The Boys Of Pointe Du Hoc, By Douglas Brinkley

In the 1940s the United States was getting ready to get involved in World War II and needed to set an example of good ethics on a global stage to help bring. The book The Boys of Pointe Du Hoc written by, Douglas Brinkley has many examples of ethical decision making that was critical at the time in order for the United States to bring peace to World War II. For instance the author is re-establishing already known information but with a new style of how he obtained the information, which was straight from the sources of D-day survivors. With the decision to tell the story of D-day through the quotes of survivors it helps show how the army generals and rangers would act showing their ethnicity toward the United States and helping resolve World
In order to show this type of leader ship the author uses examples of the utilitarianism (3) philosophy which is when the consequences are taken into account and the greatest output for the greatest amount of people is the goal to be achieved. This is a very important aspect of global ethics, because when the world is involved in war, decisions involving massive casualties must have great consideration on the outcome of the greatest number of people involved. Brinkley uses a message that was sent to all American from president Eisenhower that would show how his war efforts were in in the best interest for the greatest number of people world wide. Quoted from Eisenhower “In company with out brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts, you will bring about the destruction of the German war machine, the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed people of Europe, and security for ourselves in a free world.” (Brinkley, 61) The president was using this message to show the American people that the troops deployed across seas were doing the right thing for the greatest amount of people benefitting. Regardless the consequence of suppressing the German empire the president was being ethical on a world wide scale and trying to free
Within the book author Douglas Brinkley uses a speech that gives a feel for what the soldiers were going through when fighting for the freedom of their country and how it would’ve been ethical due to the conditions they had to endure at the time. This speech gives a great example of a moral philosophy know as relativist. Relativist perspective (4) is “definitions of ethical behavior are derived subjectively from the experiences of individuals and groups.” (Moulton, 98) The relativist perspective was the best philosophy to connect to the authors way of showing how the soldiers were truly hero’s during this time just doing the most ethical things they could at the time for the greats good. When the allies were experiencing the beach fighting and vertical gun fights while scaling the Pointe Du Hoc cliff side was all deemed ethically accepted by the soldiers and their supporters back home due to the situation of trying to bring peace back the the European continent. The author Brinkley uses a quote from Gingerly, Noonan setting the scene of what the soldiers were enduring on a daily basis during this time, “We stand on a lonely, windswept point on the northern shore of France. The air is soft, but forty years ago at this moment, the air was dense with smoke and the