"The state that separates its scholars from its warriors will have its thinking done by cowards and it’s fighting done by fools.”
Your post made me think about this great guy.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/s ... /20070404/
Paul Workman, CTV News South Asia Bureau Chief, CTV News
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan -- I'm sure it makes absolutely no difference to Lt.-Gen. Andrew Leslie whether Canada rents or buys a new fleet of tanks, just as long as the antiques his troops are now using get replaced. He calls them "big iron monsters," and the idea of a young tank crew roasting to death in 65-degree heat should be enough to shame any government.
So, on a day when no less than three cabinet ministers were visiting the troops in Afghanistan, the 49-year-old general offered the most persuasive argument yet for replacing Canada's old Leopard tanks with something new and air-conditioned.
I'm not going to lose soldiers, he said.
It's maybe something his grandfather would have said. Or both his grandfathers. Or perhaps his father. All of them were military men with distinguished careers in the Canadian army. In fact, "distinguished" doesn't nearly describe the pedigree of Lt.-Gen. Andrew Brooke Leslie, CMM, MSC, MSM, CD, (try pinning that on your chest) and today "Chief of the Land Staff." Or, in everyday words, head of the army.
One of his grandfathers was Gen. Andrew McNaughton, often described as the "father of the Canadian army," or better still, as "Canada's most prominent soldier of the 20th century." McNaughton was a gunner in the First World War, led Canadian forces into World War II, and later served as Minister of Defence.
His other grandfather was Brooke Claxton, who as an artillery officer during the First World War was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal and also went on to serve as a Minister of Defence and later as Canada's first Minister of National Health and Welfare.
Leslie's father, Col. "Teddy" McNaughton, commanded the Royal Canadian Horse Artillery in Korea, where according to his biography, he legally changed his surname name to "Leslie," to comply with the terms of an inheritance. (There must be a good story there.)
Both grandfathers fought at Vimy Ridge, and that's where the third-generation McNaughton-Leslie will be when Canada marks the 90th anniversary of the battle, considered a defining moment in the country's history.
"After Remembrance Day, this is it," he says, "in terms of the importance to us as an army, in terms of the emotion it generates.
"Just about every regiment that's in the Canadian order of battle fought there, and had people who died."
He's a very eloquent, impressive soldier who, to be head of the army at 49, has climbed the ladder quickly. Driven by heritage? Duty?
Family honour? Probably all of that since the lineage includes a strong sense of Canadian nationalism and a worthy obligation to serve the country.
"I was a private for about a month," he says, before moving up the ranks in a dozen different places and positions. France, where he took French Army commando training; field tours in Germany and Cyprus; as a brigade commander in the former Yugoslavia, and now as head of the army. Along the way he picked up a couple of master's degrees and is working on his doctorate. Now that's driven.
"He's been a mover," says an officer in Afghanistan. "One of the chosen. The troops like him and people are very impressed with him.
"And he looks like a kid."
The general is based in Ottawa, but makes a couple of trips a year to Afghanistan. Usually he gets a bunch of soldiers together and listens to their complaints. And if you doubt his conviction, listen to this.
"Afghanistan is a 20-year venture. There are things worth fighting for. There are things worth dying for. There are things worth killing for," he says.
For the journalists who met him in Kandahar, he left a swath of good quotes, and showed remarkable patience with our often-simple questions. We're not used to that. One of my colleagues thanked him effusively for his time.
It's obvious he believes deeply in the Afghan mission and says it has changed the Canadian army, something I've heard others say.
"Afghanistan is changing the army's culture, because for the first time you've got people within the same organization working on the diplomatic front, working with the police and the Afghan National Army, doing their combat duty. So this is the most advanced stage of complex missions you could possibly imagine."
"And" -- now here's the punch line -- "our nation is remarkably good at it."
The pedigree shows.
