Virgil's masterpiece was entirely a made-up piece of propaganda, but it was bought hook, line, and sinker by the citizens of Rome. In particular, Aeneas' "pieta" (selfless loyalty) became the animating spirit of the Roman Empire as it expanded across the known world.
From Aeneas' lips, via Virgil's pen, we have a saying that has motivated human endeavors more than any other like utterance for the millennia since:
Fortes Fortuna Juvat
Fortune Favors the Brave (or Bold)
The phrase has slipped the lips of men and women of valor in challenging circumstances in every century and on every continent.
Military units across the globe and across the ages have adopted it as their moto and exemplar of their ethos.
Pliny the Elder said it as he ordered his galley across the Bay of Naples under a cloud of Vesuvius' volcanic fallout in a heroic attempt to rescue fellow Romans at Pompeii.
Pliny died shortly thereafter. But that is the point.
The example of Pliny's selfless effort, in the mold of Aeneas, motivated his fellow Romans to greater actions in greater crises thence.
Our Republic currently faces a viral volcano whose fallout threatens to bury every cherished right and privilege for which generations of Americans have placed their very lives at risk.
Fortune favored the actions of the brave men who rallied against British government heavy-handedness in 1775.
Fortune favored the commitment of the brave men who pledged their lives and their sacred honor with signatures on the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
Fortune favored the bold act of General George Washington as he gambled on a newly developed smallpox vaccine for his army in winter camp in 1777.
Let's pause and look in depth at that bold move.
Smallpox was raging in North America at the time of the Revolution. Most of the British soldiers sent to put down the colonial rebellion had already been exposed in Europe and were largely immune. Those on the American continent were not. Washington knew that were smallpox to sweep through his army in the field, the debilitating disease would render it completely ineffective and at the mercy of simple British attack. But, vaccinating against smallpox was considered dangerous and was, dare the Colonel say it, politically incorrect -- the Continental Congress even went so far in their feckless fear as to pass a law forbidding inoculation.
General Washington was mindful that disease (smallpox included) accounted for nine times more casualties than battles in 18th Century warfare. He disregarded Congress' political posturing and boldly embarked on a smallpox inoculation program for his army. Washington had to do it secretly -- his army was within easy striking range of the main British force and if they divined that the rebel army was temporarily incapacitated by the effects of the inoculation, they could stamp out the hope of the rebellion in so far as it depended on Washington's ability to keep an army in the field.
Washington's bold move could have ended disastrously. It was a high risk move. But fortune favored his boldness. In the months ahead, wings of a small, but relatively healthy, Continental Army scored dramatic successes at Saratoga, and exhausted Cornwallis in a chase across the Carolinas. Without the two of which, the climactic, war-ending battle at Yorktown would not have been possible.
In the two and a half centuries since, fortune has favored bold American action in the face of daunting challenges, the recounting of which will no doubt risk the patience of the Colonel's meager readership.
The Colonel isn't praising foolhardy risk-taking -- you know, the kind of carelessness that the comely and kind-hearted Miss Brenda reminds him to avoid every time he leaves the house, and for good reason. No, the key to fortunate outcomes is calculated risk.
Sun Tzu said it best: "Know your enemy and know yourself: in a hundred battles you will not be in peril."
Knowledge, therefore, is the indispensable foundation.
Not feelings...
Not popular belief or majority opinion...
Knowledge
In any endeavor, if you prepare with study and arm yourself with truth, you will decidedly shift the probability of positive outcome in your favor.
While a foundation of knowledge -- of the factors bearing on the situation and of one's own capabilities -- is foundational, there is the grasp of another intangible on which fortune smiles:
Morale
Napoleon's equation is instructive: "In war, the moral is to the physical as ten is to one."
Nowhere in the history is the multiplying effect of cohesive morale, and bold leadership more evident that at the 334 B.C. Battle of the Granicus River.
When Phillip of Macedon, the king of a resurgent Greek empire, died, his son Alexander inherited the throne and, with it, Phillip's goal of invading and subduing long-time adversary Persia.
It was a daunting goal. The Persian Empire was far larger, wealthier, and accomplished than Macedon.
But, Alexander, barely into his twenties, had quickly consolidated his father's recently-won empire -- quickly subduing rebellious Greek provinces -- and in the process had begun to develop an aura of personal invincibility. Alexander led from the front; his weapons often drawing first blood.
And, with his elite shock-troop body-guard, the 300-man Companion Cavalry, as his fiercely loyal and exemplary spearhead, Alexander's battlefield exploits were often the decisive action. Morale in his army was ascendant.
When Alexander crossed the Hellespont (the strait separating Greece and Asia Minor) in 334 B.C., the Persian forces in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) adopted a strategy of exhausting the Greek army until well-defensible terrain could be used to halt and destroy Alexander's invasion force. That terrain feature was the Granicus River.
When Alexander arrived on the south bank of the Granicus after a rapid and exhausting 60 - mile march, the young warrior king found his adversary guarding the north bank. The Persian commander calculated, quite reasonably, that if the Greeks attempted to cross the river the attackers could be cut down as they climbed the Granicus' steep banks on the Persian side.
Alexander's senior generals counseled caution. They advised Alexander to seek another, less well-defended, crossing. It was sound advice.
But Alexander had prepared himself mentally, and his army physically, for just this opportunity.
The odds were against him. The Persian army far outnumbered his own, and was arrayed in a commanding defensive position. Alexander's forces needed rest.
Alexander, however, knew that he possessed key intangible strengths vis-a-vis the Persians.
First, Alexander's army was far more cohesive. Morale springs from cohesion -- the bond between brothers-in-arms -- and, morale rises to leadership by example.
The army facing Alexander was a polyglot of units drawn from across the Persian empire. A large component of the Persian force was actually a Greek mercenary outfit.
Alexander knew his enemy. He knew his own capabilities. And, he knew the high spirit of his army -- embodied by his own personal example.
Alexander immediately attacked.
It seems a rash action, taken almost without pause upon his arrival at the Granicus. But, Alexander calculated the risk of immediate action against that of delaying, and saw the intangible blow to Persian morale going forward were his Greeks triumphant in this first contact.
While Alexander and his Companion Cavalry stood on the right flank of his army, a Greek feint against the Persian right drew attention and forces to meet it. Alexander then led his spearhead splashing across the river and crashing into the Persian center.
The melee that followed was brutal, but the high morale of Alexander's men, and Alexander's bold leadership, prevailed against the greater numbers of the enemy.
What do the historical examples of Washington's and Alexander's risk-taking mean to our Republic today? Well, our Republic's future success depends, in the Colonel's not-so humble opinion, on the level of risk adversity that our people allow to creep into their souls.
The men and women who immigrated to our continent's shores, and then subdued and settled its breadth, were masters of the calculated risk. The safe bet would have been to remain in their countries of origin. Further, the far less risky course of action for the new Americans would have been to remain huddled in the relative safety of enclaves east of the Appalachians.
But, our ancestors calculated the risk against the potential reward and attacked across their "Granicus."
Our ancestors accepted the risks of inoculation and defeated smallpox, typhus, yellow fever, and polio, even as many of their fellows counseled caution and peddled fear.
Our ancestors stood up to some of the greatest war machines in history -- Great Britain (twice), Germany (twice), Japan, the Soviet Union, to name but a few -- even as many of their fellow Americans counseled appeasement and accommodation.
The Colonel is at the point of his life where his mortality is felt more and more keenly with every waking. There's not much left in the tank for physical combat. But, he will never stop exhorting his fellow Americans to seize on the example of their forebears and adopt the motto:
Fortune Favors the Bold!
