Too Fat to Fight
By Jon E. Dougherty (07/04/05)
It seems that, more than 60 years after the first Battle of the Bulge, American forces are fighting it again. Only this time, the enemy isn't a battle-hardened and re-invigorated German Army.
It's Ronald McDonald.
Americans have been told for years now they are losing the battle of the bulging waistline. Too many of us lead fast-food lives while engaging in too little physical exercise to keep the empty calories off. As a result, incidents of adult-onset diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and all of the other diseases associated with these have risen dramatically.
Now the military is sounding a new alarm because "Generation X" is also too fat too fight.
"Nearly 2 out of 10 men and 4 out of 10 women of recruiting age weigh too much to be eligible, a record number for that age group," The Associated Press reported this week. "This is quickly becoming a national security issue for us. The pool of recruits is becoming smaller," said Col. Gaston Bathalon, an Army nutrition expert.
At a time when the global war on terror is making a casualty of the military's recruiting efforts, the last thing the armed services needed was an even smaller recruiting pool, made that way by the, er, increased size of potential volunteers.
But why worry about such things? After all, even though most of our military branches are having trouble meeting their recruitment quotas, there will always be enough volunteers to meet our nation's national security demands under the current operational tempo, right? Iraq will eventually be pacified and Afghanistan is still manageable, so all in all, things will work out, won't they?
Well, let's hope so.
But consider this: What if a new crisis arises somewhere else – Iran, North Korea, or Taiwan, for instance – and the nation finds itself needing to draft large numbers of men to fight. Skinny and fat will be drafted just the same, but how much longer will it take to the fatties into some semblance of condition – the kind of conditioning that will keep them alive (presumably by turning them into smaller targets)?
The current "shape" of our potential fighting force mirrors our society in general, and it's not a pretty picture. But this isn't about having that bikini body or fitting into your favorite pair of jeans. It's about a nation that is, quite literally, "unfit" to defend itself. And that's serious business.
Boot camp isn't some just some sadistic ritual of initiation. It is designed to create physical fitness optimal for the unimaginable rigors of combat. It is designed to enhance a soldier's survivability. Fat boys and girls who have poor conditioning won't live long in combat.
Look at it this way. When the enemy kills more of you than you of him, you lose battles.
Then you lose the war.
Then you lose your country.
Our fast-paced, fast food, high-carb, low-nutrition society has created a generation of softees whom we must depend upon for our survival.
What's more, I'm not sure what can be done to reverse the trend. Success such as ours breeds sedentary lifestyles and after a generation of such excess, it may be impossible to pull back from the abyss.
So, I'm going to do the only thing I can. I'll keep going to the gym, because I don't ever want to be too fat to fight.
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