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Article: H.D.S. GreenwayNo more troops to Afghanistan
- Article from:
- The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)
- Article date:
- September 22, 2009
CopyrightCopyright 2009 The Boston Globe. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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ON AN AUTUMN night in 1415, in their anxiety-filled camp on the
"vasty fields of France," the English waited for the dawn that would
bring them to battle at Agincourt "upon St. Crispin's day."
The king's generals feared they could not win without more
troops. Shakespeare has the earl of Westmoreland say: "O that we now
had here/ But one ten thousand of those men in England/ That do no
work today!"
But Henry V answers: "No my fair cousin . . . God's will I pray
thee, wish not one man more."
The king, in the most memorable call to war in all literature,
says he does not want his "happy few," his "band of brothers," to
have to share the glory, but the truth was he hadn't more troops to
spare.
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