Before I explain the differences between Oliver’s view of military goals vs. Roland’s view of the military, I should explain the type of people Oliver and Roland are. By understanding the types of people some are, then you are able to tell their actions based on who they are as a person. Won’t you agree?
Oliver is one of Roland’s best friends. He is the type of person who likes to think things through, he’s quite intelligent, logical thinker as well, and basically he’s a pretty smart guy. He was that one wise person out of the army. Roland was quite the opposite, he is more of a just-do-it type of guy. He won’t let anything or anyone stand in his way of achieving his potential goal. Having pride and honor is one of those qualities that best describe him. He is quite ignorant and sorta arrogant when someone corrects him and you can see where I am going with this.
Now that you have an idea of the types of people those 2 are, you can understand their military views better.
I’ll skip forward into the mid battle time. Oliver suggested Roland to blow the trumpet and call out for backup/help or at least blow the trumpet when they are starting to run out of soldiers. That wasn’t exactly a plan coming from Oliver, but that certainly was a good suggestion that he gave Roland. It’s only natural to call for help when in times of need amiright? The reason Oliver told Roland to blow the trumpet earlier in the battle, was because Oliver had already planned out and predicted the battle action knowing how many muslims came. And Oliver ended up with the fact that they indeed needed to have backup sooner or later. There had to be backup, Oliver thought, or else they are dead meat.
Roland was ignorant of what Oliver suggested and decided to proceed to the battle saying they should die with honor. It’s better to save your honor to go to battle with what you have rather than call for help. That’s where pride kicked in, Roland wanted to be this hero who conquered the battlefield with little army he had.
Roland thought twice, however, on Oliver’s suggestion because, Oliver died giving his all and Roland noticed that what’s left of the army were 60 soldiers. He blew the trumpet and Charlemagne’s army came to the rescue. Altho unnecessary deaths could’ve been avoided if he blew that trumpet earlier. His pride got the best of him so, now that happened I hope he realized his mistake of not listening to his teammate.
Oliver’s view of the military goal was to approach a more safe way and to achieve the goal as efficiently as possible. While Roland used all force he had right away and not being afraid of anything he charged forward not realizing how things are going to turn out without a decent plan instead of just using up all you have at once.
If they worked together, Oliver using his brain and Roland learning how to listen to others, together they would’ve been unbeatable. Lessons are there to be learn and mistakes happen we just need to move forward and learn from them.
Thanks for reading this essay, I hope you enjoyed it. I’ll be posting more soon, so stay tuned. As always have a great rest of your day, see you on the next post!