"Battlefield studies have long told us that in life-and-death moments, soldiers don't fight for some abstract concept of a nation; they fight for the comrades beside them," Roosevelt said.
"I can't let the guy on my right die—that is the most genuine motivation.
"Through training and rituals, the military forges a group of strangers into a small community of fire and blood. This identity is more concrete and warmer than just being Americans.
"As for those grand narratives of freedom and democracy, those are stories the nation tells them, helping them weave the blood they shed into a greater purpose.
"The nation itself is an imagined community. Most of us will never meet each other in our lifetimes, but because of a shared language, history, and rituals, we imagine that we are one.
"In reality, the nation is full of rifts, but in our imagination, it is an equal Brotherhood."
Roosevelt paused.
