The Rhetorical Analysis Of General Douglas Macarthur's Speech

When a person is at his or her lowest point, the only thing they have is their belief system. What a person believes in shapes the way he or she lives their life.While receiving the Sylvonus Thayer Award, General Douglas MacArthur addresses his audience with words that will most likely stay within their hearts for their life. He reminds his fellow soldiers of the words that kept them going through every battle, and stresses it by a number of literary devices, such as imagery, repetition, and pathos. He additionally employs allusion and anecdotes to provide a more in-depth speech. General MacArthur starts off his speech by expressing his gratitude for his award, and segueing into the ideals that were instilled in him during his time at the …show more content…
He reminisces of horrible memories saying, “As I Listened to those songs [of the glee club], in memory’s eye I could see those staggering columns of the First World War…” He describes them in vivid detail, using negatively connotated words such as “slogging” and “weary” so no one has an inaccurate image of what he is retelling. In this instance. Reading this, civilians were most likely shocked at the horrors of war, and impressed that the men kept going, leading to how MacArthur ties this into “duty,honor country.”: “Always through the bloody haze of their last reverberating shot, the vision of their gaunt,ghastly men reverently following your pasword of: Duty, Honor, Country.” Without that moral code, the soldiers may not have been able to carry forward, and as a result, America may not be the same country it is …show more content…
He states, “Yours is the profession of arms, the will to win...if you lose, the nation is destroyed;that the very obsession of your public service must be; Duty, Honor, Country.” To these men, they do not have a choice in the matter of their belief system. If they do not follow that law, then they have failed their country. He tells them it is their job to the job that is gruesome but necessary, and defend their country with their life, no matter how corrupt politics become or how economically troubled America is. He truly puts a heavy burden on their shoulders, telling them that “You are the leaven which binds together the entire fabric of our national system of defense.” He is basically saying that without them, America may as well be done for. He reassures them, telling them that they aren’t warmongers, but simply doing what they must in order to protect those who cannot protect their country in such a way. To add credibility to what he says, he uses the lines of Plato, “only the dead have seen the end of war,” reminding them that their duty is never finished until they are. A soldier reading this would take this to heart, seeing as it came from such a respected figure in the U.S. Military. On the other hand, a civilian reading this probably feels a bit detached, as this part was not made for