Rat Army
Rat Army is one of the most distinctive and successful armies in the Battle School, a unit whose reputation for disorder and irreverence masks a formidable competitive record. Under the command of Rose the Nose, a self-mocking Jewish boy who embraces the nickname "Kike Force" in half-parody of Mazer Rackham's Strike Force, Rat Army sits in second place in the school standings, perpetually "bucking for first." The army's barracks are rumpled, cluttered, and noisy, a stark contrast to the disciplined order Ender Wiggin had known in Salamander Army, and its commander's leadership style is as unorthodox as its culture. Rose, who sleeps in the common barracks rather than his private commander's cabin because he is "scared to be alone, scared of the dark," rules through a combination of crude humor and a single-minded emphasis on winning. His three rules—"Do what I tell you and don't piss in the bed"—reduce to a philosophy that winning is more important than anything, a message he delivers while displaying an animated image of male genitals on his desk. It is into this chaotic, winning-obsessed environment that Ender is traded by Bonzo Madrid, who hopes to rid himself of a soldier he considers useless, and it is here that Ender's military education takes a decisive turn.
Culture and Command Under Rose the Nose
Rat Army's culture is defined by its commander's personality: loud, profane, and deliberately provocative. Rose the Nose, whose real name is Rosen, mocks himself to forestall the anti-Semitic comments of those he defeats, but he also ensures everyone knows he is Jewish, a fact that carries prestige because the Strategos of the I.F. has always been a Jew and there is a myth that Jewish generals don't lose wars. His army is often called the Kike Force, a nickname that plays on Mazer Rackham's Strike Force and reflects the army's willingness to embrace insult as a badge of identity. Rose's command style is lax in matters of discipline—he does not enforce the strict uniform and fraternization rules that Bonzo Madrid imposed—but he is ruthless in his pursuit of victory. He takes Ender on not because he needs a good soldier but to prove that he can win even with "a little puke of a soldier like you," and he immediately forbids Ender from using his desk until he has frozen two enemy soldiers in the same battle, a rule born of self-defense because Ender is a genius programmer who might "screw around" with Rose's own desk. The army's disorder makes Ender uncomfortable at first, but he soon learns that Rat Army's apparent chaos conceals a flexible, adaptive approach to battle that contrasts with the rigid formations of Salamander Army.
Ender's Integration and Dink Meeker's Toon
Ender's arrival in Rat Army is not a dumping but a deliberate acquisition: Dink Meeker, the leader of one of the army's toons, has asked Rose to trade for Ender because he has watched Ender's practice sessions with the Launchies and sees promise in him. Dink, who has twice refused promotion to commander, trains his toon independently from the rest of Rat Army, with a discipline and vigor that make it a separate army within the army. He immediately puts Ender to work demonstrating his feet-first attack position, a technique that the other boys initially hate because it feels like attacking while lying on their backs, but which they come to appreciate as they realize how much harder it is to shoot an enemy attacking feet first. Dink's philosophy, which he imparts to Ender, is that commanders have only as much authority as soldiers let them have, and that the teachers, not the other armies, are the true enemy. He tells Ender that the Battle School is destroying the children, that the bugger menace is a fake used by the I.F. to maintain power, and that a civil war is coming in which Ender, as an American, will be his enemy. Ender does not fully accept Dink's cynicism—he still believes the bugger threat is real—but the seed of doubt Dink plants changes how Ender listens to people and makes him wiser. Under Dink's tutelage, Ender learns to fight as part of a toon, and his first battle with Rat Army, against Centipede Army, is a suicide mission ordered by Rose that Ender turns into a devastating attack, freezing three enemies and disabling two more before being iced himself. The battle establishes Ender's reputation and leads Dink to adopt Ender's instant-emergence tactic, changing the way all armies approach the game.
The Battle Against Centipede Army and Its Aftermath
Ender's first battle as a member of Rat Army is a test of his obedience and his ingenuity. Rose, still resentful of Ender's insubordination, orders him to jump through the door as soon as it opens and go straight toward the enemy's gate, a suicide mission. Ender complies, but he uses the tactic he has developed—doubling his legs under him and firing between them—to freeze many Centipede soldiers as they emerge from their own door. He is flashed in the legs but continues firing until they freeze his body, and his attack is so effective that it changes the game: Dink begins practicing instant emergence from the corridor, and soon no army can take time to size up the battlefield. After the battle, Rose does not speak to Ender, and Ender's standing remains first because he has frozen three, disabled two, and damaged seven enemies. The battle also marks the beginning of Ender's rise in the standings, as he drops to fourth before climbing back to first, and it cements his relationship with Dink, who becomes a mentor and a friend. It is in Rat Army that Ender also experiences the first stirrings of doubt about the war, as Dink's words about the bugger menace being a fake take root in his mind, making him more attentive to what people mean rather than what they say.
Significance and Legacy
Rat Army's significance in Ender's development cannot be overstated. It is the army where he learns to fight as part of a toon, where he is first exposed to a commander who wins through flexibility rather than rigid discipline, and where he meets Dink Meeker, who teaches him that the teachers are the enemy and that the game is not worth the destruction it causes. The army's chaotic culture, embodied by Rose the Nose's crude humor and Dink's independent training, provides a stark contrast to the honor-obsessed Bonzo Madrid and prepares Ender for his own command of Dragon Army, where he will combine the discipline of Salamander with the flexibility of Rat. Rat Army also serves as a microcosm of the Battle School's larger tensions: the myth of Jewish military genius, the resentment of American hegemony, and the growing suspicion that the war against the buggers may be a pretext for political control. When Ender leaves Rat Army to become commander of Dragon Army, he carries with him the lessons of Dink's cynicism and Rose's pragmatism, and he applies them to create an army that is more flexible and more innovative than any that has come before. Rat Army, in turn, continues to be a competitive force, and its commander, Rose the Nose, eventually graduates, succeeded by Dink Meeker, who finally accepts command. The army's legacy is thus intertwined with Ender's own rise, and it stands as a testament to the idea that winning is not always about order and discipline, but about understanding the enemy and adapting to the situation.
