later in Southeast Asia, Massengale re gards Damon’s re lent less honesty and sin gle- minded mil i tary in tegrity not as oper ational as sets but as obsta cles to his own ad vance ment. Massengale dis misses Damon’s fre quent pro fes sional pro tes ta - tions over his self-seeking command methods as naïve: “Like most strictly combat types he [Damon] lacks polit i cal savoir faire.”90 Myrer’s sprawl ing saga

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be comes a power ful med i tation on the moral choices in volved in mil i tary officership and upon the eter nal dan ger that the un scru pu lous Massengales pose to the honest Damons. Indeed, both the title and tone of the book are taken from Aes chy lus’s fa mous lines:

So in the Libyan fable it is told That once an eagle stricken with a dart, Said, when he saw the fash ion of the shaft, “With our own feath ers, not by others’ hands, Are we now smit ten.”91

The sec ond moral choice that will confront many West ern offi cers in par tic u - lar is the sub stance of officership as a choice between a quest for sta tus and a search for real achieve ment. Here a useful model is the tem pestu ous career of the bril - liant U.S. Air Force colo nel John Boyd—a man whom some observ ers have re - garded as “the Ameri can Sun Tzu,” be cause of his es pousal of maneu ver warfare and the novel “OODA” (ob serve, ori ent, de cide, act) de cision cy cle. Boyd was an iras ci ble and out spo ken in tel lec tual mav er ick whose views were al ways at odds with the U.S. Air Force es tablish ment. Con se quently, his strate gic ideas were un - wel come and re mained lit tle ap pre ci ated dur ing his pro fes sional ca reer.92 To day, in the second de cade of the twenty-first century, those who opposed and impeded Boyd’s ca reer are forgot ten men, while Boyd’s influ ence perme ates ad - vanced mil itary doc trine through out the West. In ret rospect, his dogged pursuit of strate gic inno va tion can now be seen as a monu ment of moral courage, a trib- ute to imagi na tive profes sional perse ver ance, and a salu tary reminder that profes - sional mili tar ies often ne glect their finest minds. Boyd’s spirit of officership is con veyed in his Stoic-like “to be or to do, that is the question,” speech de liv ered to mili tary colleagues and sub ordi nates in the Penta gon in June 1974: You have to make a choice about what kind of per son you are go ing to be. There are two [mili tary] career paths in front of you, and you have to choose which path you will fol low. One path leads to promo tions, titles and posi tions of distinc tions. To achieve success down that path, you have to conduct yourself a certain way. You must go along with the system. . . . The other path leads to doing things that are truly signif i cant for the Air Force, but you may have to cross swords with the party line on occa sion. You can’t go down both paths, you have to choose. Do you want to be a man of distinc tion or do you want to do things that really influ ence the shape of the Air Force? To be or to do, that is the ques tion.93 A third moral choice facing mili tary pro fession als in volves the need to resist the cor ro sive in flu ence on the warrior spirit of bureaucratization. As Charles de Gaulle once wrote, the true combat offi cer must always keep his intel lect fo cused

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on the art of war and re sist the intru sion of bureau cratic poli tics—for only through a dedi cated pur suit of mili tary philos o phy “will an edge be given to the sword.”94 A good ex ample of this moral choice is exem pli fied by Emman uel Wald’s 1992 book The Decline of Israeli Na tional Secu rity since 1967, in which the au thor an a lyzes the con cep tual con fu sion and an a lyt i cal fail ings of the Is raeli of - fi cer corps—con fu sion and fail ings that ar gu ably came to a head during the re - verses suffered in the sec ond Leba non war, in 2006.95 Wald’s book warns that dur ing the 1970s and 1980s the Israeli De fense Force’s much-vaunted op er ational phi loso phy, honed in the 1948, 1956, and 1967 wars against the Arabs, be came cor roded by “a pro cedure of nonstrategy” based on bu reau cratic com pro mise and con for mity.96 Wald quotes Gen eral Israel Tal’s speech at the Israeli National Defense College in April 1979 on how bu reaucratic ar rogance, intrigue, and me dioc rity can combine to de stroy the cre ative imag i - nation that is funda men tal to future gener als: [Israeli] offi cers at the rank of captain or major, naïve and full of youthful enthu si - asm, be lieve they will be judged by their achieve ments. Lack ing bu reau cratic ex peri - ence, they will try to exer cise criti cal and origi nal thought. . . . If these offi cers do not grasp that it is for bidden to damage bureau cratic harmony and coddling they will quickly be dropped from the IDF [Is raeli De fense Force] sys tem which does not tol - erate devi ants. If they are able to last in an organi sa tion which, by its very nature, en- slaves and constrains the thinker, then they will even tually, af ter many years of learning, reach the rank of general. By then, of course, not much can be expected from them in terms of cre ative thinking. 97 A fourth moral choice for those in uniform arises from the prop osi tion that no indi vid ual of charac ter can re main neutral in a moral crisis. Here much can be learned from the 1930s “wilder ness years” of Winston Churchill, dur ing which, in Stoic-like grandeur, he waged a lonely crusade to warn the Brit ish people about the mortal threat that growing Nazi power posed to Western civi li zation. In par tic u lar, Chur chill’s 1948 The Gath er ing Storm is instruc tive, for in this vol - ume of his monu mental history of the Sec ond World War the great statesman docu ments how the liberal democ ra cies of the 1930s lacked es sen tial el ements of char ac ter, per sis tence, and con vic tion in mat ters of in ter na tional se cu rity. West - ern policy toward Hit ler’s Ger many took the form of moral compro mise, based on the pol icy of appease ment. Knowing that this failure of states man ship was to cre ate a war in which the worst “mate rial ruin and moral havoc” in re corded his - tory would be in flicted upon hu manity, Chur chill re flects: It is my pur pose as one who lived and acted in those days to show how eas ily the trag edy of the Sec ond World War could have been pre vented; how the mal ice of the wicked was re in forced by the weak ness of the vir tu ous. . . . We shall see how the

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coun cils of pru dence and re straint may become the prime agents of mor tal dan ger; how the middle course adopted from de sires for safety and a quiet life may be found to lead direct to the bull’s-eye of disas ter. 98 Churchill’s book em bod ies his famous moral les son: “In War: Res olu tion / In De feat: De fiance / In Vic tory: Mag nanim ity / In Peace: Good Will.”99 A fifth choice that re flects Stoic teaching re volves around the neces sity for a mil i tary profes sional always to make the best of adver sity. As Seneca argues, the in- divid ual of good char ac ter will always seek to turn adver sity to advan tage, for “the thing that mat ters is not what you bear but how you bear it.”100 There are in - ter est ing con nec tions be tween Sto icism and Chris tian ity here, as ev i denced in such works as St. Au gus tine’s Con fes sions and Thomas à Kempis’s The Im i ta tion of Christ.101 As men tioned earlier, a Christianized form of Sto icism was dissem i - nated in the sixteenth century by Justus Lipsius, up holding Sen eca’s teaching that “we are born into a kingdom; to obey God is to be free.” In deed, the or i gins of the West ern pro fessional mili tary ethic it self can be traced to Lipsius’s Chris - tian neo-Sto icism and its influ ence over such early mod ern West ern mil itary re - form ers as Maurice of Nassau, Gustavus Adolphus, and Ol iver Crom well.102 Given these con nec tions, the anon y mous “Soldier’s Prayer” from the Amer ican Civil War, found in a mili tary prison in 1865 (and given below as re pro duced by Admi ral Stock dale), re pays read ing as both a Stoic and Chris tian testa ment:

We asked for strength that we might achieve, God made us weak that we might obey. We asked for health that we might do great things He gave us infir mity that we might do better things We asked for riches that we might be happy; We were given poverty that we might be wise. We asked for power that we might have the praise of men; We were given weakness that we might feel the need of God We asked for all things that we might enjoy life; We were given life that we might enjoy all things We re ceived noth ing that we asked for But all that we hoped for And our prayers were answered. We were most blessed.103

The sixth moral choice that mili tary profes sionals need to ponder is whether they are will ing to pay the terri ble price that may be required when choos ing to act out of con science and prin ci ple. No where in re cent mili tary his tory is this better il lus trated than by the Ger man army offi cers who joined the abor tive 20 July 1944 VALKYRIE plot to kill Adolf Hit ler, as re counted by such emi nent his tori ans

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as Sir John Wheeler-Bennett, Pe ter Hoffmann, and Joachim Fest.104 Much in spi- ration can be drawn from the actions of Bri gadier General Henning von Tresckow and Colo nel Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg, who were the noblest spirits behind the 1944 conspir acy to rid Ger many of a crimi nal re gime. Both men came to view Hitler as the Antichrist, the archen emy of both Germany and Western civi li za tion, whose death was a redemp tive neces sity “be fore the eyes of the world and of his tory.”105 Im me di ately fol low ing the fail ure of the as sas si na tion at tempt, von Tresckow prepared to commit suicide with a grenade in order to deny the SS the oppor tu - nity to tor ture him into re vealing the names of other conspir a tors. As this young general and cultured Ger man patriot left his Eastern Front headquar ters on 21 July 1944 to take his own life in no-man’s-land, he turned to his adju tant, Cap- tain Fabian von Schlabrendorff, and said with Stoic poignancy: When, in a few hours, I go be fore God to ac count for what I have done and left un - done, I know I will be able to justify in good conscience what I did in the struggle against Hitler. God promised Abraham that He would not destroy Sodom if just ten righ teous men could be found and I hope God will not de stroy Ger many. None of us can bewail his own death; those who con sented to join our cir cle put on the robe of Nessus. A human being’s moral integ rity be gins when he is prepared to sac ri fice his life for his con vic tions.106 Tresckow’s cou ra geous par tic i pa tion in the doomed 1944 as sas si na tion plot em- bodies Seneca’s famous challenge: “What is the duty of the good man? To offer himself to Fate,” for “good men toil, spend and are spent, and willingly.” 107 A sev enth and final moral choice for mil itary pro fession als concerns the need to sub mit one self to the spirit of en durance . Such a choice re flects the Stoic teaching that true courage rep resents stead fastness of soul, expressed in a deci sion to bear and forbear the storms of life over time and circum stance. In Seneca’s words, “The dem onstra tion of courage can never be gentle. For tune scourges and rends us; we must endure it. It is not cruelty but a contest, and the oftener we submit to it the braver shall we be.”108 Here much wisdom can be gleaned from the writ ings of the philos o phers Ar - is totle and Ar thur Schopenhauer, from the Aus trian psychi atrist and Holo caust sur vivor Viktor E. Frankl, from former Brit ish prime min is ter Gordon Brown, and from the Amer ican war cor re spondent and nov elist Glendon Swarthout.109 In his insight ful re flections on the meaning of courage, Aris totle warns us that true courage differs from audac ity. 110 The latter is counter feit courage; it is based on an “ex cess of in tre pid ity,” on a phys i cal im pul sive ness that rep re sents “a boastful species of bravery and the mere ape of manhood” and may conceal a fun da men tal moral cow ard ice. For Ar is totle, real cour age—par tic u larly in its

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mil i tary man i fes ta tion—is based on a com bi na tion of con fi dence and cau tion, on the capac ity for discriminating thought and clear judgment, and it pre fers “the grace and beauty of a habit ual forti tude.”111 Both Ar thur Schopenhauer and Viktor Frankl ar rive at a sim i lar con clusion on courage as a form of forti tude. In his writ ing on ethics, Schopenhauer de fines courage as “a kind of endur ance.”112 Frankl’s book Man’s Search for Mean ing ech- oes the work of Epictetus, in stat ing that the way one be haves in a situ a tion de - pends more on personal deci sions rather than on imper sonal condi tions. 113 He holds that all faced by physi cal Ethics need to be com plemented by a stron ger dan ger and moral adver sity have focus on phi los ophy that permits the profes - at their dis posal a mas ter key to sional mil i tary to be come fully a self-conscious pick the lock of courage, in the moral com mu nity. form of “the last of human free- doms—[the right] to choose one’s atti tude in any given set of cir cumstances, to choose one’s own way.”114 More re cently, in his Courage: Eight Por traits, Gordon Brown concen trates on courage in the Stoic spirit, not simply as physi cal audac ity but as prolonged expo sure to dan ger and risk in the form of “sus tained al tru ism,” ex hib ited by com mit ted in divid u als as diverse as the British wartime nurse Edith Cavell, the German theo lo gian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and the Bur mese po lit i cal dis si dent Aung San Suu Kyi. Brown quotes ap provingly Churchill’s famous remark that “cour age is the first of all human quali ties be cause it is the quality which guaran tees all the others.” 115 Per haps no where in twen ti eth-cen tury Amer i can mil i tary lit er a ture are Ar is- totle’s dis tinc tion be tween mere au dacity and real cour age, Frankl’s “last of human free doms,” and Brown’s notion of “sus tained altru ism” better illus trated than in Glendon Swarthout’s Pu litzer Prize–nomi nated 1958 novel They Came to Cordura, one of the most insight ful liter ary medi ta tions ever composed on what consti tutes courage under arms.116 Swarthout’s novel is set during the U.S. Army’s abor tive 1916 puni tive expe dition into Mexico to chas tise Pancho Villa and his revo lu tion ar ies. The central fig ure is Major Thomas Thorn, awards of fi - cer of the campaign, who is or dered to escort five caval ry men cited for the Con - gressio nal Medal of Honor across the bar ren desert of Chihua hua to the town of Cordura and safety. As the patrol moves across the stark ter rain, Thorn, a mid dle- aged soldier tortured by the memory of his own sudden failure of nerve in a pre vi - ous mil i tary en gage ment, ponders the qual i ties of the five heroes in his charge, whom he re gards as members of Soc ra tes’s “golden race.”117 The jour ney to Cordura—the town’s name means “courage” in Spanish—be - comes a dark met aphor by which Swarthout ex am ines the char ac ter of courage in wartime. The pa trol is am bushed by Villistas and tor mented by heat, thirst, and https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 22 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 53

adver sity, and the golden met tle of Thorn’s five “heroes” be gins to be tray base quali ties. With the ex ception of Thorn, each man falters un der the strain of prolonged expo sure to danger and risk. Faced by the need to exhibit contin u ous courage, each of the five heroes chooses instead to become a moral coward. It becomes clear that the physi cal gal lantry un der fire that had been demon strated by the five Medal of Honor candi dates had been little more than Aris totle’s “deformed cour - age” of au dac ity, mo men tary ac ci dents in their oth er wise un dis tin guished lives. In the end, Thorn, with classic Stoic forti tude, comes to Cordura—and thus to the meaning of courage—by de liver ing the flawed nomi nees to safety against all odds and, within sight of the town, at the sacri fice of his own life. His journey has seen him discover the reser voirs of an endur ing brav ery that he feared he did not pos - sess—a re aliza tion that al lows him to ful fil a sworn duty to five appar ently cou ra - geous, but in real ity mor ally unwor thy, comrades. 118

LIFE IS BE ING A SOLDIER In contem po rary West ern culture, the teachings of ancient Sto icism may seem re dun dant, but it is not so. In twenty-first-century warfare the instru mental di- mension of the scien tific bat tle space may be impor tant to success, but warfare remains a profoundly human expe ri ence that reflects exis ten tial meaning and re veals both moral agency and char ac ter. We must remem ber that hu man na ture is unchang ing and that it is hubristic of any gen era tion to suggest that it can somehow escape the long shadow cast by his tory. We may not live in the past, but the past lives in the present, and we ig nore its wisdom at our peril. There is a fa - mous say ing (at tributed to Albert Einstein) that is espe cially per ti nent to ad - vanced Western mili tar ies in the new millen nium—“Not ev erything that counts can be counted; and not ev ery thing that can be counted, counts.” As the ancient Stoic think ers teach us, what truly does count is the na ture of life it self as an un ending form of warfare that must be con fronted and mas tered if one is to overcome fortune and fate. While we can never in sulate ourselves from misfor tune, tragedy, or suffer ing, Stoicism, a philos o phy of reso lu tion that spans the ages, seeks to make its adher ents Captains of the Soul, building inner cit adels of char ac ter, ra tional thought, and moral val ues. The Stoic jour ney is one of rigor and self-disci pline; it demands a re gime of constant self-improve ment. It does not promise a life of comfort or ease and one can expect to become only a reason able arche type of the success ful Stoic, since perfect wisdom and complete equa nimity are un reachable ide als. In words that are not for the fainthearted, Epictetus warns of the endur ance re quired from the mas ter Stoic: “Show me a man who though sick is happy, who though in danger is happy, who though dy - ing is happy, who though condemned to exile is happy, and who though in dis re - pute is happy! Show him to me! By the gods, I would then see a Stoic!”119

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Yet for all its as cetic chal lenges and ardu ous demands, a Stoic philos ophy has much to offer to day’s West ern uniformed pro fession als in their pursuit of vivere militare. No where is this truer than in the Stoic teaching that real courage is in it - self endur ance of the hu man spirit. Such courage is based on a re silience in which in di vid u al ity is em bed ded within a larger com mu nity of com rade ship, a unity of self and soci ety that up holds a balance be tween the prin ciples of private ex cel lence and public duty. For these reasons, the Stoic philos o phy bequeathed to us by the Hel lenis tic Age will continue to find new adher ents in the twenty-first century, not least among those who choose the lives of duty, honor, and sac ri fice demanded by the mil i tary call ing. As Epictetus also writes, “Great is the strug gle [of the Stoic life] and di vine the task. The prize is a kingdom, free - dom, seren ity and peace.”120 In many respects, the Stoic ideal recalls the famous injunc tion to the Ithacan wander ers in Tenny son’s poem “Ulysses”—“To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”121 In the Stoic creed, it is always our moral mastery of the testing journey of life that abides. In this sense, Stoicism’s virtues are like the stars in the night sky: they shine high above us, and while we may not al - ways reach them, we are enno bled both by their presence and by their promise.

NOTES

1. See the works of Christo pher Paul, in cluding War,” in The Postmodern Mil itary: Armed The Eth ics of War and Peace: An In troduc tion Forces af ter the Cold War, ed. Moskos, Wil - to Le gal and Moral Is sues (Englewood Cliffs, liams, and Segal (New York: Ox ford Univ. N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1941); also George R. Press, 2000), pp. 1–13. Lucas, Jr., and Paul E. Roush, eds., Eth ics for 5. Ibid., p. 4. Mil i tary Lead ers (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1998); Mar tin L. Cook, The Moral 6. Ibid., p. 5. War rior: Eth ics and Ser vice in the US Mil itary 7. John Allen Williams, “The Postmodern Mili - (Al bany: State Univ. of New York, 2005); and tary Re con sid ered,” in Postmodern Mil i tary, Tim o thy L. Challans, Awak en ing War rior: ed. Moskos, Williams, and Segal, p. 274. Rev o lu tion in the Eth ics of War fare (Albany: 8. Chris to pher Coker, Hu mane War fare State Univ. of New York, 2007). (London: Routledge, 2002), Wag ing War 2. Two useful studies that empha size issues of with out War riors? The Changing Culture of moral charac ter in war and that draw from Mil i tary Con flict (Boul der, Colo.: Lynne clas si cal lit er a ture are Jon a than Shay, Achil les Rienner, 2002), The Fu ture of War: The in Viet nam: Com bat Trauma and the Un do ing Re-en chant ment of War in the Twenty-first of Charac ter (New York: Simon & Schuster, Cen tury (Ox ford, U.K.: Blackwell, 2004), The 1994), and Shan non E. French, The Code of War rior Ethos: Mil itary Cul ture and the War the War rior: Ex plor ing War rior Val ues Past on Ter ror (New York: Routledge, 2007), Eth- and Pres ent (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & ics and War in the 21st Cen tury (London: Littlefield, 2003). Routledge, 2008), and War in an Age of Risk 3. Quoted in John Sellars, Sto icism (Los An geles: (Lon don: Pol ity, 2009). Univ. of Cal i for nia Press, 2007), p. 153. 9. Coker, Wag ing War with out War riors? p. 2, 4. Charles C. Moskos, John Allen Williams, and and Eth ics and War in the 21st Cen tury, pp. Da vid R. Segal, “Armed Forces after the Cold 97, 137. https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 24 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 55

10. Coker, Wag ing War with out War riors? p. 160. 26. James Bond Stock dale, Thoughts of a Philo - 11. Ibid. soph i cal Fighter Pi lot (Stan ford, Calif.: Hoover In sti tu tion, 1995). 12. See Peter Berger, “On the Obso les cence of the Con cept of Honor,” in Re vi sions: Chang - 27. For Stock dale’s role at the U.S. Na val War ing Per spec tives in Moral Phi los o phy, ed. Stan- College see Joseph Gerard Brennan, Founda - ley Hauerwas and Alastair MacIn tyre (Notre tions of Moral Ob li ga tion: The Stock dale Dame, Ind.: Notre Dame Univ. Press, 1983), Course (Novato, Ca lif.: Pre sidio, 1994). For pp. 172–81. Stockdale’s influ ence on Tom Wolfe see A. A. Long, Epictetus: A Stoic and Socratic Guide to 13. Profes sor Akbar S. Ahmed, lecture (Ethics Life (New York: Ox ford Univ. Press, 2002), and Pub lic Pol icy Cen ter, Wash ing ton, D.C., pp. 269–70, 273–74. 10 March 2003, re ported in Wash ing ton Post, 11 March 2003); James Bow man, Honor: A 28. Stock dale, Thoughts of a Philo soph ical Fighter His tory (New York: En coun ter Books, 2007), Pi lot, p. 189. Stock dale’s ap proach to Sto icism esp. part 3, and “Decline of the Honor Cul - is largely drawn from Epictetus. See his es- ture,” Pol icy Re view, no. 156 (Au gust– says, pp. 177–189, 222–37. Sep tem ber 2009), pp. 27–39. 29. Aes chy lus, The Oresteian Tragedy: Aga mem - 14. Bowman, “De cline of the Honor Culture,” non/The Choephori/The Eumenides, trans. pp. 27–39. Philip Vellacot (London: Penguin, 1959), p. 58. For stud ies of Sto icism see Inwood, ed., 15. Coker, Eth ics and War in the 21st Cen tury, p. The Cambridge Com pan ion to the Sto ics; 112. Sellars, Sto icism; and Brennan, Stoic Life. 16. Tad Brennan, The Stoic Life: Emo tions, Du ties Other good general studies include Pierre and Fate (Ox ford, U.K.: Ox ford Univ. Press, Hadot, The In ner Cit a del: The Med i ta tions of 2007), pp. 8–9. Marcus Aurelius (Cam bridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press, 1998); Long, Epictetus; Keith 17. Charles Tay lor, A Sec u lar Age (Cambridge, Sed don, Epictetus’ Hand book and the Tab let of Mass.: Belknap, 2007), pp. 116, 119. Cebes: Guides to Stoic Liv ing (New York: 18. For the legacy of Greek and Roman Stoicism Routledge, 2005); M. Andrew Holowchak, see Brad Inwood, ed., The Cambridge Com- The Stoics: A Guide for the Perplexed (New pan ion to the Sto ics (Cam bridge, U.K.: Cam - York: Contin uum Inter na tional, 2008); and bridge Univ. Press, 2003), esp. pp. 365–92; William B. Irvine, A Guide to the Good Life: Sellars, Sto icism, chap. 6; and Frank McLynn, The An cient Art of Stoic Joy (New York: Ox- Marcus Aurelius: A Life (Phil a del phia: Da ford Univ. Press, 2009). For Sto icism and the Capo, 2009), chap. 19. chal lenge of mod ern phi los o phy see Law- 19. Nancy Sherman, Stoic War riors: The An cient rence C. Becker, A New Sto icism (Princeton, Phi los o phy be hind the Mil i tary Mind (New N.J.: Prince ton Univ. Press, 1998). The case York: Ox ford Univ. Press, 2005), p. 125. for a practi cal course in Sto icism, adapted to mod ern sen si bil i ties, is pre sented by Keith 20. Terri Tanieelian and Lisa H. Jaycox, eds., In - Sed don, Stoic Se ren ity: A Prac tical Course on vis i ble Wounds of War: Psy cho log i cal and Cog - Find ing In ner Peace (Hert ford shire, U.K.: by ni tive In ju ries, Their Con se quences, and author through Lulu, 2008). Ser vices to Re cov ery (Santa Monica, Ca lif.: RAND, 2008). 30. Hadot, In ner Cit a del, esp. chap. 6. 21. Ibid., pp. ix–xx. 31. For dis cus sion of these teach ings see Holowchak, Sto ics, chap. 1; Sellars, Sto icism, 22. H. R. McMaster, “Ancient Les sons for To - chaps. 2 and 5; and Irvine, Guide to the Good day’s Soldiers,” Sur vival 50, no. 4 (Au gust– Life, part 3. Sep tem ber 2008), p. 187. 32. Brennan, Foun da tions of Moral Ob li ga tion, p. 23. Coker, War rior Ethos, p. 103. 2. 24. See Sellars, Sto icism, pp. 1–31. 33. Stock dale, Thoughts of a Philo soph ical Fighter 25. Peter Ryan, “Behind Enemy Lines with Pi lot, pp. 180, 234–36. Stoic eth ics and moral Marcus Aurelius,” Quad rant (April 2010), p. au ton omy are well dis cussed in Long, Epicte - 128. tus, chaps. 7–8.

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34. Epictetus, En chi rid ion, trans. George Long 52. Cicero, “The Dream of Scipio,” in On the (New York: Pro me theus Books, 1991), p. 11. Good Life, trans. Grant, pp. 357–67. See also the pop u lar in ter pre ta tion of 53. Ibid., p. 366. Enchiridion in Sharon Lebell, Epictetus: The Art of Liv ing—the Clas sic Man ual on Vir tue, 54. On this theme see Seddon, Epictetus’ Hand - Hap pi ness, and Ef fec tive ness (San Francisco: book and the Tab let of Cebes, and Stoic Harper, 1995). Se ren ity. 35. Epictetus, En chi rid ion, p. 11, and Sed don, 55. Sen eca, “The Happy Life,” in Hadas, Stoic Epictetus’ Hand book and the Tab let of Cebes, Phi los o phy of Sen eca, pp. 239–47. pp. 14–27. 56. Marcus Aurelius, Med i ta tions, trans. and ed. 36. For a Stoic view of public affairs see Cicero, A. S. L. Farquharson (Lon don: Ev eryman’s On the Good Life, trans. Michael Grant (Lon - Library, 1992), p. 11. don: Folio Soci ety, 2003), es pe cially his es says 57. Cited in Holowchak, Sto ics, pp. 196–97. On Du ties and On the State; L. P. Wilkinson, 58. Marcus Aurelius, Med i ta tions, p. 14. Let ters of Cicero (Lon don: Hutch in son, 1966); Mo ses Hadas, The Stoic Phi los o phy of Sen eca: 59. Ibid., p. 7. Es says and Letters (New York: W. W. Norton, 60. Ibid., p. 33. 1958); and McLynn, Marcus Aurelius. 61. Epictetus, En chi rid ion, p. 13; Sed don, Epic- 37. Epictetus, Dis courses, cited in Seddon, tetus’ Hand book and the Tab let of Cebes, pp. Epictetus’ Hand book and the Tab let of Cebes, 17–18. p. 27. 62. Charles de Gaulle, The Edge of the Sword, 38. For good anal ysis on these points see Stock - trans. Gerard Hopkins (London: Faber and dale, Thoughts of a Philo soph ical Fighter Pilot, Faber, 1960, orig i nally Le fil de l’épée), pp. 22, and Holowchak, Sto ics, pp. 19–28. 40, 42. 39. Hadot, In ner Cit a del, p. 83. 63. Ibid., pp. 39–40, 42–43 [em pha sis orig i nal]. 40. Epictetus, Dis courses, cited in Seddon, 64. For the three disci plines see Seddon, Epic- Epictetus’ Hand book and the Tab let of Cebes, tetus’ Hand book and the Tab let of Cebes; pp. 17–18; Stock dale, Thoughts of a Philo - Long, Epictetus, pp. 14–20; and Hadot, In ner sophi cal Fighter Pi lot, p. 182. Cit a del, chaps. 6–8. 41. Sen eca, “On the Short ness of Life,” in Hadas, 65. Taylor, Sec u lar Age, pp. 130–32. Stoic Phi los o phy of Sen eca, p. 51. 66. See E. S. Haldane and G. R. T. Ross, eds., The 42. Ibid., pp. 55, 59, 68. Philo soph i cal Works of Des cartes (Cambridge, 43. Seneca, “On Provi dence,” in Hadas, Stoic U.K.: Cam bridge Univ. Press, 1931), pp. Phi los o phy of Sen eca, p. 36. 95–97, 290 [em pha sis added]. 44. Ibid., p. 44. 67. Ibid., p. 97. 45. Cited in Sherman, Stoic War riors, p. 101 [em - 68. William Ernest Henley, “Invictus,” cited in pha sis added]. Brennan, Stoic Life, pp. 3–4. 46. Cited in Holowchak, Sto ics, p. 162. 69. Marcus Aurelius, Med i ta tions, p. 26; Seneca, “On Prov i dence,” p. 41. 47. Epictetus, En chi rid ion, p. 19. 70. James R. Giles and J. Michael Lennon, intro - 48. Ibid., p. 21. duc tion to The James Jones Reader: Out stand - 49. See Sherman, Stoic War riors, chap. 7. ing Selec tions from His War Writ ings (New 50. See Michael Grant, “Intro duc tion” in Cicero, York: Birch Lane, 1991), p. 19. On the Good Life, pp. xxvii–xxxi, and Hadas, 71. Ibid., p. 262. Stoic Phi los o phy of Sen eca, pp. 1–26. 72. Ibid. [up percase in origi nal]. 51. See Cicero, “On Duties (II): Service” and 73. Ibid., pp. 262–63. “On Du ties (III): A Prac ti cal Code of Behav - iour,” in On the Good Life, trans. Grant, pp. 74. Gen. George C. Marshall, “The Challenge of 69, 107–108. Command: An Ad dress to the First Of fi cer https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 26 Evans: Captains of the Soul EVANS 57

Candi date School, Fort Benning Georgia, 18 Changed the Art of War (New York: Back Bay Sep tem ber 1942,” in Selected Speeches of Gen- Books, 2002); and Frans P. B. Osinga, Science, eral of the Army, George C. Mar shall, Chief of Strat egy and War: The Stra te gic The ory of John Staff United States Army, ed. H. A. DeWeerd Boyd (New York: Routledge, 2007). (Wash ing ton, D.C.: In fan try Jour nal, 1945), 93. Quoted in James G. Burton, The Pen ta gon pp. 220–21. Wars: Reform ers Challenge the Old Guard 75. Howard Spring, Fame Is the Spur (New York: (Annapolis, Md.: Naval In stitute Press, 1993), Vi king, 1940). p. 37 [em pha sis orig i nal]. 76. Fame Is the Spur, directed by Roy Boulting 94. De Gaulle, Edge of the Sword, p. 14. (Two Cities Films, 1947). Michael Redgrave 95. Em man uel Wald, The Wald Report: The De- appeared as Hamer Radshaw. cline of Is raeli Na tional Se cu rity since 1967 77. See Long, Epictetus, pp. 236–40, and Hadot, (Boul der, Colo.: Westview, 1992). For Is rael’s In ner Cit a del, chaps. 6–8. poor perfor mance in the 2006 Leba non war 78. Epictetus, En chi rid ion, pp. 21–22. and its root causes see Avi Kober, “The Is rael De fense Forces in the Second Leba non War: 79. James Kennaway, Tunes of Glory Why the Poor Perfor mance?” Jour nal of Stra- (Harmondsworth, U.K.: Pen guin Books, te gic Stud ies 1, no. 1 (Febru ary 2008), pp. 1985). 3–40. 80. Ibid. 96. Wald, Wald Report, p. 131. 81. See Tunes of Glory, directed by Ron ald 97. Ibid., pp. 132–33. Neame (Ja nus Films, 1960, in the Cri te rion Collec tion, 2004). Alec Guinness appears as 98. Winston S. Chur chill, The Sec ond World War, Acting Lt. Col. Jock Sinclair and John Mills as vol. 1, The Gath er ing Storm (New York: Pen- Lt. Col. Ba sil Bar row. guin, 2005), p. 16. 82. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “The Ascent,” in The 99. Ibid. Gulag Archi pel ago, 1918–1956 Abridged: An 100. Sen eca, “On Provi dence,” p. 30 [empha sis Ex per i ment in Lit er ary In ves ti ga tion (New added]. York: Harper, 2007), pp. 299–313. See also 101. St. Au gus tine, Con fes sions (Harmondsworth, Ed ward E. Ericson, Jr., and Dan iel J. U.K.: Pen guin, 1961); Thomas à Kempis, Mahoney, eds., The Solzhenitsyn Reader: New The Im i ta tion of Christ (New York: Pocket and Es sen tial Writ ings, 1947–2005, 2nd ed. Li brary, 1961). For dis cus sion of Stoic- (Wilmington, Del.: In ter col le giate Stud ies In - Chris tian connec tions see H. Stanley Da vis, sti tute, 2009), pp. 253–67. Greek and Ro man Sto icism and Some of Its 83. Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Ar chi pel ago, Dis ci ples (Boston: Her bert B. Turner, 1903), 1918–1956 Abridged, pp. 299–314. chap. 8; and McLynn, Marcus Aurelius, chap. 84. Ibid., pp. 311–13. 19. 85. Ibid., p. 312 [em pha sis orig i nal]. 102. Tay lor, Sec u lar Age, pp. 114–15, 118–19. 86. Ibid., p. 313 [em pha sis orig i nal]. 103. Cited in Stockdale, Thoughts of a Philo soph i - cal Fighter Pilot, p. 124. 87. Sen eca, “On Prov i dence,” pp. 37, 42. 104. Sir John Wheeler-Bennett, The Nem e sis of 88. Anton Myrer, Once an Ea gle (Carlisle, Pa.: Power: The Ger man Army in Pol itics, 1918– U.S. Army War College Foun da tion, 1997). 1945 (London: Macmillan, 1953), chap. 7; 89. Ibid., p. 788. Pe ter Hoffmann, The His tory of the Ger man Re sis tance, 1933–1945, trans. Rich ard Barry 90. Ibid., pp. 793–94. (Cam bridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1977), part 9; 91. Ibid., p. xiii. Joachim Fest, Plot ting Hit ler’s Death: The 92. For Boyd’s career and mili tary sig nif icance Ger man Re sis tance to Hit ler, 1933–1945, trans. see Grant T. Hammond, The Mind of War: Bruce Little (London: Phoenix, 1997), chap. John Boyd and Amer ican Se cu rity (Washing - 9. ton, D.C.: Smith so nian In sti tu tion, 2001); 105. Quoted in Fest, Plot ting Hit ler’s Death, p. 173. Rob ert Co ram, Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who

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106. Ibid., pp. 289–90. 114. Ibid., p. 66. 107. Sen eca, “On Prov i dence,” pp. 41–42. 115. Gordon Brown, Cour age: Eight Por traits 108. Ibid., p. 39. (New York: Weinstein Books, 2008), pp. 138, 140. 109. Aris totle, “On Courage,” in Waller R. Newell, What Is a Man? 3,000 Years of Wis dom on the 116. Glendon Swarthout, They Came to Cordura Art of Manly Vir tue (New York: Harper, (Lon don: Secker and War burg, 1974). 2001), pp. 551–52. See also Aris totle, The 117. Ibid., p. 75. Nichomachean Eth ics, trans. H. Rackham 118. Ibid., pp. 214–48. (Cam bridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press for Loeb Clas si cal Li brary, 1934), chaps. 6–7. 119. Epictetus, Dis courses, cited in Holowchak, Sto ics, p. 193. 110. Ar is totle, “On Courage,” p. 551. 120. Epictetus, Dis courses, cited in Seddon, Stoic 111. Ibid. Se ren ity, p. 5. 112. Arthur Schopenhauer, “On Ethics,” in Es says 121. Al fred, Lord Ten ny son, “Ulys ses,” in The Ox- and Aph o risms, trans. R. G. Hollingdale (Lon - ford Li brary of Eng lish Po etry, vol. 3, From don: Pen guin, 1988), p. 135. Dryden to Heaney, ed. John Wain (Oxford, 113. Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Mean ing U.K.: Ox ford Univ. Press, 1987), pp. 85–86. (Boston: Bea con, 2006).

https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/nwc-review/vol64/iss1/4 28 Evans: Captains of the Soul

Dr. Mi chael Evans is the ADC Fel low at the Aus tra lian Defence Col lege in Can berra. He served in the Rhode - sian and Zimbabwean armies and was for merly head of the Aus tra lian Army’s Land War fare Stud ies Cen tre at the Royal Mili tary College of Austra lia, Duntroon. He is widely published in ter na tion ally and most re cently was the lead author of the Austra lian Army’s Land War fare Doc trine 3-0-1, Coun ter in sur gency (Decem - ber 2009). He may be contacted at [email protected] .au.

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