Bearded soldiers

The clean-shaven, beardless soldiers with close-cropped hair are a relic that comes down to us from the First World War, along with disposable razor blades, due to poison gas attacks, as it was necessary for the mask to fit inside. anti-gas and the face there was a perfect fit that the beautiful face and long hair prevented. Before this, it was normal for members of the armies to wear long mustaches and in many cases beards.

The first who ordered their soldiers to wear radical haircuts were the Romans, the idea was, somehow, to give uniformity, consistency and esprit de corps to one of the first professional armies, not mercenaries, in the history of humanity. , that is to say, to avoid that the members of a body were seen in their own eyes and others, different from each other, avoiding, incidentally, the privileges of image. So the haircut and beard made them all equal and without privileges of race or social origin, remember that the Roman legion went through several stages over the centuries until it reached an equalization of conditions among the members of its ranks, which is impossible to call democracy because it would be an absolute lie.

Times later, during the cold war, things changed, anti-gas masks no longer need a perfect fit because the new materials and technologies applied to gas supply make this a secondary matter and even unnecessary in some cases.

In these times that we live in, it is really silly for the military to use their shaved heads and faces more than to give free rein to the equality between women and men, but this is also empty thoughts because they are dressed in distinctive clothing of the sex, they are allowed to have long hair and they are not allowed to have armpit hair and a muzzle. If someone says that this hair removal is for hygiene, they are wrong, for that there are anti-lice shampoos, antiperspirants and the cleaning conditions in the barracks are now very different from what they were a hundred years ago. Conclusion, hair, hair and beauty do not affect what a soldier is for and they are not very important for war.

In fact, several modern armies allow it: just look at photos of the soldiers of the Spanish Legion, the French Foreign Legion or the English Navy. Military from Pakistan and India are other bearded for cultural reasons. The Cubans were an example until they backed down, perhaps due to the bad influence of the Americans who are so close to them.

Today the bearded men in the military are in the news, a few years ago British soldiers in Afghanistan were allowed to grow their beards because the high military commands were convinced that they were more respected that way by the local tribes who consider it as a authority mark. Such measure contributed to reduce the number of attacks against.

On the other hand, the beards manifest themselves in the Israeli army, where the group "Barbudos de Israel" seeks to end the obligation to shave and allow any soldier to have the right to wear a beard, not to shave, and not only religious Jews. They allege that the obligation to shave, unnecessary according to them, affects the self-esteem and confidence of young recruits. They add “We want the military to take care of what really matters, to invest their efforts, resources and time in the defense of the country”, not in the soldiers' beards, while evoking stories of bearded warriors and long hair like Samson.