Tipping points.
Stand your ground! Don't fire unless fired upon! But if they want to have a war, let it begin here!
Captain John Parker's orders to his troops. Like many good quotes, probably apocryphal - but part of the mythos, regardless, and captures the spirit of the restive residents of Massachusetts.
BY the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set to-day a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, song composed for and sung on
the raising of the Minuteman Statue at Concord Bridge, April 19, 1836.
As the sun rises, Sgt. Phillip Chang, from the Alaska Army National Guard, patrols the outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan... some 200-odd years later, who'd have thought a Guardsman named Chang, from Alaska, would be conducting patrols in Afghanistan.
And yes, there are many Founding Fathers who would not approve, on several levels. As there are those that would.
Seeing CAPT H in the commentary, it moves me to add... '...and, while in Afghanistan, working under the command of a (hock, ptui!) Tory General!
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