Remembering Admiral Stockdale
James Stockdale has died. He gave the commencement address the year I graduated at St. John's College.I'm sad to say that, as I was deeply apolitical at that point in my life, I didn't pay much attention. And consequently had no idea who he was or why he was invited to speak at St. John's except that he was friend's with our new college president. Of course, at the time being a vague squishy liberal, I'm not sure how impressed I would have been with all of those military citations. Although I imagine the fact that he remembered and utilized Epictetus during his wartime prison confinement as a way to fight against the North Vietnamese would have made a lasting impression.
The Navy once sent [Adm. Stockdale] to Stanford University; he later said that from a philosophy course there, he learned of Epictetus, the crippled former slave whose motto has been given as "bear and forbear."...
On Sept. 9, 1965, his A-4 fighter-bomber was hit by antiaircraft fire, and he ejected over a small coastal village. A beating on the ground broke his left knee. It was broken again in prison, and he never regained its full use. In prison, he was tortured and suffered other injuries. He was placed in leg irons for two years and held in solitary confinement for four....
In prison, Adm. Stockdale recalled these words of Epictetus: "Lameness is an impediment to the leg but not to the will."
I remeber my sophomore year philosophy teacher saying of Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius that Stoicism was a philosophy that made sense only if one existed at the extreme of slave or emperor. As prisoner of war to the North Vietnamese, Adm. Stockdale fulfilled these conditions, with an existence as mean as any slave of the Romans.
When Adm. Stockdale later ran on the ticket with Perot, it was my sister, not myself, who remembered that he gave my commencement address and pointed this out to me with a certain amount of irony. By then, I was political.
His wartime career speaks for itself.
Citation:
For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty while senior naval officer in the Prisoner of War camps of North Vietnam. Recognized by his captors as the leader in the Prisoners' of War resistance to interrogation and in their refusal to participate in propaganda exploitation, Rear Adm. Stockdale was singled out for interrogation and attendant torture after he was detected in a covert communications attempt. Sensing the start of another purge, and aware that his earlier efforts at self disfiguration to dissuade his captors from exploiting him for propaganda purposes had resulted in cruel and agonizing punishment, Rear Adm. Stockdale resolved to make himself a symbol of resistance regardless of personal sacrifice. He deliberately inflicted a near-mortal wound to his person in order to convince his captors of his willingness to give up his life rather than capitulate. He was subsequently discovered and revived by the North Vietnamese who, convinced of his indomitable spirit, abated in their employment of excessive harassment and torture toward all of the Prisoners of War. By his heroic action, at great peril to himself, he earned the everlasting gratitude of his fellow prisoners and of his country. Rear Adm. Stockdale's valiant leadership and extraordinary courage in a hostile environment sustain and enhance the finest traditions of the U.S. Naval Service.
posted by Alcibiades @ 9:28 AM
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