Posted by
Old Bill on Sunday, August 10, 2008 7:26:42 PM
Nothing is more important than WORLD PEACE; therefore, the Olympics cannot possibly make any more important contribution to mankind than by promoting WORLD PEACE. This would be a noble goal, and one which I'm sure everyone would say they supported, and can probably be conned into contributing money toward, if they have any left over after contributing to Al Gore to buy carbon credits for the cash-deprived who can't afford to buy their own carbon credits.
It would also be in keeping with the original spirit of the Olympics ever since they were established back in 776 BC--oops, that's 776 'BCE' (Befor Common Era) not 'BC' (Befor Christ)--must use the politically correct term, mustn't we? As you know, every year, during the Panhellenic Games, of which the Olympics were one part, the Greeks called a nation-wide truce during which all war ceased, befor, during, and after the games, in order to allow the games not only to occur, but in order to allow athletes, spectators, merchants and promoters to travel safely to and from the games. This way, everybody could make out.
Not only was it a welcome respite from bloodshed and pillage, but it allowed the entrepeneurs to make some windfall profits which were no doubt sorely needed to pay taxes and allow governments all over Greece to finance armies and graft. The more things change, the more they remain the same, nicht wahr? We moderns have failed utterly to force our governments to respect this ancient principle of the Athletic Truce, and it's time we started doing so.
For a start, we could insist that Al Quaeda cancel all terror bombings and beheadings during the Olympic Games, and for the week preceeding and following the games, just to show their repect for the principle of the Athletic Truce and good sportsmanship. As a further display of good will and good sportsmanship, and to prove their appreciation of PEACE AND GOODWILL, the Palestine Liberation Organization and its core terrorist group, Al Fatah, could apologize for the 1972 massacre of 11 Israeli Jewish Olympic athletes and several German policemen during the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Germany.
We peace-loving people of planet Earth could go further by calling on the Taliban to abandon their policy of banning soccer and other recreational sports as 'incompatible with the Koran' (a position rejected by most Islamic scholars in nearly all Islamic sects, but enforced with ruthless brutality by the Taliban when they ruled over the 25 million human beings in Afghanistan, befor those human beings were liberated by the armed fighting men of the United States of America and a few of our allies, such as the British and Canadians). During the Taliban rule in Afghanistan, the Kabul soccer stadium was used only for mass entertainments, such as public beheadings and the stoning to death of people convicted of adultery or homosexuality.
The Olympic and other Panhellenic Games were used by the various Greek city-states as a venue to display the might and prowess of their athletes and thus, of their fighting men in general, in hopes of inspiring among their neighbors and enemies a healthy respect for their physical attributes and martial abilities, in the hopes that sufficient prestige might deter some fools from launching a war--the theory being, "Don't mess with the best, or you'll die like the rest!" Not a bad idea, and one which still works, if you can get people to pay attention.
The schedule of events in the original Olympics was devised precisely to enable the Greek city-states to impress each other with their military power, compare their own military skills with their neighbors--always a subject of great interest to war-planners---and encourage the soldiery to train when they weren't actually at war. Thus, the events centered around track and field: various races of various distances, because as somebody once said "War is running, both in attack and defense--when you can no longer run, you're all dead men!". The climax of these running events was the quarter-mile in full battle panoply--a full suit of armor, plus shield, spear, sword and dagger, thus duplicating what was expected of every hoplite (armored warrior) at the command "Charge!" If a quarter-mile sprint sounds easy to you, try it in this get-up sometime, in a Greek summer.
Also on the card were the horse-races, both mounted modern-style, and the ever-popular chariot race. Needless to say, these were directly taken from the syllabus of military manuevers, and the chariot race in particular was nearly as deadly on the track as on the battlefield; many a charioteer wound up crippled or dead.
Next were the field events, and these were exclusively battle-inspired. Jumping and vaulting were military skills of absolute necessity, as a soldier had to be able to, well, jump or vault over any obstacle on the battlefield, whether a stone wall, wooden fence, spike-filled ditch, flaming barricade, or simply a pile of dead bodies and crippled horses. You never know what you'll find on the battlefield, but it's always nasty and has to be traversed swiftly.
Then there were the throwing events: discus, shot, 'hammer' (actually ball-and-chain), sometimes a literal hammer, and of course the javelin. The discus is an elegant weapon, capable of reaching a greater range than even the javelin, and suitable for launching in tight spaces, unlike the ball-and-chain, which facilitates use by masses of throwers in formation. Since it tends to fly aerodynamically it usually hits edge-on, maximizing the damage to the victim. A well-thrown dicus could take a man's head right off his body, even if he was wearing a helmet, and of course would do as well for an arm or even a leg. The shot had less range, but would batter a man wearing heavy armor, breaking his bones even if it failed to penetrate the armor, the ball-and-chain and hammer naturally did the same, and the javelin was capable of penetrating more armor than any other weapon a man could carry, even penetrating through a shield and breastplate and still skewering a man through the chest and out the back. I've never read of archery being included in the Olympics, but I can't believe there weren't archery contests as well; how could the descendents of Ulysses fail to honor the bow, the most intelligent killing device ever created by man?
And of course, the games concluded with the hand-to-hand events: boxing, wrestling, and my personal favorite, pankration (meaning, of course, 'all weapons'--i.e., no-holds-barred). The boxing contests were fought with brutal wooden or metal scales laced to the knuckles to make each blow potentially deadly, not to mention skin-ripping agony. Contests were concluded when someone couldn't get up. Pankration permitted striking and grappling both. Wrestling may or may not have been limited to the 'Greco-Roman' style of grappling, with holds limited to above-the-waist. Wrestlers and pankraters were permitted to tap out when they couldn't take the pain of a hold, but don't think of these guys as sissies like you and me.
The records tell of one wrestler who got ahold of his opponent's leg on the ground, and was busy breaking his ankle, when the opponent threw an arm around his throat and squeezed; they both struggled like this for some time, until finally the one whose leg was trapped tapped out. Since they were the finalists, his opponent was the victor not merely in the match, but the Olympic Champion. Unfortunately, the defeated man (whose ankle was broken) had crushed the winners windpipe; in a matter of minutes, he suffocated, choking to death on his own blood. Still, his opponent had tapped out, and he had won. They put the traditional victor's laurel wreath on his brow, and carried his corpse on a stretcher around the stadium to the victor's platform where it was displayed to the cheers of the crowd. Now, I'm not advocating a return to gladiatorial combat--human life deserves more respect than that--but this gives you an idea of the nature of the contests that caused the Greeks to cancel their wars for the Olympics. Remember: Olympic athletes were not amateurs, they were mostly professional athletes who made a living from competing and teaching, and they were also soldiers on leave, every one--as every Greek man, of whatever age, was considered a reserve soldier bound to be called up in the event of war; all except the Spartans, of course, who were on active duty all their adult life.
Now, some modern Olympic events still offer the opportunity to deter warmongers and aggressors by demonstrating military prowess. George S. Patton, e.g., trained to compete in the modern pentathlon, an event meant to test the skills of a military courier of the 19th century: cross-country running, swimming, horse-riding, fencing, and pistol shooting. While an admirable beginning, this is simply not enough, and in any event is a little passe. The fencing skill tested is classic european sabre fencing, and the modern soldier is unlikely to possess such a weapon on the battlefield. He would be far more likely to find himself forced to fight with a knife or club, were he to run out of ammunition.
Of course, as Patton observed, it would be shameful to allow any skill created by the human race to be totally lost--an argument he used to justify the study of military equitage, itself a combat skill of once-immense value, still taught and preserved by the Spanish Riding Academy of Vienna. But Patton would have also loved to see the introduction of some of the more modern martial skills which he himself mastered into Olympic competition.
Thus, shooting compettion ought not be limited to free-style rifle shooting, trap & skeet shotgunning, and small-bore free-pistol shooting. We ought to demand the inclusion of more combat-oriented shooting competition of the types at which warriors in general, and we Americans in particular, have traditionally excelled, such as quick-draw combat pistol shooting with large-bore combat pistols; long-range high-power rifle shooting at concealed and moving targets, such as are found on the battlefield (this has been done for decades in military matches such as those conducted by NATO--the LeClerc Matches and others); and competition with submachineguns and automatic rifles which have become popular in America over the last three decades. Also, of course, competition with the vehicle-mounted machinegun and tank cannon, as well as races over long, rough courses driven by all kinds of military vehicles including tanks, armored troop carriers, scout cars, and motorcycles.
The Baja 1000 is a wonderful example of this type of racing, as is the Baker-to-Vegas cross-country motorcycle race; we just need to add some categories for tracked and armored vehicles. My father and uncles trained under Gen. Patton at the Desert Warfare Center in the Mojave Desert in 1942, and I'm sure they would have preferred facing off against German teams there, in peacetime, for a trophy, rather than in the North African Desert in deadly earnest, as they wound up doing in 1943. Perhaps the Germans wouldn't have been so quick to start a war if they had been beaten by Americans not merely in footraces and boxing (remember Jesse Owens and Joe Louis ?) but in such events as cross-country tankmanship and target shooting with the heavy machinegun from a moving tank (a skill at which my uncle excelled, and which Gen. Patton considered even more important than long-range cannon gunnery).
Well, I could go on and on, but you get the idea. Sports are fun, and fun has its place, but sports can also contribute mightily to the preservation of WORLD PEACE by constantly reminding the worlds' would-be bullies that they aren't the only people who can fight. The Greek hoplites would never have wasted their time with ping-pong.