Captain Richards did understand the strain that he and the other officers were under. At times, their judgment was negatively influenced by this strain. Combined with their various perspectives, this meant that the officers did not always see eye to eye on the appropriate way of dealing with situations. Sometimes, they even said or did things that they would later regret.
Colonel Anderson was the proper military authority. His way of dealing with situations had precedence over all others not supported by military regulations. It was sometimes necessary to swallow your pride as a junior officer and just do as you were told. But, this would be no easy thing. It could leave a foul taste in your mouth for years. You might, in the end, speak your bitterness as a man and not as a doctor.
Thus, you proffer no diagnosis. Instead, you offer an epitaph, “He was mental.”
In the second book, I read the situation in just this way. Therefore, in my opinion, The Survival Factor was the more appropriate articulation of the difficulties. A Doctor’s War may be a personal memoir; but, care must be taken not to treat of the dead unfairly.
Today, fewer people will know about or have access to the testimony of the first book. This is certainly a sad state of affairs. Thus, we are cautioned to call no man ‘happy’ (judged to have lived a truly good life) until he is dead. We recognise that even the circumstances of our dying or of our being dead can conspire against our good name.
Therefore, it becomes the responsibility of the living to take due care with the reputation of the dead. Ensuring the possibility of such care may require access to alternate sources of information. That is especially true of this case; we do need other resources for evaluating the cares and concerns of the protagonists of this drama.
In terms of Colonel Anderson, this is something of a problem.
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