ON WAR, CAMELS AND LAND ROVERS

The following was forwarded to me this morning in an email with the tag line 'Thought provoking'. My thoughts follow the message.

THE FOUNDER OF DUBAI, SHEIK RASHID, WAS ASKED ABOUT THE FUTURE OF

HIS COUNTRY, AND HE REPLIED, "MY GRANDFATHER RODE A CAMEL, MY FATHER

RODE A CAMEL, I RIDE A MERCEDES, MY SON RIDES A LAND ROVER, AND MY

GRANDSON IS GOING TO RIDE A LAND ROVER...BUT MY GREAT-GRANDSON IS

GOING TO HAVE TO RIDE A CAMEL AGAIN.

WHY IS THAT, HE WAS ASKED? AND HIS REPLY WAS, "HARD TIMES CREATE

STRONG MEN, STRONG MEN CREATE EASY TIMES. EASY TIMES CREATE WEAK

MEN, WEAK MEN CREATE DIFFICULT TIMES. MANY WILL NOT UNDERSTAND IT, BUT

YOU HAVE TO RAISE WARRIORS, NOT PARASITES."

AND ADD TO THAT THE HISTORICAL REALITY THAT ALL GREAT EMPIRES...THE

PERSIANS, THE TROJANS, THE EGYPTIANS, THE GREEKS, THE ROMANS, AND IN

LATER YEARS, THE BRITISH... ALL ROSE AND PERISHED WITHIN 240 YEARS.

THEY WERE NOT CONQUERED BY EXTERNAL ENEMIES; THEY ROTTED FROM

WITHIN.

AMERICA HAS NOW PASSED THAT 240 YEAR MARK, AND THE ROT IS STARTING

TO BE VISIBLE AND IS ACCELERATING. WE ARE PAST THE MERCEDES AND LAND

ROVER YEARS....THE CAMELS ARE ON THE HORIZON.

THE GREATEST GENERATION CONSISTED OF 18 YEAR OLD KIDS STORMING THE

BEACHES AT NORMANDY.

AND NOW, TWO GENERATIONS LATER, SOME 18-YEAR-OLD KIDS WANT TO HIDE

IN SAFE ROOMS WHEN THEY HEAR WORDS THAT HURT THEIR FEELINGS. THEY

ALSO WANT FREE STUFF FROM THE GOVERNMENT BECAUSE THEY THINK THEY

ARE ENTITLED TO IT.

THE "CAMELS ARE ON THE HORIZON" FOR SURE. SOMETHING TO PONDER?

HISTORY HAS A WAY OF REPEATING ITSELF.

I did find it thought provoking. While I agree with the Sheik’s statement that weak men create difficult times, the rest gave me pause. I don’t believe it’s being a parasite if one falls on hard times and needs a hand up, or that it creates parasites to give someone a hand up when it's needed. Or that it's easy times that create weak men. Some of the strongest people have emerged from hardships they've needed help to survive, and some of the most beneficial human inventions have been because the creators had peace, time, and the means to work on their inventions. Weak men have existed in every society and every generation from the beginning of time. Nor do I think the greatest generation was kids storming the beaches at Normandy.

When I was a teenager I asked four different veterans why they went to war. Three of them said, ‘for the adventure’. One said, ‘to get a paycheck to support my family’. None said, ‘to defend our freedoms’. The three who went for adventure all said it wasn’t the kind of adventure they expected, which left me wondering. What kind of adventure does one expect when they are shooting real bullets at someone else, and being shot at, or bombed? How many cowboy movies would one have to have watched, and seen the hero live to fight the bad guys in the next movie, and sucked that in as reality, to believe war could be an adventure? It boggles my mind.