To Good Guys Dead
They sucked us in;
King and country,
Christ Almighty
And the rest.
Patriotism,
Democracy,
Honor—
Words and phrases,
They either bitched or killed us.
In line 2 Hemmingway is referring to no specific king but is, in fact, using a rallying cry from the British Army which was used for centuries (allegedly).For example at the start of a cavalry charge against the enemy an officer (often a nobleman) might yell "For King and Country" to encourage his soldiers to fight. This goes back to the days when the monarch took a more dominant part in ruling the country than HM Queen Elizabeth does now.The other phrases are similar rallying cries which are meaningless echoes of past days and he is using them to illustrate all the stupid reasons people give for wars and in doing so is trying to denegrate war itself.Jim S
