Stardate 20030125.2035

(On Screen via long range sensors): Everyone knows who Bob Hope is. He's still alive, and if he reaches his birthday this year he'll be 100.

A lot of celebrities in WWII went on tours to visit the troops, but they nearly all went to rear areas, far from the fighting, where troops from the front had been pulled back for a rest, and usually they were only in the war zone briefly. Not Bob Hope, though; he was very active entertaining troops through much of the war, in Europe and in the Pacific, with a very small entertainment group, working very far forward.

Which is to say that he was far enough forward so that he was under fire more than once. In his book Brave Men, Ernie Pyle wrote this about Bob Hope:

I ran across Bob Hope and his crew. In fact for a couple of days we did the highlights and shadows of one bombed Sicilian city in such hilarious conjunction that it looked as though I were becoming a member of the troupe.

There were certain dissenters to the policy of sending American entertainers overseas to help brighten the lives of our soldiers. Now and then I heard some officer say, "After all, we're over here to fight, not to be entertained. Don't they know there's a war on?" But it was my experience that the most confirmed users of such phrases were usually a good many miles behind the lines. I was all for giving the troops a little touch of America through those movie stars, and I can testify that the boys enjoyed and appreciated it.

Bob Hope was one of the best that ever went to Africa. He had the right touch with soldiers. He could handle himself as well in a hospital full of suffering men as before a rough audience of ten thousand war-coarsened ones. When Hope went into a hospital he was likely to go up to a poor guy swathed in bandages, and instead of spreading out the old sympathy he would shake hands and say something such as, "Did you see my show this evening, or were you already sick?"

At his regular show, Hope carefully explained the draft status of his troupe, so that the soldiers wouldn't think they were draft dodgers. He said that his singer, Jack Pepper, had been classified 5-X, or "too fat to fight." Hope himself was in class 4-Z, meaning "Coward." And their guitar player, Tony Romano, was Double S Double F, meaning "Single man with children." Sure, it got a laugh.

The Hope Troupe, which included lovely Frances Langford as the fourth member, really found out about war. Every time they'd stop in a city, there'd be a raid there that night. Actually it got to look as though the Germans were deliberately after them. I was in two different cities with them during raids, and I will testify that they were horrifying things.

The troupe had the distinction, while in Sicily, of playing closer to the front lines than any other entertainers, and playing to the biggest audiences. One afternoon they did their outdoor show for nineteen thousand men. Everywhere they went, both in public and in private, the Hope gang was popular – mainly because, clear down (or up) to Frances, they were regular and natural.

Let this be taken as legal testimony in verification: no matter what narrow-escape story Bob tells about Sicily, it's true.

Bob Hope visited the troops in WWII, and in Korea. And when I was a kid I remember that he visited Viet Nam every year. (The show was filmed and shown in the US on broadcast TV, usually sponsored by Chrysler.)

The formula was straightforward: music, comedy, Hope's monologue, and always pretty girls to look at showing plenty of skin and curves (such as Frances Langford above and left, in photographs from 1944). In Viet Nam he almost always had two or three recent Playboy Centerfold models along, who were already very familiar to the men. Everyone else on the trip was paid for their time, but Hope never accepted any money in Viet Nam beyond his expenses.

His last war was Kuwait, in 1991. In his late 80's he yet again went to the front, with his wisecracks and pretty girls.

Thinking back on it, years later, it occurred to me that during Viet Nam I didn't remember Bob Hope ever expressing an opinion about the war itself, saying whether he supported it or not. And to this day I still don't have any idea how he felt about that.

But Hope always supported the troops, and not just with lip service. He was out there where they were, because he cared about them, and they always appreciated it. Hope was a real hero, and he could easily have lost his life doing what he did.

Bob Hope wasn't born in America. He was actually born in London and was brought here as a young child when his parents emigrated. But he was American through and through, and always thought of himself that way. And he loved his country, and loved the soldiers who fought to defend it. Despite his jokes, Hope was no coward; the real reason he wasn't in the service in WWII was that he was too old, having been born in 1903.

There is much disagreement amongst us here in America about this war, in Afghanistan or in Iraq or wherever it ends up taking us. Some think we must fight it; some think it the greatest mistake we can make. Some think that it is needed to prevent great evil; some think that it will cause great evil. Some think we have to fight elsewhere to prevent attacks on our homes; some think that fighting elsewhere will encourage attacks on our homes. Even when it's over, no matter when that happens or how it ends, there will never be unanimity about whether we should have fought at all, or whether we fought it the right way.

But I must forthrightly state that no matter what anyone thinks of the war, we all must support the troops who fight it. They didn't cause the war; they didn't make the decisions that led to it. But they're the ones who are out there risking everything on behalf of us all – even those with "Not in my name" bumper stickers on their cars.

I do not say that any person who opposes the war is unpatriotic. I do not condemn people for holding that position. Dissent is part of our tradition, and I feel that the encouragement of disagreement is one of our greatest strengths and virtues. If we actually are making a mistake, we need people who are brave enough to say so and try to convince the rest of us of that fact.

But any American who sneers at the soldiers themselves, or blames them for the war, or hopes that they die or be wounded, is beneath contempt.