Marine Corps Essay Contest, 2nd Prize Winner
"The U.S. Marine Corps has evolved its mystical appeal slowly, through an unusual combination of circumstance, good fortune, and, most of all, conviction in the hearts of resolute men. It is a combination that has both strengthened and brought glory to the United States."1
-Lieutenant General Victor Krulak, 1986
Combatants all over the world search for ways to become more lethal and improve their nation's performance in battle by purchasing new technologies, tightening training regimens, and seeking tactical innovation. Any examination of warfighting excellence ultimately comes down to results. The United States Marine Corps has earned the reputation as the fiercest warfighting organization in the world. That is a bold statement, but the Marine Corps wins and it wins every time. Why? The Corps' greatest asset is not its technology, tactics, or training. The Marines have created, and feed on, a culture of warfighting defined by victory, confidence, discipline, and loyalty. This culture of warfighting excellence has carried them from the Corps' birth 230 years ago through today's stability operations in third-world countries.
Victory plus. . .
The Marine Corps creates a special environment to improve the stock of socially transmitted behavior. Marines expect to win every fight they enter whether it is a backyard brawl or stabilizing a small country. This expectation enhances the Corps' warfighting ability because it is based upon 230 years of history. One source states that the United States Marine Corps was the only combat arm during World War II to win every battle it fought.2 Although small garrisons in the Pacific at the outset of the war were overwhelmed, the Marines never lost an island once they set foot on it. Many in the early days of World War II considered Wake Island to be a moral victory, somewhat akin to the Battle of the Alamo. The Marines, however, remember that 449 of their own and three airplanes held out for 13 days against the Japanese fleet, a carrier air wing, and 12,000 soldiers before their tiny garrison was overrun. Some historians point to the sinking of two Japanese cruisers and the lifting of American morale as constituting a victory. Certainly the country, desperate for good news in December 1941, thought so.
Confidence plus . . .
Memory of past victories reinforces confidence, which feeds the Marines' culture. Every recruit and officer candidate is taught that Marines have the ability to accomplish any assigned mission. This confidence has been called institutional arrogance but the reality is that ". . . if you tell a guy enough times that he is the best, eventually he'll start to believe it... [and] that makes a person very dangerous to his enemies."3 The Marines turn this into self-fulfilling prophecy.
Marines, as individuals and as an organization, are confident, which leads to an increased proclivity to take risks that lead to greater margins of success. More and frequent successes reinforce confidence. This relationship is seen in baseball where base stealing—inherently risky—is an important tactic to get runners into scoring position. It is much easier to score from second or third base than first so the possible reward weighs against the risk. A base runner's success reinforces the manager's confidence that a successful outcome is likely and increases the manager's willingness to take on future risk. The Corps uses its past successes to bolster confidence for future successes, which consequently encourages Marines to take the risks that have the highest rewards. Marines—and the nation—simply expect to win every time. Success breeds success and confidence becomes a commodity for future investment.
Discipline plus . . .
If confidence is the currency of warfighting excellence, then discipline is the means of depositing it into the Marine Corps' account. Marines are forged in a crucible of discipline; from the earliest days of recruit training they are taught that nothing is too hard and discipline is life. Lord Moran wrote in his seminal study of courage in World War II that "discipline can form a habit and the force of habit is regal."4 He further states that the main element of courage is discipline. Courage has obvious importance in battle but the subtlety of discipline has its own value, which should not be overlooked.
An old adage says that discipline is what kicks in when motivation runs out. Discipline is what enabled lieutenant Presley O'Bannon and the Marines he led to march across hundreds of miles of desert and defeat the Pasha in Derna on "the shores of Tripoli." Discipline sustained the 26th Marine Regiment in repelling 77 days of assault from 30,000 North Vietnamese troops at the siege of Khe Sanh. Disciplined combatants refuse to quit—or lose. Discipline leads Marines to pursue solutions when there are no apparent options. During the 1st Marine Division's assault into Baghdad in the initial phase of Operation Iraqi Freedom, a minefield and the forces defending the city stopped the division. Avoiding the obstacle was not an option. There could be no report on the news networks that: ". . . the Marines were advancing steadily but then they ran into a minefield and now they are done. Film at eleven. . . ." American citizens expect—and demand—victory from their Marines. It took combat engineers three attempts to breach that minefield. No one ever asked how long it took, only-did the Marines get through? Discipline moves Marines through minefields and wins battles.
Loyalty equals ...
All Marines are taught in their formative years to take care of the Marines alongside them. Loyalty is fundamental to their ethos—Semper Fidelis—Always Faithful-the statement of purpose that has defined the role of loyalty over more than two centuries. A Marine's job description is simply the two words "Always Faithful." They live that motto because it works. A veteran of the Normandy landing in World War II summed up the impact of loyalty: "They know they should get out. Everything tells them they should run; but they don't. They stay and other people see them stay and they come back to help them. They're the ones who win the wars."5
Loyalty, like discipline, is contagious. The more frequently it is seen, the more it is practiced. Marines practice loyalty across three dimensions. They are first loyal vertically, along the chain of command. Missions are accomplished, in part, because of trust in the commander and the desire not to disappoint him.
They are horizontally loyal to their peers. Much has been written about them fighting for and harder because of the men on either side of them. The Corps uses the incredible pull of personal loyalty to strengthen and invest in itself; loyalty is taught and modeled by experienced Marines to the younger generation. "Man is not responsible for himself alone, but also for his comrades. He who can do more and has a greater capacity of accomplishment must instruct the inexperienced and weaker ones."6
The third dimension is loyalty to ideas. Analysts are hard pressed to find a more patriotic group of people than the Marines. They view themselves, quite literally, as America's warriors and take the responsibility as the defenders of freedom much more seriously than any cliche communicates. At their heart and core, they embrace the responsibility of fighting the nation's battles. This passion is a national asset and drives them to be the best warfighters in the world.
The concept of excellence further defines the Marine Corps' culture. Good enough is not for Marines who set high standards and then work to exceed them. This is a fitting focus as the nation sets high standards for Marines and expects them to be met. The Corps does not disappoint. Consider Task Force 58's movement into Afghanistan in response to the September 11th attacks. The Marine Corps is by definition an amphibious force yet Afghanistan is a land-locked country. Conventional wisdom required an overland convoy through neighboring countries and weeks of diplomatic wrangling for permissions. The Corps instead conducted the world's deepest amphibious raid by flying 400 miles inland and surprising the Taliban. Once again, Marine operations encouraged a nation in desperate need of good news.
Culture
Culture as a warfighting asset is self-perpetuating. Older Marines teach the younger who grow to become the culture's caretakers. The Corps' warfighting culture is an annuity investment—it has value now but will be more valuable in the future. Former Secretary of the Navy Richard Danzig said, "The biggest virtue of the Corps is its sense of itself."7 No organization in America does a better job of teaching its history and values to its newest members. Recruits at boot camp are drilled on famous Marine leaders and battles. Marines of all ranks remember and celebrate those heroes and the Marine Corps birthday is celebrated with the reverence that would make a vicar jealous.
Try an experiment. Pick any Marine you know and ask him or her to name the two Marines who have twice earned the Medal of Honor, the only Marine to earn four Navy Crosses, and to give you the date of the Marine Corps' birthday. Then go to a representative of another armed service and ask that person to name any two Medal of Honor awardees and the birth date of his or her service. The results simply illustrate the value of culture to the Corps. It is this strength of culture that fuels the Marine warfighting machine with a renewable resource.
Americans seem to breathe a collective sigh of relief when the Marines are called to action. There is something deeply comforting to the American psyche about the thought that the Marines have landed and the situation is well in hand. Their culture is the core of the Marines' warfighting prowess. Their warfighting ability is braced by interlocking cultural attributes that are significantly more valuable than the latest technological invention or tactical application.
Marines win because they expect to win—confidence. Marines win because they refuse to lose—discipline. Marines win because they don't want to let down their buddy, their boss, or the country—loyalty. Marines achieve because they set high standards, work to exceed them, and celebrate their history of winning—excellence.
These traits are tremendously valuable and form the culture that makes the Marine Corps a unique asset to the nation. Lieutenant General James Conway said it well: "The Greeks had their Spartans. The Romans had their Centurions and the French had their Imperial Guard. America has her Marines."8
1 Victor Krulak. "A Soldier's Dilemma," Marine Corps Gazette. Quantico, VA: Marine Corps Association, November 1986, p. 222.
2 James Bradley and Ron Powers. Flags of Our Fathers, New York: Bantam Books, May 2000, p. 134.
3 Flags of Our Fathers, p. 161.
4 Lord Moran. The Anatomy of Courage. London: Constable and Company, Ltd., 1945, p. 171.
5 Colonel Barney Oldfield, interviewed in the video "Into the Breach: Saving Private Ryan." Dreamworks LLC, 1998.
6 Ludwig Beck, Die Truppenfuhrung (Troop Leading). Berlin: German Field Service Regulations, 1933, paragraph 12.
7 John Greenwood. "Editorial: Educating for Tomorrow," Marine Corps Gazette. Quantico, VA: Marine Corps Association, November 1999, p. 4.
8 Then Major General James T. Conway, address to Marines of 1st Combat Engineer Battalion, Camp Pendleton, CA, 2 August 2002.
Major Jernigan is an active duty Marine. He previously served as a battalion commander and a Commandant's National Fellow. He is currently assigned to Marine Forces Pacific.