general douglas macarthur duty honor country

From your ranks come the great captains who hold the nation’s destiny in their hands the moment the war tocsin sounds. You are the leaven which binds together the entire fabric of our national system of defense. For a century and a half you have defended, guarded, and protected its hallowed traditions of liberty and freedom, of right and justice. . . . 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-guardian, as its lifeguard from the raging tides of international conflict, as its gladiator in the arena of battle. From one end of the world to the other he has drained deep the chalice of courage. . . . In 20 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.

He belongs to the present, to us, by his virtues and by his achievements. He belongs to posterity as the instructor of future generations in the principles of liberty and freedom.

He belongs to history as furnishing one of the greatest examples of successful patriotism.

But when I think of his patience under adversity, of his courage under fire, and of his modesty in victory, I am filled with an emotion of admiration I cannot put into words. He has written his own history and written it in red on his enemy’s breast. Needs no eulogy from me or from any other man.

General douglas macarthur duty honor country