(January 18, 2016 at 9:56 am)Brian37 Wrote:(January 18, 2016 at 9:41 am)Gawdzilla Wrote: "No courage without fear." If you aren't worried about dying that's not courage, that's stupidity. I got shot at a lot in the Navy, mostly early '70s, and I never stopped being scared. Despite that I did my job and that's what helped me survive. (That and a lot of luck.)
If anybody says they were in combat and weren't afraid they're lying, insane, or stupid.
I am glad we have people who can do that. But would you think it wrong to admit you don't have that? I don't have that. You wouldn't want me next to you on the battlefield, I would get you killed.
I have nothing against people who don't want to get killed, I'm one of them. The thing that kept me alive was years of training before I saw combat, thanks to a neighbor who was a veteran. Without his help I don't know how I would have reacted to my first fire fight. And I had new troops who just weren't meant to be on the pointy end, and I arranged for them to find a job they were better suited for, without rancor. We kept the men who were able to fight and moved along those who weren't. I never called them cowards, I called them "smarter than me."
The rational reaction to danger is to be try to be where it isn't dangerous. Nothing wrong with that.
