More Thoughts on the Navy

Chap has a good post up drawing some similarities between the apparent ritualistic reciting of their Creed that the Navy engages in and, as he puts it, "socialist tyrannies and militaristic corporate monocultures." Ritualistically reciting a creed every morning in formation completely misses the point of what a creed (or whatever you want to call it) is for. It should be a jumping off point, not an end into itself. The reason I like the Airman's Creed so much is that it doesn't get bogged down in parochial crap or bullshit bingo. Summed up, it says that we're Airmen in the finest Air Force on the face of the planet, we've got a proud heritage, we put our lives on the line for our country, we'll never leave an airman behind, and we won't fail. Period. End of story. No talk of "diversity" or "dignity."

More importantly, we don't recite it every day mindlessly. It's used as a training tool. You'll notice that the video in my previous post was taken at a BMT graduation down at Lackland. I experienced it at Field Training. Training environments are the only place this should be used. It teaches and reinforces the above listed points and provides a springboard to discuss some of the "proud heritage" it references. What proud heritage? SJS has a post describing some on the Navy side, while I've detailed in the past a few examples from the Air Force's heritage. I'll add one more: Air Commando One, Heinie Aderholt.

If what you're doing doesn't have some application towards the pointy end of the spear, where the metal meets the meat, you should seriously rethink whether you should be doing it in the first place.