{"id":1345,"date":"2009-10-07T00:25:23","date_gmt":"2009-10-07T07:25:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/?p=1345"},"modified":"2009-11-21T21:17:38","modified_gmt":"2009-11-22T05:17:38","slug":"us-navy-a-global-force-for-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2009\/10\/07\/us-navy-a-global-force-for-good\/","title":{"rendered":"US Navy: A Global Force for Good"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over the years, the military services have tried a variety of public relations campaigns and recruiting slogans to draw attention and volunteers.\u00a0 Some have withstood the test of time (“Be all\u00a0you can be.”), and others were barely acknowledged (“Be part of the action,” which, ironically enough, was a recruiting slogan for the Coast Guard).<\/p>\n

The person at the Pentagon responsible for hitting send<\/em> on a service’s new slogan is almost deserving of pity; he will never please everyone, and there will always be staunch and cynical critics.\u00a0 Even the most recent Air Force slogan change (“Above all.”) was vilified by some<\/a> for its similarity to the German Uber Alles<\/em>.<\/p>\n

With that background, the US Navy is no longer “Accelerate your life.”\u00a0 It is now\u00a0“America’s Navy: A global force for good.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to the Navy Times<\/a>, the Navy’s motivation for the change\u00a0is admirable:<\/p>\n

The Navy\u2019s strategy is to change its appeal from young people\u2019s immediate self-interest \u2014 enlist and you\u2019ll get a good job, or go to college when you get out \u2014 to appealing to a higher sense of service.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(The intent to emphasize selfless service aligns with the potentially embarrassing release<\/a> of a slide show that shows the Navy calling the current generation, among other things, “narcissistic praise junkies.”)<\/p>\n

Without a doubt, the US military does provide an enormous amount of positive impact to the world, including humanitarian relief in response to global crises and the achievement of peace and security.\u00a0 The strategic\u00a0aims of the United States, as executed by its military–fostering democracy, securing human liberties, etc.–are indeed noble.\u00a0 While (officially) considering the\u00a0US military to be\u00a0a “force for good” is a new concept, perhaps it is a paradigm that would center the worldview of its members (in this case, of the US Navy) in a positive way, particularly given the widely publicized ethical lapses of the past few years.<\/p>\n

The slogan may eventually\u00a0have its own share of controversy.\u00a0 After all, for a military force to be “for good,” it must inherently oppose that which is evil.\u00a0 Applying\u00a0such terms to government institutions and military actions (like the war formerly known as the Global War on Terror) has been heavily criticized in recent years.<\/p>\n

Still, despite the criticisms (and despite the occasional highly-publicized\u00a0failings) it is hard to dispute\u00a0that the US Navy–indeed, the US military and even the United States as a country–is a “global force for good.”<\/p>\n

That selfless nature–the desire to serve, defend, and help our fellow man–encapsulates the American culture.\u00a0 That culture makes us proud to be Americans–and proud to serve in\u00a0America’s armed forces.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Over the years, the military services have tried a variety of public relations campaigns and recruiting slogans to draw attention and volunteers.\u00a0 Some have withstood the test of time (“Be all\u00a0you can be.”), and others were barely acknowledged (“Be part of the action,” which, ironically enough, was a recruiting slogan for the Coast Guard). The person at the Pentagon responsible […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[19,2,63,45,40],"class_list":["post-1345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fighter-pilot","tag-government","tag-military","tag-pentagon","tag-politics","tag-tradition"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1345"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1345\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}