Colonel Banning is the commanding officer of Marine Rotational Force–Darwin with III Marine Expeditionary Force. He is an armor officer by background. He deployed to Operation Iraqi Freedom 1 as a tank company commander with 1st Marine Regiment and to Iraqi Freedom 2 as a member of 1st Marines’ Operations Division. He has attended Amphibious Warfare School, the Army Command and General Staff College, the School of Advanced Warfighting, Defense Language Institute for Japanese, and the Japanese National Institute of Defense Studies.
