As ever, but especially in our present
state of civilizational malaise, there is a need for figures with the
power to inspire–men who in less confused and cynical times would have
been unabashedly described as heroic. One such figure is Corporal John
Alan Coey, a young soldier who has perhaps not yet fully received the
tribute he deserves though he has been dead these past 37 years.
In March of 1972, Coey, a young American
from Ohio, boarded a flight to white-governed Rhodesia, a country then
facing United Nations sanctions and very soon to find itself beleaguered
by black Marxist forces. Only a day prior to his departure Coey had
graduated from Ohio State University with a degree in forestry. He had
also recently been released, at his own request, from the Marine Corps
NROTC program he had nearly completed, thereby declining a hard-earned
commission as an officer.
Coey’s motives for seeking to enlist in the
Rhodesian Army rather than continue his service in the U.S. Marine
Corps are probably more readily understandable in retrospect than they
were at the time. Like many, he was repulsed by the emergence of the New
Left on college campuses and saw nihilism clearly lurking behind its
messages of free love and pacifism. Coey also concluded that the newly
ascendant radical Left represented neither an authentic grassroots
movement nor a bona fide countercultural alternative to the old liberal
order. “The left wing has recognized the dehumanizing trends of
industrial society,” he wrote, “but its activism to change society has
been channeled by the real revolutionaries of Internationalism.”
Though a confirmed Cold Warrior, neither
was Coey a reflexive supporter of the Vietnam War. He discerned in the
handling of that conflict, as well as that of the Korean War before it,
the seeds of American overreach and eventual dissolution, a trend that
continues unabated today. As Coey’s older brother Edward would later
write of American involvement in Vietnam, the American people had been
given “The Choice Between False Alternatives,” made to choose “between a
protracted no-win slaughter and a humiliating surrender.” The younger
Coey did not believe this state of affairs could be attributed merely to
incompetence or negligence on the part of those prosecuting the war
either. The primary threat to the West, Coey concluded, was not Soviet
or Chinese Communism but malevolent forces that emanated from within.
Coey somewhat quaintly referred to these forces, which he considered
more or less amenable to communism, simply as “the Conspiracy.”
While he was an apparent reader of Oswald
Spengler and keenly aware of the depth of the civilizational crisis
facing the West, Coey was not given to despair. He insisted those of
European descent must struggle to the bitter end to save their
inheritance, a deeply held conviction that determined his own choices.
Coey well understood that “the fight for Western Civilization is not in
the battlefield, but in the realm of the intellectual, spiritual, and
psychological.” He lamented also “that under present conditions one
cannot be a soldier without furthering the aims of the
Internationalists, the liberals, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR),
the Zionists, or other alien groups.” Still, Coey longed above all else
to do his part as a warrior in defense of what remained of his beloved
civilization. Rhodesia, he believed, provided him the best and perhaps
only opportunity to be of service in a worthy cause. This was in spite
of the fact that Coey already knew the likely outcome:
In the eyes of the mass media the black man can do nothing wrong and the white man can do nothing right, for even his sacrifices and help are discredited. The world cares nothing for Rhodesia, not even America, England, or the sister colonies. Rhodesia is to be sacrificed; they will not help Rhodesia. It has already been written off.
Coey in Africa
Having successfully gained a position with
the Rhodesian Special Air Service or SAS (an elite unit approximately
equivalent to U.S. Army Special Forces), Coey attempted to
communicate–perhaps imprudently–his concerns to the general public in a
series of magazine articles and letters to newspapers in Rhodesia and
South Africa. One article in particular, provocatively titled “The Myth
of American Anti-Communism” and published in the Rhodesian Army journal
Assegai, would land him in trouble with Rhodesian authorities despite–or
perhaps because of–its appearance in an official publication. As a
result, Coey was kicked out of the Rhodesian Army’s officer training
program and eventually the SAS, placements he had received only after
excelling at a grueling selection and training process. As Coey himself
reflected:
It was brought to my attention today that the article I submitted to Assegai magazine is considered “subversive,” not because it is anti- Rhodesian or criticizes the State here, but because it “destroys misconceptions about America being pro-Western, and may lower morale if read by the general public.” Although what I have written is true, it is feared that the public may not be able to stand the truth. The facts I have presented may make the article appear anti-American to those who do not yet understand how America is ruled by the CFR [Council on Foreign Relations] oligarchy, whose interest is total world power.
Despite this and other setbacks, Coey would
persist in his writing. Throughout his time in southern Africa he kept
up an extensive correspondence as well as a journal which would
eventually be published posthumously as a book. This book,
A Martyr Speaks, would have undoubtedly
proven an even more interesting historical document had not vast
segments of Coey’s original journals been redacted by Rhodesian
authorities following his death. Despite this censorship, Coey and what
was left of his writings remained controversial enough that it would
take his mother 13 years to find a willing publisher.
Though no longer under consideration for a
commission and forced to choose another unit to serve with, Coey would
also persist in attempting to make a contribution militarily to
Rhodesia. Even as he experienced moments of serious doubt and
self-recrimination following his unceremonious expulsion from the SAS,
Coey completed a medic course and transferred to the Rhodesian Light
Infantry. There, and despite resistance from some of his superiors, time
and again he insisted on accompanying infantrymen into combat at great
personal risk to himself, effectively introducing the role of combat
medic into the Rhodesian Army:
When I finish this tour of duty, I think that at least in this battalion [1st Battalion, The Rhodesian Light Infantry], which does the bulk of the fighting, that the medics will become like the Medical Corpsmen in the U.S. forces. I am the first of what are now called “Combat Medics” here. There will be others; so I have accomplished something.
Again though, Coey’s efforts were not
always understood or appreciated. Some–though certainly not all–of his
fellow foreign volunteers seem to have been merely adventurers or
opportunists who did not share in his motivations or commitment. Among
the locals, Coey’s older brother later wrote, the younger Coey “found
some few Rhodesians awake, but generally…found a people too narrowly
provincial to fully appreciate the worldwide implications of the savage
attack being unleashed against their small country.” Coey himself wrote
of the Rhodesians, for whom he came to have a special affection (indeed
he sought and was granted dual citizenship): “Most white Rhodesian
families have been here for several generations and have nowhere else
they can call home. They will stay and fight, I’m pleased to say. They
understand their position racially and historically, but come short
politically.”
An additional source of conflict for
Coey–even with fellow believers–were his religious convictions. From a
reading of his journals, it is evident that Coey’s faith was the primary
source of his strength and allowed him to persevere where others often
gave up. It also provided a source of comfort to him in his darkest
moments–moments which were plentiful in combat in the African Bush. Many
on the authentic Right have abandoned Christianity for a multitude of
reasons, citing among other things its universalist pretensions and the
tendency toward a dangerous and unhealthy cultural and racial
self-effacement prevalent among contemporary Christians. Still, Coey
possessed a vital and muscular understanding of the Faith similar to
that which must have underlain much past Western dynamism. Coey, a
Lutheran, attempted to share his belief with others through quiet
example rather than a boorish evangelism and was dismayed at the errors
into which many of his fellow Christians had fallen:
I’ve been going to Baptist church services. The Gospel is preached there, but I have decided to go elsewhere because these Baptists are convinced that the Zionist takeover of Palestine is the fulfillment of Biblical prophecy. They believe that the Second Coming of Christ is near, and think that they have the Revelation figured out completely. They expect to be “raptured” away from the coming terror to help Christ rule in the Millennium. I remind them of Christ’s words, “My kingdom is not of this world,” and ”No man knoweth the hour when the Son of God shall come again.” But they choose to ignore that. . . .
Neither, of course, did Coey abide the paralytic sentimentality of liberal Christians:
Last night I talked with a Christian man who is convinced that he must never resort to violence to defend himself or fight in any way, even for his life and liberty. He feels that communism should not be opposed by arms, and that the Second Coming of Christ will occur before they could take over the world. He believes that all governments, no matter how evil or corrupt, are ordained by God. Christianity for this man has destroyed his instinct for survival, his will to resist evil. If every Christian were to think this, we would be doomed.
Coey’s Legacy
Coey was only one of a number of foreign
volunteers who came from a variety of countries to fight for the lost
cause of Rhodesia. Likewise, he was only the first of a total of seven Americans
who would eventually die there. Of these foreigners, however, Coey was
probably the most driven by principle, as well as the one most
successful at communicating to the general public his motives for
joining the Rhodesian forces.
Admittedly, at times in his journals Coey
comes across as a somewhat fanatical and overly conspiratorial figure,
albeit one who is never truly unlikable. Though he presents a fairly
consistent worldview in his writings, it is also helpful to remember
that Coey did not style himself as an intellectual but instead a man of
action. He considered it necessary to complement his words with deeds,
and his short life was lived as one of selfless sacrifice in defense of
not only a country that he considered to be at the very frontier of the
West, but of all peoples of European descent and their shared
civilization. Coey, importantly, always sought to lead by example and
never played the sectarian:
…I am helping to unify the Europeans, simply by my presence and association with these people. For they are coming to realize that there is no important difference between Americans, White Africans, or Europeans. The accents, dialects, and languages are superficial; the customs, religion, styles of government, and thinking are the same. I believe that only when all European peoples are unified, can communism and the alien conspiracy be smashed.
There would be no such triumph of course,
either in Rhodesia or elsewhere, but perhaps it was for the best that
Coey did not live to suffer the heartbreak of witnessing his adopted
homeland fade into history.
In the final analysis, it was the very
things that drove Coey to excel as a soldier that led to his early
demise. He was possessed of that fatal combination of youthful idealism
and, what is rarer, the will and strength of character to actually put
that idealism into practice. As his older brother Edward recalled,
Revilo P. Oliver of the University of Illinois had written Coey a letter
prior to his death in which Professor Oliver lauded him for having made
“‘…the Choice of Achilles.’” That is, Coey had opted to die with glory
in combat rather than to live a long but unremarkable life. Then again,
Coey may have simply been following the dictates of fate. “I feel that I
have found my historical role here,” he wrote, “and, once that is
finished, I don’t know what I will do. . . .”
The anticipated moment came swiftly and
unexpectedly. On July 19, 1975, as he was descending into a dry river
bed in an attempt to aid two fallen Rhodesian Light Infantry troopers,
Coey was struck and killed by terrorist bullets. One is prone to wonder
if it can really be only strange coincidence that he was hit in the head
and in theheel? Whatever the case, his shining example of total
selflessness stands in marked contrast to the widespread moral
corruption of the modern military of his native United States, a
military whose senior leaders obediently serve the alien and
transnational forces that Coey believed he was fighting.
Though he is decades gone, Coey’s timeless
words continue to resonate. Yet it is fearful to think that they might
outlast the civilization they immediately pertain to only to serve as a
warning to some future people:
The basis of race, culture, and nation is vital for the survival of Western Civilization. Blood and soil, conservation and nationalism are what make a country and civilization sound, strong, and healthy. But faith is needed, faith in our way of life, our civilization, and faith in a Higher Destiny and the Divine Sanction of God….This generation of the West must believe when there is apparently no hope; it must obey, even if it means death; and it must fight to the end, rather than submit. Against the Spirit of Heroism no material force can prevail. Nothing can defeat that except inner decadence.
Ultimately Coey’s significance probably
resides in whatever ability his memory has to kindle in others this will
to fight. As Dr. Anthony P. DiPerna, a professor of African history,
observed in a letter to the Coey family: “I do not think John’s
sacrifice was in vain. There are many episodes in history where those
who gave their lives in a losing cause served as an inspiration to
others who eventually carried the banner to victory. The early Christian
martyrs come to mind immediately.”
If Coey could join us today, he would not
lose hope over the rapid deterioration of Western societies that has
occurred in the decades since his death. He would doubtlessly implore us
to redouble our efforts at self-preservation, however modest or even
futile we may believe our individual contributions to be.
Reference:
CPA Books.
