In World War 1, the doughboys marched off to war singing “Over There,” and when they went into battle, they sang “It’s a Long Way to Tipperary,” “It’s a Grand Old Flag,” and “Yankee Doodle Dandy.” The British and the French, not to be outdone, had their own lists of songs designed to keep spirits high.
In World War 2, the composers pulled out all the stops. Irving Berlin dug “God Bless America” out of his trunk and, with Kate Smith’s help, made it a second national anthem. Frank Loesser contributed “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition” and Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn wrote “I’ll Walk Alone.” From Old Blighty we heard Vera Lynn and others promise that “We’ll Meet Again” and “There’ll be Bluebirds Over the White Cliffs of Dover.” The Andrews Sisters sang about the “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B,” and a uniformed Irving Berlin was on stage singing how he hated to get up in the morning. There were dozens if not hundreds of songs about soldiers, sailors, marines, and the girls back home, some of them, like Rosie, working away as riveters. The musical legacy of World War 2 lives on, as many of the tunes became standards that are now ingrained in the national psyche.
Then things changed. Nobody sang sentimental ballads about the Korean War or about Vietnam. (The musical “Miss Saigon” has many fine tunes, but they are mostly bitter or satirical.) We are now engaged in war once again, but nobody’s writing songs about it. (“It’s a Long Way to Sadr City”? I don’t think so.) As a society, we have progressed to the point where no one writes pop tunes romanticizing war. We are endlessly exhorted to “support our troops” by backing the latest tactical surge, but even that line is getting tired, and no one is setting it to music.
Of course, hardly anyone is writing romantic ballads of any kind these days, and we are all the poorer for that. A song like “I’ll Walk Alone” was really a love song, not a war song, and that is why it is still sung. Most of the true war songs didn’t last. They sold War Bonds and made people feel patriotic, but now they are rightly forgotten.
Oh, by the way, the U.S. and its allies didn’t hold a monopoly on war songs in WW2. I have a book of Soviet popular songs of that era, and, in case you’re curious, here are the lyrics for one of them, “Tachanka,” translated into English:
Fly, oh bird, above the highway,
Beast aside, to the clear road.
Look and see the dust roll skyward,
Raised by horses swiftly rode.
Taking aim with his machine gun,
The young gunner opens fire.
And staccato shots unseen zip,
Making all the foes retire.
Eh, Tachanka rostovchanka,
You’re a beauty and our pride.
With the mounted troops Tachanka,
On four wheels you swiftly ride.
Well, it probably loses something in translation.
