Thanks to zenpundit for posting this. Scott has put together a great little blog and website related to all things Boyd. And you gotta love the title! So definitely put this on your RSS reader if you are interested in following this stuff and I will put the site on my blog roll. –Matt
Welcome to the To Be or To Do Website and Blog!
January 25, 2012
This website and much of my work was inspired by John Boyd’s professional life-example, his “to be or to do” challenge, and his thoughts on teamwork. However I have included principles that do not apply to Boyd and drawn conclusions that Boyd may well have disagreed with. As I’ve told friends and colleagues, I have taken Boyd’s scaffold, or outline, if you will, and introduced my ideas and experiences. This is the substance of my forthcoming book, To Be or To Do and of my service to clients.
The core of the To Be or To Do material is based on five attributes that exemplified John Boyd’s professional life, plus two. The core Boydian attributes, or principles, are:
-Honesty
-Courage
-Curiosity
-Conviction
-Persistence
No doubt, others could find other laudable attributes, but these principles seemed to define the man for me. The two “extras” are:
-Humility
-Optimism
By most accounts Boyd was not a particularly humble man, nor optimistic, however I’ve included because I’ve seen the power of these two attributes up close. My late grandfather, Robert F. Shipman, was the most humble man I’ve ever known, and I’m pretty sure he’d be disappointed if I didn’t include humility as an essential principle by which to live. My late mother-in-law, Janet Turney Mulvaney, PhD, succumbed to breast cancer after an eight-year battle. She attributed part of her longevity to “optimism” and impressed upon me that optimism was a key part of a life well lived. On both counts, I agree.
Hat tip to Mark over at Zenpundit. I am always on the lookout for interesting war related artwork, and I think this stuff definitely qualifies. Al Farrow has been doing these types of sculptures for awhile and they are very involved and intricate. As you can see, these sculptures are made out of bone, bullets, guns, artillery shells, etc., and Al explains where he is going with all of these pieces in the video below.
In his first exhibition in Washington, DC, Al Farrow presents welded metal sculptures of religious structures, which are composed entirely of gun parts, bullets, artillery shells, and human bone. The works form striking commentaries on the militarism embedded in the histories of the three major religions. Farrows Christian reliquaries (in a series ironically titled The Trigger Finger of Santo Guerro) and exact-scale replicas of a Jewish synagogue and a Moslem mosque are based on historical models for which Farrow assembles appropriated gun parts symbolically related to the three religions.
The plate is very unique and if you go to his website, you will see a bunch of different plates he made that have defense themes. Stuff like Men With Uzis, B2 Bomber, and Nuclear Submarines. lol
Also, if you check out that video you will see that the gallery is also displaying Shepard Fairey’s stuff (famous for the Obama campaign posters)
I also put up a couple pieces to give you an idea of the detail and intricacies of his stuff. Check it out. -Matt
Thanks to Mark from Zenpundit for the heads up about this book. Steven Pressfield is an outstanding author and he even has a novel on the Commandant of the Marine Corp’s reading list called Gates of Fire. The book is also taught at West Point, Annapolis, the Marine Corps Basic School at Quantico, the Virginia Military Institute and at Brophy College Preparatory.(I am sure there are others) So when an author gets that much respect for his written word, I tend to perk up when he writes a novel about private military companies in the near future.
You might also remember his discussion about solutions for the Afghanistan war. Him and Jim Gant were definitely promoting some interesting solutions, and it was a pleasure back then to read and follow along. I am still following his blog and he does a fantastic job of going over the process of writing, as well as discussing history’s military lessons.
I have not read this book yet, but I definitely would like to hear what others think about it. On Amazon there are reviews to check out, and Mark had a few readers on his site that chimed in. Here is a product description from Amazon.
Product Description The “master storyteller” (Publishers Weekly) and bestselling author of Gates of Fire, The Afghan Campaign, and Killing Rommel returns with a stunning, chillingly plausible near-future thriller about the rise of a privately financed and global military industrial complex.? ?The year is 2032. The third Iran-Iraq war is over; the 11/11 dirty bomb attack on the port of Long Beach, California is receding into memory; Saudi Arabia has recently quelled a coup; Russians and Turks are clashing in the Caspian Basin; Iranian armored units, supported by the satellite and drone power of their Chinese allies, have emerged from their enclaves in Tehran and are sweeping south attempting to recapture the resource rich territory that had been stolen from them, in their view, by Lukoil, BP, and ExxonMobil and their privately-funded armies. Everywhere military force is for hire. Oil companies, multi-national corporations and banks employ powerful, cutting-edge mercenary armies to control global chaos and protect their riches. Even nation states enlist mercenary forces to suppress internal insurrections, hunt terrorists, and do the black bag jobs necessary to maintain the new New World Order. ? ?Force Insertion is the world’s merc monopoly. Its leader is the disgraced former United States Marine General James Salter, stripped of his command by the president for nuclear saber-rattling with the Chinese and banished to the Far East. A grandmaster military and political strategist, Salter deftly seizes huge oil and gas fields, ultimately making himself the most powerful man in the world. Salter’s endgame is to take vengeance on those responsible for his exile and then come home…as Commander in Chief. The only man who can stop him is the novel’s narrator, Gilbert “Gent” Gentilhomme, Salter’s most loyal foot soldier and as close to him as the son Salter lost. As this action-jammed, lightning fast, and brutally realistic novel builds to its heart-stopping climax Gent launches his personally and professionally most desperate mission: to take out his mentor and save the United States from self destruction.? ?Infused by a staggering breadth of research in military tactics and steeped in the timeless themes of the honor and valor of men at war that distinguish all of Pressfield’s fiction, The Profession is that rare novel that informs and challenges the reader almost as much as it entertains.
The only commentary I have on this, just based on the description, is that Gilbert “Gent” Gentilhomme sounds like a practitioner of Jundism. lol Or basically, he had the courage to do what is right, and stop this out of control General–that he used to idolize.
So if anyone is interested in purchasing this book, you can find it in the Jundi Gear store here. You can also check out all the reviews on Amazon while on that page, and so far the book is getting good reviews. To give you a taste, Steven has even published a chapter of this book on his site. Check it out and let me know what you think. –Matt
