This is coolbert: The Olympics are going to be held in a few months now. In Athens, Greece. The home of the Olympics. Now, a number of years ago, this suggestion was made about the Olympics. Certain sports should be eliminated. And what sports were those? Well, sports that were felt to have a military component or background. Well, those sports would include all the firearms competitions, and the archery competitions, the modern pentathlon, etc. Sports that were related to war making endeavor were felt to have no place at the Olympics, as the Olympics is supposed to be about peace and people of the world coming together in harmony.


Of all sports to be eliminated, the modern pentathlon is perhaps the most egregious in the eyes of detractors of marital oriented sports. The modern pentathlon consists of events, five of them, that are based upon what a military dispatcher courier would need to know to do his job. These events include swimming, running, horse back riding, fencing, and pistol shooting. And the events are based upon the poem, "A Message to Garcia". This is an account of an American Army officer [Rowan], who carries a message from President Mc Kinley to Garcia, the leader of the Cuban insurgents just prior to the Spanish-American war in 1898. This dispatch courier, an officer, in the poem, must swim ashore, outrun his pursuers, fight a duel with swords, ride a horse, and once again, shoot it out with his pursuers. An exciting adventure. The modern pentathlon was designed with this poem in mind, and the creator of the event had in mind that this would bring military people from all over the world together in friendship.

Now, is this argument that martial oriented sports go against the Olympic tradition true? NO! Emphatically NO! The original sports at the Olympics were almost without exception sports that had a military related theme. At the original Olympics they had the track and field events, boxing, wrestling, and horse racing, and that was that. The latter three events have obvious military applications. And among the few number of track and field events held at the original Olympics, the discus throw and the javelin throw were military oriented. The discus WAS a weapon of war. A heavy object with very sharp sides was flung at a mass of enemy soldiers, causing injury by both weight and sharpness both at the same time. The javelin throw was measured both by accuracy and distance, not just distance alone as it is now. The discus and the javelin were weapons of war. Of the five events in the ancient pentathlon, three had obvious military application. The five events were a run, a long jump, the discus throw, the javelin throw, and wrestling. Too see a site about the ancient pentathlon, click here.

So we can see that the original Olympics did consist of events that were martial related. So for anyone to say that we must only have events that are peace and love oriented is just plain wrong. The very basis for the Olympics itself is to prove prowess at events that were plainly military oriented, and that is that!! To think otherwise is wishful thinking so common among certain types.

coolbert.