Patton's Speech

I tried to immerse myself into a grunt's world as Patton's speech was read aloud— as a marine or an army soldier in a briefing room awaiting orders to deploy. In a persuasive argument such as Patton's speech, understanding the audience is essential for the purpose of delivering the speech's message effectively. Generally, World War II is represented as the battle between the Allied Powers and the Axis Powers. Through political and military propaganda, the definitions of the "good guy" and "bad guy" were clearly established. With Patton's speech, we have to understand that the audience is more or less combat-ready and well-trained in the art of war, yet are human beings in the end. These men have been conditioned to kill, yet experience the same sentiments as anyone else, no matter how much it’s often denied. These sentiments, specifically fear, are what Patton hopes to persuade his audience to overcome.

The first paragraph of the speech provided key definitions that would help the audience understand Patton's intentions as the orator. A primary example is the concept of being an American. It was in Patton's interest to convince his audience that as Americans, they are the epitome of patriotism and tradition. For example, Patton speaks of the audience's childhood, detailing the admiration for competition and superiority. Patton hopes to persuade his audience by challenging current belief systems and substituting those systems with his own version. Anyone with an ideology that differs from Patton is essentially "un-American", and is forced change and associate themselves with Patton or join ranks with the enemy.

This technique could be effective for several reasons. First, for the most part, the grunts look up to General Patton not only as a role-model and leader, but as an unchallengeable high-ranking authority. As one of the higher members of the chain of command, there is little that Patton can do to undermine his authority. Patton’s goal is to understand the restrictions that may force his audience to reconsider Patton’s position and eliminate them. Ultimately, it is his goal to establish justification for battle, giving his audience to a reason to fight under his command despite their fear of death. His audience also does not have a reasonable alternative- they have to accept the hardships of war, overcome their fear, and accomplish their missions regardless of how Patton persuades them to do so. In essence, I thought of Patton’s written speech as more of a motivational speech that hides the reality of war. I cannot describe war to its full extent as I’ve never participated in it, yet I know that war cannot be compared to competing in a friendly game of marbles. Winning and losing cannot be explained in the context of war if the details are left out. However, this may have been done intentionally to avoid provoking fear in his audience.

Watching Patton’s speech provoked entirely different reactions. The moment the movie began I saw the giant American flag looming in the background. I thought back to all of the corny speeches I’ve seen on TV where an actor would try to appear patriotic and sway his audience by having someone wave an American flag behind him. However, this flag was static and did not require any support in conveying its symbolic meaning. I finally got an idea of just how large the flag was as the actor portraying Patton walked onstage. It was as if Patton was an element of the flag, carrying and displaying its image as he walked to his audience. His rank and authority was established as the camera panned to his numerous medals and ribbons. This move alone highlighted his credibility as general and speaker before his speech began.

One of the similarities between this speech and its written form is that both try to induce a sense of patriotism through the usage of straw-man argumentation. The one example that comes to mind is when Patton tries to drill into the emotions of his audience, asking about the stories they would want to tell their grandchildren. One could either provide a tremendous and courageous story of one’s participation in the world war, or you could tell your grandchildren that you “shoveled shit in Louisiana”. Of course no one would want to tell their grandchildren the latter. What would they think of you as a grandfather? It’s these statements that Patton hopes are running through the minds of his men, giving them a better reason to participate and join him in battle. The argumentation may not be sound, but it is effective at moving the audience.

The differences between the speeches involve how each addresses the subtlety of war. As I mentioned before, Patton’s written speech masks the true nature of war from his audience, suggesting war is like a competition that desired by real Americans. In the visual speech, Patton makes it clear how the enemy will be killed. Patton described how the enemy would be shot in the stomach first, and how their guts would be spilled. The moment these phrases were spoken, the style of the speech shifted from that of a motivational speech, to one of a darker tone. However, the audience has not changed. Perhaps the visual speech provided some of the harsher details of war simply because at this point, the grunts should have an idea of what to expect. As marines and soldiers, they have been toughened and conditioned to do whatever it takes to accomplish the mission. There is no nice way to point out the realities of war, and this visual speech emphasized these realities.