In days of yor it used to be that 'cream-faced loons' and indebted red-faced drunkards would look for an escape route from their hum-drum ordinary existances, take upon themselves a shiny-buttoned red coat, new breeches, puttees, pith helmet and a shillin' from His/Her Majesty and, after some puffing and panting during a few weeks of basic training, would with gun in hand begin to exercise some foreign (mis-) adventure. And, lo and behold, a bloomin' great empire was built upon the backs of those that undertook such foolish and vainglorious exploits.
The British Empire came about largely through a succession of fortunate accidents, as have all empires before (a characteristic no doubt also true for the future). Growing from individual, often minor, expeditions that seemed like jolly good ideas at the time, each of the bits of the map that turned pink came about as the result of Whitehall initiative, skill and diplomacy (such that it was), a run of near-run things and good luck (akin, at times, to the fortunate throwing of dice) and the stinking sweat and laboured tobacco-flavoured breaths in the thin red lines of bellicose, filthy-mouthed Tommy Atkins (and his nautical cousin, the syphilitic Jolly Jack Tar).
Capitalising on the weaknesses of others is nothing new, but the skill of the British to get a feel of the situation, divide and conquer, set up new trading posts for the free exchanges of products from the rest of that worldwide empire, to build churches and bungalows, to rule 'somewhat beneficently' (sometimes worse, but oft-times better than the hitherto native landed classes) meant that for more than 100 years the Children of Britannia and Hibernia and Caledonia were able to proudly take charge of these new estates albeit with the grumbling, reticent obedience of thems that looked down the barrels of their loaded Lee Enfields -safety catch off!
Of course, once the wars/arrangements for conquest/administrative oversight were won, those with their paid fingers on the triggers were then expected to man the barracks, keep safe the watch, patrol the borders and, having done some sort of 'duty', return to their homes, their wives and families, their pubs and their precarious futures. In the mean time, training kept them disciplined and to see out their tour a 'nice little earner' on the side could very often be found, be that in sparkly gems or luscious fabrics or in handsome trophies from the battlefield. Many of their fallen red-jacketed pals, of course, still lie all over the world and on all continents (bar the cold southern one -the Isle of Wight). The last great hurrah of empire, between 1939-1945, produced a magnificent crop of sorry memorials to their kind, the unfortunate 20th-century tommies that gave in to bullet, bugs and cruelty. I have wept deep bitter tears at the sight of the ranks of headstones at the Commonwealth War Cemeteries in Kanchanaburi that commemorates those servicemen killed building the imperial Japanese Army's Burma railway. Politics aside, these blokes all enjoyed a pint down the pub like everyone else, but their loves and dreams, memories and even their bodies are now all gone. All that is left are their names. Some were only 17.
So where are the tommies now? Kipling's wonderful homage to their kind is a museum piece -a bit like this Roger Moore Youtube clip here. Even those currently active in the armed forces know little of the life of these chaps who really left not knowing whence or even if they'd ever again see the White Cliffs of Dover and home. Life's just too precious now and the Health & Safety Executive even extends a forbidding grasp over things done in the name of the Queen. That's not to say that they don't get hurt or killed, but it's a different world out there and technology reigns where once pluck and guile alone may have outwitted the dastardly foe. It's a strange creature now that opts for the army. Guardians of the realm they may be, but the adventurers life is no more -it's a profession. The last time a spot of adventurism was last seen in the British Army was in Operation Palliser in Sierra Leone where instead of merely evacuating British and EU civilians from a war zone, Brigadier Richards took it upon himself to take the fight to the rebels and ended the civil war on behalf of the government.
The tommies are still out there, still pasty white, still drunken and in debt, still doing unspeakable things to poor innocent natives. But their chance for an exciting life away from the shores of Blighty need not involve receiving a uniform and a weapon in order to do so (although the stereotypical stag weekend t-shirt may suggest otherwise). Instead, if they've got the money, their victorious expeditionary exploits are now on the Laotian rafts of the Mekong where they battle the dealer to find the cheapest drugs and overcome three days and nights of red-bull enforced sleeplessness. Their war trophies are the semi-exotic Beer Chang sleeveless t-shirts and over-sized tattoos of Chinese dragons. They're very much still a bellicose and probably syphilitic lot and the air is blue with pointless expletives, but there's little point of their visit other than sheer self-indulgence, the cheap beers and even cheaper lays. These are naughty children without a mummy or daddy, a monarch, a sergeant major or even a God on Sunday to reign their excesses.
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