Nothing new under the sun

I'd heard a lot of passing remarks on how bad of an idea it is to keep an army in Afghanistan, but this excerpt from a Kipling's "A Young British Soldier" really drives the point home:

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.