The late 1940s was a tumultuous time for the U.S. Marine Corps. Amid interservice feuding and postwar budget tightening, funding for the Corps was cut to the quick. The Fleet Marine Force and the service’s air arm seemed perilously close to extinction.
Near the height of the crisis, in November 1949, Proceedings magazine published an article by Marine Reserve Major J. N. Rentz. In “Marine Corps Aviation—An Infantryman’s Opinion,” he methodically built a case for Marine air. The argument hinged on the fact that, while the Air Force emphasized strategic bombing and interdiction missions, Marine aviation had pioneered and specialized in “close-in air support,” what’s now called close air support—aircraft providing direct assistance to ground troops engaged in combat.
Major Rentz closed with prophetic words: “If another war comes we must be completely prepared. Infantrymen who will be engaged in mortal combat desire the highly trained specialists of Marine Corps Aviation in the planes flying about overhead, prepared at any instant to render close-in air support.”
Ten months later in Korea, the close air support Leathernecks on the ground received from their brothers above during Pusan Perimeter battles led an envious Army regimental commander to beseech Lieutenant General Matthew Ridgway, “We just have to have air support like that or we might as well disband the infantry and join the Marines.”
In this issue of Naval History, we close out the centennial of Marine Corps aviation by examining the service’s development and use of close air support, a story that begins in the jungles of Nicaragua in 1927 and stretches to the present day in Afghanistan. Retired Marine Colonel Joseph Alexander leads off with “Close Air Support: The Pioneering Years.” A longtime contributor to Naval History, Colonel Alexander earned the magazine’s 2010 Author of the Year award for one of his articles in that year’s April issue, “A Bitter Hemorrhage of Fighting,” about the 1st Marine Division’s grueling 1944 battle for Peleliu.
Marine Colonel Glen Butler’s article, “A Vital Concept Refined,” picks up the story in the post–Korean War era and carries it forward into the skies over Iraq and Afghanistan. A theme running through his piece is the Corps’ increasing use of the helicopter as the close-air-support instrument of delivery. Having served two tours in Iraq with Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 169, the colonel has firsthand knowledge of the subject. During one close-air mission at Najaf, Iraq, he snapped the photo on page 24 of his wingman firing rockets at an enemy mortar emplacement.
Elsewhere in this issue, “Climax of Isolationism, Countdown to World War,” by retired Army Lieutenant Colonel Frank N. Roberts Jr., commemorates another significant anniversary. Seventy-five years ago Japanese aircraft launched an unprovoked attack against the USS Panay on China’s Yangtze River, sinking the gunboat. On board was Colonel Roberts’ father, Army Captain Frank Roberts, a military attaché who was being evacuated from Nanking. For his “display of coolness, resourcefulness and tact” during the attack and afterward, when as the senior uninjured American officer he took command of the survivors ashore, Captain Roberts earned the Navy Cross.