The Terrible Toll of Close Combat: Fact and Myth from Xenophon to Fallujah to the X-Box

"Close Combat" is the direct, violent encounter of troops at short range. Commanders, historians, and politicians may view grand elements of strategy, logistics or tactical maneuver to assess armed conflict. But in close combat, soldiers on that "thin red line" face a rapidly narrowing set of possibilities as terrain, time and distance are focused to a point of brutal action. Psychologically this is the vanishing point of legal, moral, and religious proscriptions that have guided life to that point where, it is said, the soldiers becomes "transparent": all that one is or hoped or dreamt can be abruptly extinguished en toto. In this course we will examine the sociobiological, medical, psychological, and legal aspects of close combat: including the systematic preconditioning of soldiers for killing, the fraternal social milieu of the small combat unit and the impact on survivors who need to deconstruct that conditioning and social bond. We will examine first-hand descriptions of close combat, through memoir, literature, congressional testimony, and guest speakers. The perspective will be that of the long history of youth facing the bleeding edge of battle and the recent ambiguous implications of "remote" and "virtual" combat. Course will include preparatory excerpted reading, short didactics, occasional guest speakers for half the sessions and group discussion of session topics / student presentations for the latter half. The student will be expected to write a short paper on each of two topics from a list of prompts.