Usuario:Canaan9801/Taller

General Westmoreland, general Groves, invitados distinguidos, y señores del cuerpo. Mientras yo salía del hotel esta maña, un portero me preguntó, "A donde va, general?", y cuando repliqué, "West Point," él comentó, "un lugar hermoso, usted ha estado alli?"

Ningun ser humano podría fallar ser cambiado profundamente por un tributo como este, de una profesión que he servido por tanto tiempo y de un pueblo que he amado tanto. Me llena con una emoción que no puedo expresar. Pero este premio no es destinado a honrar una personalidad, sino a simbolizar un gran código moral-- el código de conducta y caballería de los que guardan esta amada tierra de cultura y antigua ascendencia. Eso es el significado de este medallón. Para todos los ojos y todo el tiempo, es una expresión de la ética del soldado americano. Que yo soy integrado de esta manera con un ideal tan noble despierta un sentido de orgullo y aún de humildad que será conmigo siempre.

"Deber," "Honor," "Pais"-- estas tres palabras sagradas dictan reverentemente lo que debéis ser, lo que podéis ser, lo que seréis. Estas son vuestros puntos de encuentro para generar coraje cuando el coraje parece fracasar, para reganar la fe cuando parece haber poca causa para la fe, para crear la esperanza cuando la esperanza se pone desesperada.

Desafortunadamente, yo poseo ni esa elocuencia de dicción, ni esa poesía de imaginación, ni esa brillantez de metáforo para deciros todo que significan.

Los incrédulos dirán que no son sino palabras, sino un lema, sino una frase extravagante. Cada pedante, cada demogo, cada cínico, cada fariseo, cada alborotador, y, lo digo con dolor, unos otros de un carácter totalmente distinto, intentarán degradarlas aún hasta la burla y el redículo.

Pero estas son unas de las cosas que ellas hacen. Construyen vuestro carácter básico. Los moldean para vuestros papeles futuros como los guardianes de la defensa de la nación. Los hacen bastante fuerte para saber cuando sois débiles, y bastante valiente para enfrentaros cuando tenéis miedo.

Os enseñan a ser orgullosos y inflexibles en el fracaso honesto, pero humildes y suaves en el éxito; a no sustituir palabras por acción, a no buscar el sendero de confort, pero a enfrentar el estrés y estímulo de dificultad y retos; a aprender a estar de pie en la tempestad, pero tener compasión para los que fracasan; para dominaros antes de buscar a dominar a otros; a tener un corazón que es limpio, un objetivo alto; a aprender a reíros, pero no olivdar cómo llorar; a extenderos hacia el futuro, pero nunca descuidar el pasado; a ser serios, pero nunca considerarse demasiado seriamente; a ser modestos para que recordéis la sincillez de la verdadera grandeza; la mente abierta de la verdadera sabiduría; la mansedumbre de la verdadera fortaleza.

Estas os dan un temple de la voluntad, una calidad de la imaginación, un vigor de las emociones, una frescora de las fuentes profundas de la vida, un predominio temperamental de coraje sobre la timidez, un apetito de aventura sobre el amor de facilidad. Crean en vuestro corazón el sentido de asombro, la esperanza inquebrantable de lo que siga, y la alegría y inspiración de vida. Os tocan de esta manera para ser un oficial y un caballero.

Y cual tipo de soldados son los que vais a guiar? Son fiables? Son valientes? Son capables de la victoria?

Su cuenta es conocida por todos de vosotros. Es la cuente del hombre americano en armas. Mi estimación de él fue formado en los campos de batalla hace muchos, muchos años, y nunca ha cambiado. Lo consideré entonces, como lo hago ahora, como uno de los carácteres más nobles del mundo; no solo como uno de los cáracteres militares más excelentes, pero también como uno de los más inoxidables.

Su nombre y fama son el derecho de nacimiento de cada ciudadano americano. En su juventud y fortaleza, su amor y lealtad, él dio toda que mortalidad puede dar. Necesita ningún elogio de mí, ni de cualquier otro hombre. Ha escrito su propia historia y lo ha escrito en rojo en el pecho de su enemigo.

Pero cuando pienso en su paciencia bajo la adversidad, de su coraje bajo el fuego, y de su modestía en la victoria, soy lleno con una emoción de admiración que no puedo expresar en palabras. Ese hombre pertenece a la historia como proveer uno de los más grandes ejemplos del patriotismo exitoso. Pertenece a la posteridad como instructor de generaciones futuras en los principios de la libertad. Perteneces al presente, a nosotros, por sus virtudes y por sus logros.

En veinte campañas, en cien campos de batalla, alrededor de mil fogatas, he presenciado esa fortaleza duradera, esa abnegación patriotica, y esta determinación invencible In twenty campaigns, on a hundred battlefields, around a thousand campfires, I have witnessed that enduring fortitude, that patriotic self-abnegation, and that invincible determination which have carved his statue in the hearts of his people.

From one end of the world to the other, he has drained deep the chalice of courage. As I listened to those songs of the glee club, in memory's eye I could see those staggering columns of the First World War, bending under soggy packs on many a weary march, from dripping dusk to drizzling dawn, slogging ankle deep through mire of shell-pocked roads; to form grimly for the attack, blue-lipped, covered with sludge and mud, chilled by the wind and rain, driving home to their objective, and for many, to the judgment seat of God.

I do not know the dignity of their birth, but I do know the glory of their death. They died unquestioning, uncomplaining, with faith in their hearts, and on their lips the hope that we would go on to victory. Always for them: Duty, Honor, Country. Always their blood, and sweat, and tears, as they saw the way and the light.

And twenty years after, on the other side of the globe, against the filth of dirty foxholes, the stench of ghostly trenches, the slime of dripping dugouts, those boiling suns of the relentless heat, those torrential rains of devastating storms, the loneliness and utter desolation of jungle trails, the bitterness of long separation of those they loved and cherished, the deadly pestilence of tropic disease, the horror of stricken areas of war.

Their resolute and determined defense, their swift and sure attack, their indomitable purpose, their complete and decisive victory - always victory, always through the bloody haze of their last reverberating shot, the vision of gaunt, ghastly men, reverently following your password of Duty, Honor, Country.

The code which those words perpetuate embraces the highest moral laws and will stand the test of any ethics or philosophies ever promulgated for the uplift of mankind. Its requirements are for the things that are right, and its restraints are from the things that are wrong. The soldier, above all other men, is required to practice the greatest act of religious training—sacrifice. In battle and in the face of danger and death, he discloses those divine attributes which his Maker gave when he created man in his own image. No physical courage and no brute instinct can take the place of the Divine help which alone can sustain him. However horrible the incidents of war may be, the soldier who is called upon to offer and to give his life for his country, is the noblest development of mankind.

You now face a new world, a world of change. The thrust into outer space of the satellite, spheres and missiles marked the beginning of another epoch in the long story of mankind—the chapter of the space age. In the five or more billions of years the scientists tell us it has taken to form the earth, in the three or more billion years of development of the human race, there has never been a greater, a more abrupt or staggering evolution. We deal now not with things of this world alone, but with the illimitable distances and as yet unfathomed mysteries of the universe. We are reaching out for a new and boundless frontier. We speak in strange terms: of harnessing the cosmic energy; of making winds and tides work for us; of creating unheard synthetic materials to supplement or even replace our old standard basics; of purifying sea water for our drink; of mining ocean floors for new fields of wealth and food; of disease preventatives to expand life into the hundred of years; of controlling the weather for a more equitable distribution of heat and cold, of rain and shine; of space ships to the moon; of the primary target in war, no longer limited to the armed forces of an enemy, but instead to include his civil populations; of ultimate conflict between a united human race and the sinister forces of some other planetary galaxy; of such dreams and fantasies as to make life the most exciting of all time.

And through all this welter of change and development your mission remains fixed, determined, inviolable. It is to win our wars. Everything else in your professional career is but corollary to this vital dedication. All other public purpose, all other public projects, all other public needs, great or small, will find others for their accomplishments; but you are the ones who are trained to fight.

Yours is the profession of arms, the will to win, the sure knowledge that in war there is no substitute for victory, that if you lose, the Nation will be destroyed, that the very obsession of your public service must be Duty, Honor, Country.

Others will debate the controversial issues, national and international, which divide men's minds. But serene, calm, aloof, you stand as the Nation's war guardians, as its lifeguards from the raging tides of international conflict, as its gladiators in the arena of battle. For a century and a half you have defended, guarded and protected its hallowed traditions of liberty and freedom, of right and justice.

Let civilian voices argue the merits or demerits of our processes of government. Whether our strength is being sapped by deficit financing indulged in too long, by federal paternalism grown too mighty, by power groups grown too arrogant, by politics grown too corrupt, by crime grown too rampant, by morals grown too low, by taxes grown too high, by extremists grown too violent; whether our personal liberties are as firm and complete as they should be.

These great national problems are not for your professional participation or military solution. Your guidepost stands out like a tenfold beacon in the night: Duty, Honor, Country.

You are the leaven which binds together the entire fabric of our national system of defense. From your ranks come the great captains who hold the Nation's destiny in their hands the moment the war tocsin sounds.

The long gray line has never failed us. Were you to do so, a million ghosts in olive drab, in brown khaki, in blue and gray, would rise from their white crosses, thundering those magic words: Duty, Honor, Country.

This does not mean that you are warmongers. On the contrary, the soldier above all other people prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war. But always in our ears ring the ominous words of Plato, that wisest of all philosophers: "Only the dead have seen the end of war."

The shadows are lengthening for me. The twilight is here. My days of old have vanished - tone and tints. They have gone glimmering through the dreams of things that were. Their memory is one of wondrous beauty, watered by tears and coaxed and caressed by the smiles of yesterday. I listen then, but with thirsty ear, for the witching melody of faint bugles blowing reveille, of far drums beating the long roll.

In my dreams I hear again the crash of guns, the rattle of musketry, the strange, mournful mutter of the battlefield. But in the evening of my memory I come back to West Point. Always there echoes and re-echoes: Duty, Honor, Country.

Today marks my final roll call with you. But I want you to know that when I cross the river, my last conscious thoughts will be of the Corps, and the Corps, and the Corps.

I bid you farewell.