2nd Massachusetts Co. A After Action/Pictures

[F. L. Villarreal]

http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k96/flvillarreal85/afteractpic_zpso6ane5qm.jpg

This post is to be used for non recruiting purposes. Officers and NCOs will be posting after action reports and images on this thread. The 2nd Massachusetts takes pride in its appearance, bearing, and desire to fight while maintaining discipline and the highest of moral values. Feel free to browse in comment if you are not a member of our company!

http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k96/flvillarreal85/handsig_zpsmjbnrqrv.jpg

[F. L. Villarreal]

Photo by: Cpl Franklin


http://i86.photobucket.com/albums/k96/flvillarreal85/2ndmassscreen_zpsto1fjpl6.jpg

[Crazywolf]

Last night we had a pretty good turn-out for our afternoon muster. Rigorous drill, and firing exercises were conducted with much success. Watching our training were a couple randoms who we promptly invited (Get in formation you milk drinkers) for our casual training session. (Much suffering ensued).
Drill went off perfectly, the men learned quick and were very eager to be part of the unit demonstrations. Wanting to test their mettle 2nd MA Co.A marched to Antietam to further broaden their training in a trial by combat, the dead littered the field of battle on this fenced road. Union forces desperately grasped at straws hoping the Confederates had a weakness in their line. In a last ditch effort the 2nd MA Co.A was called upon to turn the tide of battle, and that they did. As the Confederate force eagerly overwhelmed the Union skirmish line, the 2nd MA, unseen by the enemy, was quickly moving up their flank. The carnage that followed could only be described as a flurry of glistening red bayonets chorused by Confederate screams of pain and distraught. Picking my way through the wounded I received a dispatch from a courier stating that the Confederate forces were swept completely off the field taking so many casualties that their dead could not be recovered.

Honorably, 1SG. Crazywolf

7085 7086 7087708870897090

[F. L. Villarreal]

Your report is received. I expected nothing less from you and the men of company A.

[F. L. Villarreal]

Gentlemen,

This is a read that I encourage you all to study and try to internally identify. Without a warrior ethos you have no purpose and no morality if you decide to take up arms against another human being.

Here is an excerpt from a Marine Corps Association article on a gentleman by the name of Stephen Pressfield, he is author of "The Warrior Ethos".

"The warrior ethos is a code of conduct, Pressfield writes, that embodies a life where integrity, loyalty, honor, and selflessness, and courage are one’s guide. Starting thousands of years ago with the hunters, these concepts evolved into the warrior societies where protection for the tribe was best achieved as a group working together. The rudimentary laws arising from the successful tribes evolved into the warrior ethos practiced by the Spartans and others where courage, cooperation, and acknowledging the strength of the group over that of the individual, enabled the tribe or the nation to survive.

At that point in history, the ability to fight was of paramount importance, he notes. Tribes and nations prospered or were conquered by the strength of the warrior culture existing within a warrior society – a far cry from today when the military is just a tiny fragment of a civilian society. But as Philip of Macedon, Alexander the Great, Xerxes, and others marched into history as they fought their way across the Mediterranean and Central Asia, civilization was spread as conquerors and conquered traded goods, took wives, and exchanged ideas.

This sort of intermingling led to the Indian warrior epic “Bhagavad-Gita” expanding the warrior ethos to a loftier plane - from the war against one’s neighbor to an internal struggle to reach one’s better nature as Arunja, the Gita’s hero, battles against enemies whose names can be translated as greed, sloth, and selfishness – all moral weaknesses that must be overcome.

It’s that need to test oneself against both physical and moral adversity, coupled with the blunt Spartan courage in the face of overwhelming odds, Pressfield believes, that gives us the warrior ethos of today. But despite the military component of society being increasingly marginalized in the West, young men and women still flock to recruiting stations to challenge themselves and see how well they perform under adverse conditions.

Pressfield writes “each of us struggles every day to define and defend our sense of purpose and integrity, to justify our existence…to understand, if only within our own hearts, who we are and what we believe in.” This struggle might be Fallujah for a chosen few, or working the night shift for others. “The Warrior Ethos” does not provide a definitive answer as to what makes someone a warrior, but is rather a conversation guide to the warrior ethos. A most thought-provoking book, imagine the conversations it will start amongst those Marines on the midnight watch in Helmand and elsewhere in the world talking with their brother warriors."

My question to the men of the 2nd Massachusetts is this, in your opinion what's the difference between a warrior with an ethos and a mercenary?