Good Morning, My name is David Bass, I chose to speak with you today about retirement speech by General Douglas MacArthur upon accepting this Thayer award in may of 1962 This speech titled Duty Honor Country still impacts military personal with the inspiring words that he so eloquently spoke to the troops in attendance. A little about General MacArthur, he is one of the youngest to achieve the rank of general and one of nine men to be a 5-star general in the Army. Growing up was the son of General, who himself was a civil war hero, general Macarthur went on to be top of his west point class of 94 cadets, earning a record number of merits, a position that something only two other cadets achieved, one of whom was General Robert e Lee. …show more content…
(another reason that General MacArthur was unique in getting this award as he was a cadet of westpoing) We see that General MacArthur’s career truly exemplified these values as he had acquired the rank of General of the Armed Forces all while serving in World War I, World War II, and the Korean War. This speech made over 50 years ago still has importance among the cadets at West Point, throughout the speech General MacArthur used pathos when referencing their motto he says , Duty, Honor, Country, and those words were used to establish the role of the soldier in the American society and using the values instilled in them by west point academy. He tells them, “those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be and what you will be. This statement shows the cadets of where they are starting at, and where they will be in the future, by following this motto. We see that he uses his personal experience and accomplishments with the cadets when he refeences how he too was in their position as a cadets he was talking to and that by upholding the values learned at the academy it helped to become the man he