Here’s two for the boys overseas, originally made for their compatriots from the last Empire.

“Banks of the Nile” – Richard Thompson

“Island of No Return” – Billy Bragg

“I get free medical care because we lost the war. I lost it real good for them, too. They look at my record and say ‘How much Demerol would you like today, Mr. Trout?'” —Bob Trout (UDT veteran, Vietnam)

“When the flag comes out, it’s only a matter of time before someone’s handing you a rifle.” —My great-uncle Richard Sears. (Army grunt, WWII, Sicily invasion)

We aren’t no thin red ‘eroes, nor we aren’t no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An’ if sometimes our conduck isn’t all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don’t grow into plaster saints;
While it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Tommy, fall be’ind”,
But it’s “Please to walk in front, sir”, when there’s trouble in the wind,
There’s trouble in the wind, my boys, there’s trouble in the wind,
O it’s “Please to walk in front, sir”, when there’s trouble in the wind.

—Kipling, “Tommy”