Sledge was instructed during basic training that if fighting "Japs," he should "kick him [a Japanese soldier] in the balls before he kicks you in yours," and was counseled that knives were especially effective fighting the Japanese because of their underhanded tactics. (18) The Japanese enemies were seen as less ethical and more desperate combatants than the Germans, because of their kamikaze warplane tactics. The idea of the Germans

E.B Sledge starts with his marine training in company K. in the 3D battalion in the 5th regiment of the 1st Marine Division. The memoir is based on two horrific battles which ultimately destroyed the Division. The initial one of these battles was fought at Peleliu. There were over 8769 Americans killed, wounded or missing in action in 10 weeks of battle. Almost the whole enemy garrison on the

Old Breed In real war, soldiers have been ripped from their families, surviving, sometimes barely, in foreign surroundings. The author of With the Old Breed repeatedly states he "just wanted to survive," (p. 186), which underscores the fact that cinematic versions of war often overplay the elements of honor and pride and downplay the more real, mundane, everyday feelings and experiences. In fact, Sledge notes that he did not want to

These men represented a number of virtues and standards that were in accordance with those core, basic elements of humanity that the war threatened. The affection that the author feels for the old breed, in their attempts to help him and others ultimately win their own personal wars against debauchery, are alluded to in the following quotation. War is brutish, inglorious, and a terrible waste. Combat leaves an indelible mark

Those officials who did look at the question of Japanese intentions decided that Japan would never attack, because to do so would be irrational. Yet what might seem irrational to one country may seem perfectly logical to another country that has different goals, values, and traditions. (Kessler 98) The failures apparent in the onset of World War II and during the course of the war led indirectly to the creation

One exception to this is Pausanias, a Greek writer. He recorded the quarrying done in Greece but he lived in the second century a.D. For other details, the information related to their architecture is limited to the writings of Vitruvius, an architect in Rome, also a military engineer and a writer who lived during the rule of Augustus (Masrgary, 1957; Derry and Williams, 1961). The Greek construction inherits its glory