Wednesday, 24 September 2003 - 6:55 AM CDT

Geographical disputes aside, there is one thing everybody agrees about: the South is a region where increased US defence spending and the war in Iraq are popular. Back in 1835 Alexis de Tocqueville observed that southerners were "passionately fond of hunting and war". General William T. Sherman, while burning his way through Georgia, feared what he called the "young bloods of the South" who were "splendid riders, first-rate shots, and utterly reckless". This martial tradition continued into the 20th century. By the time Theodore Roosevelt had become president, 93 per cent of America?s generals had deep southern connections. Studying such Medal of Honor winners as Alvin York of Tennessee, Stephen E. Ambrose, the late historian, once quipped that the South was "where fighting is a respectable profession". Today, as the Democratic party struggles for leadership, General Wesley Clark of Little Rock, Arkansas, is running for US president. He is seen as part of a southern military tradition that harkens back to George Washington, Robert E. Lee and George C. Marshall.

In the post-9/11 world, the concept of "security" leads the list of national concerns. At Fort Knox, Kentucky, 80 per cent of the US national gold reserves is protected by impenetrable granite walls and steel doors. As the cliche goes, our national goal, in fact, is to make airports, cargo stations, and railroad centres as secure as Fort Knox. Meanwhile, the Bush administration, in its post-9/11 "Wanted: Dead or Alive" mode, vengefully searching for justice, is evoking the chivalric code of southern honour. While in the north, legal action is the desired mode of settling scores, in the South it is still fisticuffs. What Mary Boykin Chesnutt wrote in her famed diary of the Confederacy more than 150 years ago still holds true: "For us, soon as one defamatory word is [uttered] pistols come at once to the fore. That is South Carolina ethics."