Hold The Line

SecDef Mattis was visiting Jordan, and a mixed group of US troops "ambushed" him with an impromptu school circle. Somebody had a cellphone cam handy...

"Well done to you...it's good to see you all out here, young men and women. For those of you who I haven't met, my name's Mattis; I work at the Department of Defense, obviously. Good to see you there...

Thanks for being out here, okay. I know at times you wonder if any of us know. And you get promoted after a while you're so remote that you get out of touch with those of you who matter. But believe me I know you're far from home, every one of you. I know you could all be going to college, you young people, or you could be back on the block...just grateful. The only way this great big experiment that you and I call America is gonna survive is we've got tough hombres like you.

You remember, some of you are too young, Cpl. Long, but on 9/11, we racked up against an enemy that thought if he hurt us, he could scare us. But we don't frickin' scare. That's the bottom line. We'll go out here, we'll fight alongside our friends and allies, and we're gonna keep right on fightin' until they're sick of us, and leave us alone.

You're buying time; you're a great example to our country right now; it's got some problems, you know it, and I know it. It's got problems we don't have in the military.
You just hold the line, my fine young soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines. You just hold the line, until our country gets back to understanding and respecting each another, and showing it, being friendly to one another, that Americans owe to one another. We're so doggone lucky to be Americans, and we've got two powers. The power of inspiration - and we'll get the power of inspiration back; and we have the power of intimidation, and that's you if someone wants to screw with our families and our country or our allies.

So thanks so much for being out here; you complete took me by surprise, I'm off in Lalaland having a group here...that's good, keep the old guys like me guessing. The only reason I came back - I flunked retirement - the only reason I came back is to serve alongside young people like you who are so selfless, and frankly so rambunctious. It's a pleasure to be around you all.

Take care of each other out here - we call them in the Naval phrase "take care of your shipmates" out here, okay - take care of each other. It can get old, it can get hot, you can get sloppy, and you can get complacent; don't let it happen.

Oorah! Thank you. Thanks all of you. Listen to your NCOs now. So long."

Just spitballing, but I'll bet dollars to donuts that no DoD assbag, service secretary, or SecDef himself in the last 8 years, ever got the kind of spontaneous cheers from anyone when they showed up or left anyplace they went that SecDef Mattis gets just by walking up to a group of bottom-ranking service members.

We've got a navy that can't sail without crashing, a boondoggle airplane that can't fly for shit, and a sack of generals and admirals that aren't worth the bullets it'd take to line 'em up against a wall like they deserve.

But our rank-and-file troops, despite over a decade of grinding and senseless war, and nearly a decade of ruinous social experimentation, is going to be just fine.

You can take that to the bank. God help the fools that dare them to prove it.

Fuckin' A right!