Marine Corps History

Issues of Marine Corps History can be found on the History Division 

Website at https://www.history.usmc.mil under Publications.
The History Division is moving!

History Division will be moving to the Simmons Marine Corps History Center, part of the Marine Corps University. The new state-of-the-art wing will bring together all of the Marine Corps University schools into one 

unit. The structure will offer many new features and amenities for the student body, faculty, and staff at Marine 

Corps Base Quantico.

New History Division Publication!

U.S. Marines and Irregular Warfare

Training and Education, 2000–2010

Dr. Nicholas J. Schlosser

U.S. Marines and Irregular Warfare covers 

a period of considerable intellectual activity for the U.S. Marine Corps. The initial 

fighting during the Iraq and Afghanistan 

Wars convinced many Marine leaders 

that it needed to strengthen and enhance 

how it trained and educated Marines 

in counterinsurgency (COIN) operations. This book recounts the work of 

Marines and educators in the field and 

at home at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, and at Marine Corps Air 

Ground Combat Center, Twentynine 

Palms, California.
PRESIDENT

of Marine Corps University

Brigadier General H. G. Pratt

...

DIRECTOR

of History Division

Dr. Charles P. Neimeyer

DEPUTY DIRECTOR

Paul J. Weber

CHIEF HISTORIAN 

Charles D. Melson

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT

Cassandra Bennett

...

HISTORIES BRANCH

Charles D. Melson (Branch Head); 

J. Michael Miller; Douglas Nash; 

Paul W. Westermeyer

...

HISTORICAL REFERENCE BRANCH

Pete Ferraro (Branch Head); Annette 

D. Amerman; Beth L. Crumley; Kara R. 

Newcomer; Shelia Phillips

...

ORAL HISTORY

and VIDEO SECTION

Dr. Fred Allison and Dr. Tom Baughn

...

EDITING AND DESIGN BRANCH

Angela J. Anderson (Branch Head); 

Jennifer Clampet; Nora Ellis; W. Stephen Hill; Robert A. Kocher; Gregory A. 

Macheak; Vincent J. Martinez; Christianna Sanders; Shawn H. Vreeland

...

MARINE CORPS

HISTORY DIVISION

3078 Upshur Avenue

Quantico, Virginia 22134

Telephone (703) 432-4877

http://www.history.usmc.mil

history.division@usmc.mil

...

COMMANDANT OF THE

MARINE CORPS

Department of the Navy

Headquarters United States

Marine Corps

3000 Marine Corps Pentagon 

Room 2B253

Washington, DC 20530-3000

OFFICIAL BUSINESS

PCN 10600011300

Director’s Foreword

Dr. Charles P. Neimeyer

Operation Steel Dawn II 

The Raid on Bahram Chah 

Colonel Nathan S. Lowrey, USMCR, (Ret)

From Making Men to Making Marines 

Marine Corps Recruiting During World War II

Zayna N. Bizri

Vietnam Marines and the Defense of 

Quang Tri in 1972

Charles D. Melson

Counselor of War

General Wallace M. Greene Jr. and the Escalation

of the Vietnam War, 1964–65

Dr. Nicholas J. Schlosser

Book Reviews

Victory Fever on Guadalcanal:

Japan’s First Land Defeat of World War II

James A. Smith

History Division’s Publications:

Marines in the Vietnam War

Paul W. Westermeyer

Defend and Befriend:

The U.S. Marine Corps and Combined

Action Platoons in Vietnam

Lieutenant Colonel Edward T. Nevgloski

Da Nang Diary:

A Forward Air Controller’s Gunsight View

of Flying With SOG

Dr. Fred H. Allison

Al Gray, Marine:

The Early Years, 1950–1967, Vol. 1

Charles D. Melson

Underdogs: The Making of the Modern

Marines Corps

David J. Ulbrich

3

6

23

37

50

67

71

74

76

78

80

 Volume 1, Number 1 Summer 2015

Cover Art:

“Gunner” by LCpl Richard R. Yaco, USMC

The gunner of a Boeing CH-46 Sea 

Knight helicopter from Marine Medium Helicopter Squadron 262, 

Marine Aircraft Group 39, at Quang 

Tri, Vietnam, in 1968.

Welcome to the inaugural edition of 

Marine Corps History (MCH) magazine, which replaces the Marine 

Corps Historical Program’s bulletin Fortitudine. MCH will contain substantive book 

reviews and features on new History Division publications, but most importantly, scholarly, in-depth 

analyses of Marine Corps’ history on all elements of 

the Corps—culture, technology, doctrine.

The genesis of Fortitudine as a newsletter began 

in the early 1970s, renamed as a bulletin in the summer of 1987, and stayed as such until the present day. 

The focus of the 24-page newsletter was the Marine 

Corps Historical Program, which later became History Division. The content spanned a range of stories, 

reader feedback, awards, quizzes, Corps chronology, 

combat artists, museum acquisitions, new books, 

etc. The publication was written for general audiences with some knowledge of the Marine Corps. In 

general, the stories were short, usually no more than 

a couple pages, with a focus on the narrative of the 

moment.

In contrast, Marine Corps History will deliver 

scholarly military history articles that demonstrate 

both the author’s and the reader’s deeper understanding of the topic. By encouraging academic 

rigor, History Division can make a more direct contribution to Marine Corps University, its students, 

researchers, and the general public. All submissions 

selected for publication undergo peer review by an 

editorial review board made up of subject matter experts. Hopefully, this change in focus demonstrates 

the core mission of Marine Corps University by providing ongoing academic military education that 

connects with the students’ education before and after they leave campus. 

In this, the first issue of Marine Corps History, 

Colonel Nathan Lowrey, who recently retired from 

the Reserves but is still an active historian with the 

Joint History Office, delves into Marine Corps operations in Afghanistan. Lowrey also previously served 

the History Division for a number of years as a historian, deputy director, and as a member of its Individual Marine Augment (IMA) detachment. He is 

Dr. Charles P. Neimeyer

Director, History Division

Marine Corps University

Dr. Charles P. Neimeyer: the director is responsible for the collection, production, publication, 

and dissemination of Marine Corps history and 

manages the functioning of a wide variety of Marine Corps historical programs. 

FOREWORD

Photo by Sgt Joseph R. Chenelly

Marines with Company C, Battalion Landing Team 1/1, 

15th Marine Expeditionary Unit (Special Operations 

Capable), raise the first American flag in Afghanistan 

on 26 November 2001 as Operation Enduring Freedom begins. 

DIRECTOR’S

3
4 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

the author of the acclaimed History Division monograph, From the Sea: U.S. Marines in Afghanistan, 

2001–2002. Colonel Lowrey’s article, “Operation 

Steel Dawn II: The Raid on Bahram Chah” highlights 

Marine Air-Ground Task Force (MAGTF) operations in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, a subject 

that will likely resonate with a number of Marines 

today. Lowrey specifically focuses on Marine Corps 

efforts to interdict the Taliban and its drug smuggling activities in and around the village of Bahram 

Chah, a dangerous location once described by then 

Major General Richard Mills, the I MEF forward 

commanding general, as “a dark and evil place.” The 

colonel’s contemporary history article sheds light on 

the intense combat operations as they occurred in 

Helmand Province.

From the austere terrain of Afghanistan, we move 

further back in time to the Corps’ involvement in the 

Second World War. Former History Division intern 

Ms. Zayna Bizri offers a period-specific perspective on the changing role of women in society and 

the military in “From Making Men to Making Marines: Marine Corps Recruiting During World War 

II.” Bizri is working to complete her doctoral degree 

at George Mason University. This article represents 

a revised version of Bizri’s presentation at the 2015 

meeting of the Society of Military Historians held 

in Montgomery, Alabama. The information generated great discussion from the audience and highlights how gender studies and the military is just as 

active an issue today as it was when the war began. 

The author focuses on the period of Marine Corps 

history involving the recruitment and retention of 

female Marines (officers and enlisted) during World 

War II as compared to the methods the Corps used 

Photo courtesy of CSM Mike Martin, USA (Ret)

Vietnamese Marine infantry being airlifted into combat in Quang Tri Province on Bell UH1 Iroquois helicopters.

Marine Corps Art Collection

“Serve . . . Women Marines” by Wayne Blickenstaff, 9 

November 1955.
Summer 2015 5

to recruit males for active service. While this article 

serves as a direct contrast to the operational histories 

that the History Division has traditionally focused 

on, it sheds a great deal of light on gender issues and a 

woman’s role in military service that continues today.

Chief Historian Charles Melson then offers an introspective analysis of the inter-Service rivalries that 

impacted Marine Corps activities in Southeast Asia 

in an article titled, “Vietnam Marines and the Defense of Quang Tri in 1972.” This piece becomes a 

capstone to Melson’s long and successful career as a 

Marine and as chief historian for the History Division. Early in his military career, Melson served at 

the conclusion of the Vietnam War in Quang Tri 

Province, making this article a poignant reminder 

of his service and focusing predominately on the activities of the Vietnamese Marine Corps (along with 

a handful of U.S. Marine Corps advisors) and their 

efforts to halt the massive “Easter Offensive” of the 

North Vietnamese Army. Melson sheds light on a little known aspect of the Vietnam War and the South 

Vietnamese Marines who valiantly attempted to hold 

their ground when so many were fleeing southward 

in panic and confusion. 

Former History Division historian Nicholas 

Schlosser rounds out the discussion of the Vietnam 

War with a stateside perspective on the political 

machinations taking place as the Corps leadership 

attempts to define its role on the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

in an article titled, “Counselor of War: General Wallace M. Greene Jr. and the Escalation of the Vietnamese War, 1964–65.” Dr. Schlosser recently joined the 

U.S. Army Center of Military History; however, prior 

to his departure, he was actively engaged in completing what will be his next published work, The Greene 

Papers: General Wallace M. Greene Jr. and the Escalation of the Vietnam War (October 2015). Schlosser’s 

work represents pathbreaking scholarship in that 

some of General Greene’s letters relating to the Vietnam War have only recently been declassified. 

On 7 August 2015, the president of Marine 

Corps University, Brigadier General Helen B. Pratt, 

USMCR, along with the then 36th Commandant of 

the Marine Corps, General Joseph F. Dunford Jr., 

Senator John W. Warner, and Mr. Clark Simmons, 

the son of History Division Director emeritus Brigadier General Edwin H. Simmons, will rededicate the 

Brigadier General Edwin H. Simmons Marine Corps 

History Center and the Warner Center for Advanced 

Military Studies. Soon thereafter, the History Division will once again move to its final location, representing the third move in a decade. The new Marine 

Corps History Center will offer a state-of-the-art 

research venue for historians and other interested 

scholars with access to the university’s experts and 

historical documents in a single location: History 

Division, Special Collections and Archives, etc. 

As we move forward with this new venture in providing Marine Corps-specific history to our readers, 

I encourage you to become engaged with our process by submitting articles or even planning a visit 

to our modern research facilities. It is our hope that 

leaders like Generals Simmons and Greene and the 

Marine Corps community will be pleased by this 

dedication to and focus on professional military 

education. s1775s

Defense Department (Marine Corps) 2-224-66

Gen Wallace M. Greene Jr., Commandant of the Marine 

Corps, confers with a young lieutenant of the 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, in Vietnam 1966.
Colonel Nathan S. Lowrey, USMCR (Ret)

Joint History Office

Introduction

While speaking at a May 2003 news 

conference in Kabul, Secretary of 

Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld declared optimistically that Coalition 

operations in Afghanistan had “clearly . . . moved 

from major combat activity to a period of stability 

and stabilization and reconstruction activities.”1

 Benign neglect over the next three years, however, allowed the Taliban to regroup, to adopt new tactics, 

and to expand their insurgency to the south and 

east.2

 A British contingent of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) assumed command of 

Regional Command South (RC-South) in 2006, but 

encountered significant resistance when it attempted 

to challenge enemy activity in the area, particularly 

in Helmand Province to the southwest, where the 

enemy tended to operate with near impunity.3

Around the same time—as hostilities in Iraq began to decline—Commandant of the Marine Corps 

James T. Conway sought a more active role for his 

Service in Afghanistan.4

 The number of Marine 

expeditionary forces in southwestern Afghanistan 

increased, with the type of deployed units growing 

steadily from a regimental to a brigade and finally to 

a corps-size presence. Two months after the arrival 

of Major General Richard P. Mills and I Marine Expeditionary Force (I MEF/Task Force Leatherneck) 

in April 2010, Marines established Regional Command Southwest (RC-SW) in Helmand and Nimroz 

Provinces.5

 In addition to allowing senior leaders 

to focus on smaller geographic areas, the new command enhanced the Marines’ autonomy and allowed 

them to maintain an offensive posture while working to extend security throughout the region.

Operation Steel Dawn II—a joint raid against an 

enemy command center and logistics hub in Bahram 

Chah, Afghanistan, during October 2010—exemplified I MEF’s aggressiveness as well as the operational 

utility of the Marine air-ground task force. Nestled 

in a remote desert valley among the Chagai Hills, 

Bahram Chah is situated in the southernmost district in Helmand Province. Its isolation and proximity to the Pakistani border provided the Taliban 

with a safe haven ideal for pursuing a wide range of 

illicit activities. In addition to an al-Qaeda training 

camp and Taliban prison, the area housed facilities 

for producing improvised explosive devices (IEDs). 

The Bahram Chah bazaar served as a central location for smuggling fighters, weapons, ammunition, 

and explosives northward into Afghanistan and for 

moving refined opium, heroin, and other narcotics 

southward out of the country.6

 Major General Mills 

THE RAID ON BAHRAM CHAH

Operation Steel Dawn II

1 Associated Press, “Rumsfeld Declares Major Combat Over in Afghanistan,” Fox News, 1 May 2003.

2 Thomas H. Johnson and M. Chris Mason, “Understanding the Taliban and Insurgency in Afghanistan,” Orbis 51, no. 1 (Winter 2007): 72, 81–82, 

84.

3 Jeffrey A. Dressler, Securing Helmand: Understanding and Responding to the Enemy, Afghanistan Report 2 (Washington, DC: Institute for the 

Study of War, 2009), 7, 33–34.

4 Ann Scott Tyson, “Marines’ Afghanistan Plan Sparks Debate,” Washington Post, 12 October 2007, A-14. 5 ISAF Joint Command-Afghanistan, “Regional Command Southwest Stands Up in Afghanistan,” Resolute Support News, 14 June 2010.

6 Dressler, Securing Helmand, 13; I MEF Navy Unit Commendation recommendation, 26 July 2012 (Military Awards Branch [MilAwdsBr], Headquarters Marine Corps [HQMC], Quantico, VA); and Sgt Stuart R. Sanford intvw with Maj Beth Wolney, 8 February 2011 (Oral History Collection 

[Oral HistColl]). All oral history materials cited in this work can be found at the Gray Research Center (GRC), Quantico, VA.

6
Summer 2015 7

considered it “a dark and evil place” and decided to 

deny the enemy sanctuary.7

Background

Coalition forces were aware of the town’s notorious 

reputation and had been raiding Bahram Chah on a 

regular basis for six years. Established by the Taliban 

in the mid-1990s, the town tripled in size between 

2002 and 2005, with as many as 1,000 drug traffickers 

operating in the area on a busy day. Coalition forces 

first confronted the enemy sanctuary in May 2005 

when the recently established Afghan Special Narcotics Force (ASNF) raided the town’s bazaar during 

a three-day operation to eliminate drug laboratories 

in southern Helmand Province. Although the drug 

traffickers fled to safety across the Pakistani border 

before the raid force arrived, ASNF personnel seized 

250 kilograms of heroin, 2.5 tons of opium, and 3.5 

tons of precursor chemicals used to manufacture 

heroin.8

The Taliban retaliated four months later by ambushing a company-size Afghan National Police convoy as it traveled south through a canyon located five 

kilometers north of Bahram Chah. The attack began 

shortly before nightfall, with insurgents firing down 

from all directions. When the fighting ended seven 

hours later, six vehicles had been seized or destroyed 

and 18 police officers had been killed, including the 

provincial deputy police chief.9

Not to be deterred, the ASNF raided Bahram Chah 

several times in April 2006. During the first operation, the antinarcotics force seized 75 kilograms of 

opium resin and arrested one suspect. During the 

second operation, the force arrested four suspects, 

seized 1,000 kilograms of opium, and destroyed an 

arsenal of heavy weapons discovered in an underground bunker. A third raid resulted in the death of 

one drug dealer as well as the seizure of substantial 

amounts of heroin, morphine, opium, and drugmaking chemicals.10

In May 2007, a U.S. electronic surveillance unit 

(Task Force Orange) tracked Mullah Dadullah to 

Bahram Chah. Released two months earlier during 

a controversial prisoner exchange, Dadullah was 

a senior Taliban military commander and trusted 

advisor to Mullah Omar, the infamous one-eyed 

Taliban leader. After a small reconnaissance element determined that air strikes alone were insufficient to ensure Dadullah’s elimination, Afghan 

special operations forces and 50 commandos from 

C Squadron, British Special Boat Service (SBS), were 

inserted by two Royal Air Force Boeing CH-47 Chinook helicopters. Although immediately targeted 

by rifles, machine guns, and rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), the assault force maneuvered forward 

against the walled compound’s 20 defenders. After 

a four-hour firefight, during which the commandos 

suffered four casualties, the facility was cleared and 

Dadullah killed.11

In October 2008, Afghani, Pakistani, and Arabic militants gathered at Bahram Chah. Coalition 

aircraft struck the group with precision munitions 

during a nighttime raid after ground reconnaissance 

forces positively identified the insurgents. Although 

an ISAF spokesman said that the target had been a 

small number of Taliban commanders, an Afghan 

official from Helmand Province claimed that two 

vehicles were destroyed and as many as 70 fighters 

killed.12

Bahram Chah may have escaped the Coalition’s 

attention in 2009, but southwestern Afghanistan did 

not. Arriving that spring as a vanguard of President 

7 MajGen Richard P. Mills intvw with Dr. Kimberly Kagan, 2 May 2011 (Oral HistColl).

8 “Largest Drugs Bazaar Raided,” PakTribune, 31 May 2005, http://paktribune.com/news/Largest-Drugs-Bazaar-raided-107625.html; and Waheed, “Afghan Forces Destroy Country’s Largest Drug Bazaar,” Afghan Warrior (blog), 5 June 2005, http://afghanwarrior.blogspot.com/2005/06

/afghan-forces-destroy-countrys-largest.html.

9 Ron Synovitz, “Afghanistan: Police Chief Says Smugglers Helped Taliban with Ambush,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 11 October 2005, 

www.rferl.org/content/article/1062020. 

10 “Afghanistan Raids Drug Bazaar Near Pakistan Border,” Voice of America News, 11 April 2006; Daniel Cooney, “U.S. Warns Afghanistan Violence Will Worsen,” ABC News, 3 April 2006; and Reuters, “Afghans Seize Four Tonnes of Drugs, Arrest Seven,” Afghanistan News Center, 12 

April 2006, http://www.afghanistannewscenter.com/news/2006/april/apr122006.html.

11 “Special Boat Service Operations—Hunting Mullah Dadullah,” Elite UK Forces, 12 May 2007, http://www.eliteukforces.info/special-boat-service/operations/mullah-dadullah/.

12 “Seventy Taliban Said Killed in Afghanistan,” Reuters, 15 October 2008; “Up to 70 Taliban Killed in Afghan Strike: Local Official,” Agence 

France-Presse, 15 October 2008; and “70 Taliban Killed in Afghan Strike,” Daily Times, 16 October 2008, http://archives.dailytimes.com.pk

/national/16-Oct-2008/70-taliban-killed-in-afghan-strike.
8 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

Barack H. Obama’s eventual troop surge, 2d Marine Expeditionary Brigade deployed to Helmand 

Province and began clearing operations to break a 

stalemate that had existed between British and Taliban forces for three years. In July during Operation 

Khanjar (Strike of the Sword), three Marine battalions pushed south from Camp Bastion and occupied 

key population centers in Garmsir, Nawa-I-Barakzayi, and Khan Neshin. 

The 2d Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion 

(2d LAR) occupied Khan Neshin and established the 

Marines’ southern flank in the rural Khan Neshin 

District. Light armored reconnaissance forces continued to patrol the area during successive troop 

rotations, conducting counterinsurgency (COIN) 

operations along the lower Helmand River valley 

and interdiction operations across the southwest 

desert. Lieutenant Colonel Michael Martin, who 

commanded 4th LAR in December 2009, explained 

that while he would have welcomed an outpost at 

Bahram Chah, the battalion lacked sufficient resources and the town’s isolation would have placed 

his Marines at risk.13

Lieutenant Colonel Scott D. Leonard and 1st LAR 

Defense Imagery 101029-M-0000A-001

A light armored vehicle from Task Force Highlander (1st 

LAR) sits outside the Bahram Chah bazaar on 30 October 2010 during Operation Steel Dawn II. 

13 Sebastian Abbot, “Taliban Sneak Past Marines in Southern Afghanistan,” Associated Press, 16 December 2009.

14 Maj John R. Bitonti II intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 7 February 2011 (Oral HistColl); Maj John R. Bitonti II award, 2 December 2010 (MilAwdsBr, 

HQMC, Quantico, VA); and Sgt Dean Davis, “Charlie Company Marines Travel Far and Wide to Reach Afghan Locals,” Marine Corps News, 4 

June 2010.

(Task Force Highlander) assumed tactical responsibility for Reg-e Khan Neshin District, Helmand 

Province, (Area of Operations Mameluke) in May 

2010. Task Force Highlander’s headquarters was located at Combat Outpost Payne, situated near the 

district center in Khan Neshin on the northern side 

of the lower Helmand River “fishhook.” Tasked with 

disrupting enemy operations throughout the region, 

Leonard assigned three of his maneuver companies 

to sectors of responsibility within the battalion’s 

750-square-kilometer area of operations; a fourth 

company supported I MEF operations in the Kajaki 

District to the north.

Companies A and C, commanded by Major John 

R. Bitonti II and Captain Jason T. Ford, focused on 

COIN operations conducted along the north and 

south banks of the lower Helmand River. These distributed operations had dispersed platoons assigned 

to areas of responsibility. The Marines patrolled actively to engage the populace and secure the region’s 

thoroughfares, a physically demanding and dangerous mission that often became kinetic. Ambushes 

or strikes from IEDs buried along the dirt roadways 

were common and a constant concern. Each Marine 

company also worked diligently to develop the civil 

infrastructure, local government, and national security forces in their sectors.14

Farther south, operating in a more austere and 

sparsely populated area, Captain Adrian B. Haskamp commanded Company B. Lieutenant Colonel 

Leonard realigned the battalion’s assets to take advantage of the armored vehicle’s mobility and directed Company B to focus on interdicting the enemy’s 

clandestine transportation routes, or ratlines, running through southern Helmand Province. During 

long-range patrols that lasted up to 30 days and were 

conducted more than 100 kilometers from the closest support facilities, the company split into platoons 

and sections to search for contraband and to document the region’s demography. Assisted by intelligence, reconnaissance, and surveillance (ISR) assets 

that helped direct their efforts, the Marines detained 

21 suspects for questioning, identified two enemy 
Summer 2015 9

command and control nodes, and seized more than 

4,400 kilograms of opium, 1,750 kilograms of ammonium nitrate, and 70 IED components. The Marines’ presence severely restricted Taliban movement 

and forced the enemy to shift its trafficking routes 

farther west and east into the desert.15

During 2010, as Coalition forces expanded their 

influence over southwestern Helmand Province, 

Bahram Chah received a greater amount of military attention. On 22 March, a combined patrol 

operating in Registan District stopped two vehicles 

transporting 725 kilograms of hashish to the enemy 

transshipment center.16 On 2 June, U.S. Air Force 

aircraft launched a missile and rocket at enemy positions that had fired on Coalition forces operating 

near Bahram Chah.17 Then, on 1 July, Afghan special 

operating forces and British SBS commandos again 

raided the town’s bazaar.18

In the latter action, commandos were inserted via 

CH-47 helicopters near the village of Haji Wakil. 

They arrived around 0200 hours and, shortly after, encountered enemy resistance. Forward progress remained difficult, and the commandos had to 

maneuver through an orchard while being fired on 

from all directions. The commandos did accomplish 

their mission, but Royal Marine Corporal Seth Stephens was killed and at least one other team member 

wounded during the five-hour firefight.19

Although clear evidence of enemy activity in Bahram Chah was found, the military operation had 

been costly. The commando’s ground assault force 

was unable to sufficiently support the withdrawal 

of the raid force, and 1st LAR—despite being designated the regional quick reaction force—was not 

contacted when the situation began to deteriorate. 

On 19 September, Coalition aircraft launched two 

rounds of precision munitions at the town’s bazaar, 

destroying an IED factory and 4,500 pounds of explosives material.20

Planning and Preparation

Lieutenant Colonel Leonard and those from Task 

Force 210 discussed the problems with Bahram Chah 

that summer, but waited until early October to propose a raid of the enemy’s logistics base. The proposal 

was presented to Brigadier General Joseph L. Osterman and 1st Marine Division (1st MarDiv Forward) 

staff at Camp Leatherneck.21 During an operational 

debrief, Leonard and his British counterpart described the tactical situation and pitched the concept 

for near-simultaneous air and ground assaults. The 

plan called for two companies driving down from the 

north to screen the bazaar from adjacent residential 

areas to the west and east, enabling the commandos 

to fly in and strike the objective.22 By attacking before 

the Taliban had an opportunity to withdraw southward into Pakistan for the winter, Coalition forces 

could delay the production of IEDs and disrupt enemy operations into the summer of 2011.23

Around 10 October, 1st MarDiv endorsed the 

concept, adding slides to illustrate the mission before submitting it to I MEF (Forward) five days later.24 Major General Mills directed the planning to 

continue and forwarded the proposal to the ISAF 

Joint Command (IJC) for approval. In the end, the 

plan took about two weeks to wend its way up the 

chain of command. At some point, ISAF briefed the 

Afghan government, which in turn notified the Pakistani government 24 hours in advance of the raid, 

enabling the Pakistani Army to withdraw its border 

position—but this may have also alerted the Taliban.25 

Most of the deliberate planning and preparations 

15 Capt Adrian B. Hascamp intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 7 February 2011 (Oral HistColl); LtCol Scott D. Leonard intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 8 February 2011 (Oral HistColl); Capt Adrian B. Hascamp award recommendation, 2 December 2010 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA); and LtCol 

Scott D. Leonard award recommendation, 6 June 2011 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA). 

16 ISAF Joint Command Headquarters, “Joint Patrol Discovers 725 kg of Hashish,” 22 March 2010.

17 “June 2 Airpower Summary: KC-135s Provide Fuel Support,” U.S. Air Force News, 4 June 2010.

18 Thomas Harding, “Special Forces Commando Took on Taliban Single-handedly,” Telegraph, 24 May 2011. 19 Ibid.

20 ISAF Joint Command Headquarters, “IED Factory, Materials Destroyed in Southern Helmand,” 21 September 2010.

21 Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 365 (VMM-365) Command Chronology, hereafter ComdC, October 2010 (GRC, Quantico, VA), Part 2, 3.

22 Leonard intvw. 

23 1stLt Thomas F. Clauss III intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 7 February 2011 (Oral HistColl); and Capt Nicholas S. Rapkoch intvw with LtCol R. S. 

Sellards, 7 February 2011 (Oral HistColl).

24 Capt Nicolas S. Rapkoch award recommendation, 27 December 2010 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA).

25 Leonard intvw.
10 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

Operation Steel Dawn II would ultimately involve “one of the most robust fires packages ever executed in 

Afghanistan,” including a wide variety of offensive aircraft: Rockwell B-1 

Lancer bombers, Fairchild Republic 

A-10 Thunderbolt II attack aircraft, 

Lockheed AC-130 Spectre gunships, 

McDonnell Douglas F/A-18 Hornet 

fighters, and Bell AH-1 Cobra attack 

helicopters.28 While the IJC may have 

understood the rules of engagement, 

Captain Rapkoch later complained, 

the command did not necessarily appreciate their spirit or intent. The IJC 

chose to deny some preassault fires 

against fighting positions associated 

with residential compounds near 

Bahram Chah because the targeting 

requirement for two corroborating 

sources of intelligence in habitable 

areas was not met.29

Marine planners understood that dust or thunderstorms could inhibit the use of aircraft, so an artillery 

presence would be necessary to ensure an all-weather 

fire support capability.30 That task fell to Lieutenant 

Colonel Adolfo Garcia Jr. and 1st Battalion, 11th Marines. The artillerymen were already well known to 

1st LAR—the two battalions had worked together 

during an Enhanced Mojave Viper exercise at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine 

Palms, California, shortly before deploying. After arriving in Afghanistan in May 2010, the 1st Battalion, 

11th Marines, established its headquarters at Fire Base 

Fiddler’s Green. The headquarters, one rocket battery, 

and three cannon batteries operated eight firing positions distributed throughout I MEF’s area of operations. In addition to supporting Regimental Combat 

Teams 2 and 7, the 1st Battalion, 11th Marines, had 

also secured a portion of Route 605 in Marjah and 

conducted COIN operations in the Kajaki District.31

occurred at Combat Outpost Payne.26 One of the 

more difficult issues the planners had to address was 

targeting. Although the first 140 kilometers of the 

proposed route to Bahram Chah included open desert, the final 20 kilometers involved traveling through 

one of two narrow mountain passes to reach the objective. Aware of the region’s recent operational history, the Marines knew they would have to eliminate the 

enemy’s defensive positions along the pass in advance 

of the movement. They developed the plan according 

to doctrine, incorporating shaping fires, suppressive 

fires, and fires in support of obstacle breaches. They 

also observed Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) 

398, which governed the use of supporting fires in 

theater. Captain Nicolas S. Rapkoch, 1st LAR’s fire 

support coordinator, spent many evenings in discussion with the battalion lawyer, struggling to address 

the engagement requirements before seeking ISAF 

approval through the IJC.27

Photo by Cpl Ismael E. Ortega, Defense Imagery 140514-M-RD023-096

Marines with Battery B, 1st Battalion, 11th Marines, fire the M777A2 howitzer during Exercise Desert Scimitar 2014 at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine Palms, California.

26 Ibid.

27 Rapkoch intvw.

28 1st MarDiv ComdC, 16 October—15 November 2010 (MCHC, Quantico, VA) Section 2, Fires; and Rapkoch intvw.

29 1st MarDiv, Task Force Leatherneck After Action Report for Operation Enduring Freedom 10.1–11.1, 24 February 2011 (GRC, Archives, Quantico, VA), 68.

30 LtCol Adolfo Garcia Jr. intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 9 February 2011 (Oral HistColl).

31 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 1 May—21 November 2010 (Marine Corps Heritage Center [MCHC], Quantico, VA) Part 2, 6–44; LtCol 

Adolfo Garcia Jr. comments on draft ms, 10 March 2015 (MCHC, Quantico, VA); and Garcia intvw. 
Summer 2015 11

Because Bahram Chah was located outside the range of the artillery pieces positioned at Combat 

Outpost Payne, artillerymen had 

to accompany the raid force. To facilitate coordination during the operation, Lieutenant Colonel Garcia 

formed an artillery group under the 

command of his operations officer, 

Major David J. Grabow. This special 

purpose task organization included 

the battalion’s jump command post; 

1st Platoon, Battery L, equipped 

with three 155mm light howitzers; 

and 3d Platoon, Battery S, equipped 

with the High Mobility Artillery 

Rocket System (HIMARS).32

In preparation for the raid, Battery S, under Captain Jeffrey S. 

Curtis, conducted test fire ranges at 

Camp Leatherneck on 11 October 

and then at Combat Outpost Payne 

on 14 October.33 The 3d Platoon also 

performed a route reconnaissance 

to a proposed assembly area to ensure the desert terrain was suitable 

for supporting the heavy HIMARS 

during travel.34 In the meantime, 

Captain Bitonti and Company A 

received a warning order, switched 

areas of responsibility with Company C, remounted their armored 

vehicles, and embarked on an intense week of refresher training and 

maintenance.35

On 19 October, organizations 

participating in the operation 

moved toward Combat Outpost Payne, which served 

as an initial staging area for Task Force Highlander. 

The 1st Battalion, 11th Marines’ communications 

platoon, under Captain Ronnie L. Creech, began to 

actively support Operation Steel Dawn II, providing 

the equipment and personnel necessary to operate 

the forward combat operations center.36 Lieutenant 

Colonel Leonard issued an operations order to key 

leaders the following day and, on 22 October, the 

participants reconvened to conduct a detailed rePhoto by Cpl Ismael E. Ortega, Defense Imagery 140518-M-RD023-077

Marines with Battery S, 5th Battalion, 11th Marines, fire the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket System during Exercise Desert Scimitar 2014 at Twentynine Palms. 

Photo by Cpl Paul D. Zelner, Defense Imagery 339079

A convoy from Combat Logistic Battalion 3, 1st Marines Logistics Group 

(Forward), heads to Combat Outpost Payne on 21 October 2010 to support Operation Steel Dawn II.

32 Maj David J. Grabow award recommendation, 14 February 2011 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA); and 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 

35–39.

33 Ibid., 38.

34 Garcia intvw.

35 Bitonti intvw; and LCpl Adam B. Ramirez intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 8 February 2011 (Oral HistColl).

36 Garcia intvw; and 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 23, 25.
12 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

hearsal of concepts drill. Majors Matthew Miller and 

Jon A. Custis, the 1st LAR’s operations and executive 

officers, respectively, walked the participants through 

the operational sequence and corrected problems 

identified during the group exercise.37 Lieutenant 

Colonel Garcia later noted that “The thorough planning and rehearsals conducted prior to the raid ensured the seamless integration of these elements and 

refined the command and control of the raid force.”38

Companies A and B departed Combat Outpost 

Payne the next day, heading in opposite directions to 

conduct interdiction operations for five days. As part 

of Lieutenant Colonel Leonard’s deception plan, the 

companies intended that any Taliban groups monitoring the Marine units’ activities would interpret the 

movements as routine patrols.39 Shaping and reconnaissance operations conducted in support of Steel 

Dawn II (e.g., Operations Steel Dawn I and Press 16) 

also began on 23 October.40 Gunnery Sergeant Aaron J. Abrams, 

Company A’s 2d Platoon sergeant, 

served as Task Force Highlander’s 

liaison to Task Force 210 during 

Operation Press 16. The British reconnaissance patrol collected information on the proposed route, 

identified enemy observation posts 

covering the mountain passes, and 

observed activities in and around 

Bahram Chah.41

On 25 October, Major Custis began to push command and support 

elements south. The intermediary 

goal was to establish a logistics staging area (LSA) about 60 kilometers from Combat Outpost Payne.42 

Lieutenant Colonel Leonard, who 

considered Bahram Chah the “nexus of all bad things . . . happening” 

in Helmand and Kandahar Provinces, spoke candidly to his Marines before departing: “We will go 

into the Bazaar of Barham [sic] Chah and say, ‘We’ll 

come here any time we want—you can’t stop us. You 

don’t get to operate with impunity.’ We will tell them, 

‘If you want to come back and rebuild this place, go 

ahead. We will be back in three months’. ”43

The LSA was situated in a large wadi (dry stream 

bed) in the middle of the desert, a site specifically 

chosen for its remoteness. Task Force Highlander 

assembled 178 vehicles and 1,100 personnel into 

a raid force in the isolated location without being 

observed. Getting to the LSA was difficult as sand 

dunes and rough terrain hindered the progress of 

the heavily laden vehicles.44 During the week-long 

operation, for example, one M88 armored vehicle 

crew recovered or repaired 53 vehicles.45

Upon the artillery group’s arrival at the LSA, MaPhoto by Cpl Paul D. Zelner, Defense Imagery 101021-M-4388Z-004

LtCol Scott D. Leonard, commanding officer of 1st LAR and Task Force 

Highlander, addresses Marines participating in Operation Steel Dawn II at 

Combat Outpost Payne on 25 October 2010.

37 Leonard intvw.

38 Garcia comments on draft ms.

39 Bitonti intvw; and GySgt Aaron J. Abrams intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 8 February 2011 (Oral HistColl).

40 1st MarDiv ComdC, Part 2, Fires.

41 Abrams intvw; and GySgt Aaron J. Abrams award recommendation, 2 December 2010 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA).

42 Maj Jon A. Custis award recommendation, 15 March 2011 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA).

43 Cpl Derek B. Carlson, “Afghan, Coalition Forces Kill Insurgents; Seize Drugs, Weapons during Raid,” Marine Corps News, 1 November 2010, 

http://www.3rdmaw.marines.mil/News/NewsArticleDisplay/tabid/8112/Article/548747/afghan-coalition-forces-kill-insurgents-seize-drugs

-weapons-during-raid.aspx.

44 Leonard intvw; and Maj Jon A. Custis intvw with Maj Beth Wolney, 7 February 2011 (Oral HistColl).

45 Cpl Paul D. Zellner, “Wrecker Crew Keeps Convoy Rolling during Operation Steel Dawn II,” Defense Imagery, 13 November 2010.
Summer 2015 13

ground running along each side of the proposed 

route—and fired at enemy positions previously designated as on-call targets. When the rounds began 

to impact, the enemy fired flares into the night sky 

and attempted to flee in vehicles. Abrams reported 

that numerous headlights illuminated a large traffic 

jam.52

The next day, the reconnaissance patrol rejoined 

Task Force Highlander at the LSA and delivered 

their account to Lieutenant Colonel Leonard. Although Leonard had originally intended to follow 

the western pass through the mountains, the patrol 

reported that the circuitous route would take the 

convoy directly past the city’s main residential area. 

Shortly before departure, the route was changed to 

the eastern pass.53

Movement to Contact

The raid was originally scheduled to begin on the 

evening of 28 October, but torrential rains resulted 

in a one-day weather delay.54 Around 1800 hours the 

following evening, Task Force Highlander formed a 

jor Grabow established a command and control 

node to support other task force elements during 

the operation. The communications platoon from 

1st Battalion, 11th Marines, provided host services 

via multiple tactical satellite radio networks. Due to 

its communications capabilities, the artillery command element also fulfilled the role of camp commandant.46

Combat Logistics Battalion 3 Marines provided 

critical assistance to Task Force Highlander throughout the operation. Motor Transport Company B, under Captain Matthew J. Neely, provided eight pallets 

of food and 15,000 gallons of water as well as fuel, 

ammunition, and other supplies via combat logistics 

patrols and helicopter support teams. Marines from 

Landing Support Platoon, Headquarters and Service 

Company, off-loaded supplies at multiple sites,47 and 

the 1st Medical Battalion’s Shock Trauma Platoon 

provided a mobile trauma bay.48

Marine Wing Support Squadron 373 also contributed significantly to the operation, constructing 

a forward arming and refueling point (FARP) near 

the LSA.49 A Bell Boeing MV-22B Osprey from Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 365 (VMM-365), 

commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Craig C. LeFlore, was the first aircraft to land at the FARP on 

29 October and provided assault support during the 

operation.50 Captain Patrick W. Richardson, a Bell 

AH-1 Super Cobra pilot with Marine Light Attack 

Helicopter Squadron 369, also operated from the 

FARP. Richardson later explained that “We were able 

to spend 15 minutes in transit, 20–30 minutes to refuel and rearm, and get back to support troops on 

the ground.”51 The facility also had on-hand casualty 

evacuation capability.

On 26 October, operating farther south near the 

objective area, Gunnery Sergeant Abrams and the 

British reconnaissance patrol conducted a night 

mortar raid against Bahram Chah. The commandos 

established two observation posts—situated on high 

Photo by Sgt Derek Carlson, Defense Imagery 101029-M-4388Z-003

Supplies are offloaded from a Bell Boeing MV-22B Osprey with VMM-365 at a remote logistics staging area 

on 29 October 2010. 

46 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 13, 23; and Garcia intvw.

47 Cpl Paul D. Zellner, “Marines Provide Logistics Support to Coalition Forces during Operation Steel Dawn II,” Defense Imagery, 11 November 2010.

48 Leonard intvw.

49 Carlson, “Afghan, Coalition Forces Kill Insurgents.”

50 See image courtesy of Defense Imagery (337483) that accompanies Carlson, “Afghan, Coalition Forces Kill Insurgents”; and VMM-365 ComdC, 3.

51 Carlson, “Afghan, Coalition Forces Kill Insurgents.”

52 Abrams intvw; and Abrams award. On 23 and 26 October 2010, Task Force Leatherneck executed dynamic strikes against compounds associated with the production of IEDs, destroying buildings and their contents, according to the 1st MarDiv ComdC.

53 Rapkoch intvw; and Abrams intvw.

54 Ibid.
14 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

column and headed south to Bahram Chah.55 The 

Marines first needed to reach the line of departure 

on the north side of Chagai Hills—20 kilometers 

short of the bazaar—and then maneuver through 

the mountain pass to arrive at a designated release 

point by 0700 hours the following morning.56 The 

time requirement deepened the Marines’ sense of 

urgency; if they failed to arrive on time, Task Force 

210 would have to execute its portion of the mission 

without ground support. Lance Corporal Ramirez, a 

vehicle driver from Company A, later recalled that 

the Marines had traveled light and fast—bringing 

only water, chow, ammunition, and a one-day pack 

per man.57

Company A held the lead position in the 85-vehicle convoy, and Captain Bitonti divided the unit into 

two sections for movement: 2d Platoon with attachments from 3d Combat Engineer Battalion, company headquarters, and logistics vehicles followed by 

1st and 3d Platoons. The engineering assets included 

assault vehicles with rocket-propelled mine clearing 

line charges and a D7 bulldozer and M870 semitrailer for breaching three IED-laden choke points. The 

battalion’s jump command post was next in line, followed by Company B and the logistics train.58 Major Grabow and the cannon platoon brought up the 

rear, while Captain Curtis and the HIMARS platoon 

remained at the LSA.59 Major General Mills and representatives from several U.S. government agencies 

also accompanied the raid force.60

Working its way south, Company A marked the 

route and relayed situational information to the remainder of the convoy. Gunnery Sergeant Abrams, 

who guided the lead platoon, recalled that the sky 

had been clear when the company began the road 

march. However, a solitary black cloud followed 

the Marines, eventually bringing rain, thunder, and 

lightning. During the approach, the Marine company had expected to strike numerous IEDs, but none 

were encountered.61

Task Force 210 approached the objective area 

aboard CH-47 helicopters, relaying position reports to Marines as it crossed airborne phase lines. 

When the British were approximately two minutes 

from the landing zone, at around 1940 hours, Task 

Force Highlander initiated the kinetic portion of the 

operation.62 A B-1 bomber attacked enemy fighting 

positions and observation posts along the Marines’ 

axis of advance and near the commandos’ ingress 

point. During two passes, the bomber struck eight 

preplanned targets with laser-guided 2,000-pound 

bombs.63

As the convoy reached the north side of the Chagai 

Hills, the logistics train and artillery group pulled off 

the road and established a functional firing position 

in only 15 minutes.64 While Task Force Highlander 

maneuvered along the eastern corridor toward Bahram Chah, the artillerymen shot illumination rounds 

over the western pass in an effort to deceive the enemy on which direction the Marines would initiate 

the attack. When Company A approached the first 

IED-laden choke point, the Marines spotted Taliban 

fighters massing along high ground paralleling the 

canyon. At Captain Rapkoch’s request, the cannon 

platoon began to shoot preplanned preparatory fires 

against enemy defensive positions, shifting in concert 

with the task force’s advance, effectively suppressing 

the enemy with at least one sympathetic detonation 

and allowing the convoy to continue forward. At a 

second choke point, the cannon platoon again suppressed Taliban forces.65 In all, the platoon fired 107 

high explosive rounds in support of the breaches.66

Task Force Highlander also employed close 

air support to strike the enemy.67 Lance Corporal 

55 Clauss intvw; and MSgt Curtis C. Gregory intvw with Col N. S. Lowrey, 8 February 2011 (Oral HistColl).

56 Rapkoch intvw; and Ramirez intvw.

57 Ibid.

58 Gregory intvw; and Custis award.

59 Maj David J. Grabow intvw with LtCol R. S. Sellards, 9 February 2011 (Oral HistColl); Garcia intvw; and Grabow award.

60 Leonard intvw; and Mills intvw.

61 Abrams intvw.

62 Rapkoch intvw; Clauss intvw; Abrams intvw; and Rapkoch award.

63 Ibid.; and Rapkoch intvw.

64 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 25; Rapkoch award; and Rapkoch intvw.

65 Rapkoch award; Garcia intvw; and Leonard intvw.

66 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 36.

67 Rapkoch intvw.
Summer 2015 15

Ramirez recalled the surreal experience of riding 

through the night with bombs exploding near the 

objective, artillery impacting along the ridgelines, 

and illumination rounds drifting downward over the 

western pass.68 Sergeant Stuart R. Sanford, a vehicle 

commander in Company B, similarly remembered 

an “awesome fireworks show” as the “artillery was 

blowing the hell out of everything.”69

The journey south was not without difficulties for 

Coalition forces. At one point, the trailer hauling the 

bulldozer became stuck and, when Marines tried to 

pull it free, an axle broke. While leaders contemplated 

what to do, a lance corporal climbed into the driver’s 

seat, backed the bulldozer off the trailer, and asked 

“Hey, gunny, which way do I go?” The gunnery sergeant pointed south, and the young Marine moved 

out at three and a half kilometers per hour.70 On 

another occasion, the combat engineer support element led a convoy down the wrong corridor. When 

3d Platoon Commander First Lieutenant Michael D. 

Wright realized what happened, he initiated corrective action and, on Captain Bitonti’s orders, assumed 

maneuver control of the engineer element.71

Progress was swift and Task Force Highlander 

reached its designated release point, a hilltop near 

the southern entrance to the mountain pass, around 

0430. Having arrived two hours before sunrise and 

well ahead of schedule, the Marines received word 

that Task Force 210 was not ready to launch the attack and halted the convoy. As Marines established 

a hasty blocking position and waited in the dark, the 

infrared strobe lights on the antenna of the armored 

vehicles reminded Captain Rapkoch of a traffic jam 

on U.S. Interstate 95.72

Shortly after being inserted about three miles 

southeast of the bazaar, the British commandos began to receive small-arms fire. In response, the HIMARS platoon fired three GPS-guided rockets into 

the buildings where the gunfire emanated. Before 

long, the commandos proceeded to secure the perimeter. They established preliminary positions on 

each corner of the bazaar and an observation post 

on a mountain peak northwest of Bahram Chah; 

they also marked lanes for the armored vehicles to 

follow. The Marines then surged forward.73

Actions on the Objective

The road sloped down beyond the release point, first 

heading southeast and then cutting sharply to the 

southwest before opening into a three-kilometerwide valley.74 The smaller village of Jumakhan was 

situated to the east, the larger village of Haji Wakil to 

the west, and the bazaar near the middle. When First 

Lieutenant Sean T. Knapp led the engineer platoon 

forward in the dark to breach the entrance to the 

objective area, the platoon encountered small-arms, 

machine-gun, and RPG fire. First Platoon, Company A, under First Lieutenant Jonathan R. Walaski, 

moved forward to establish a temporary blocking 

position and to provide cover fire; the company 

quickly suppressed the enemy. After the rocket-propelled line charges twice misfired, Captain Bitonti 

pushed forward with the mine rollers. Around this 

time, the bulldozer emerged from the pass.75

Photo by Sgt Derek Carlson, Defense Imagery 101029-M-1842C-002 

Artillery illumination and a desert storm light up the 

night sky over the Chagai Hills as Task Force Highlander 

maneuvers south through a mountain pass toward Bahram Chah on 29 November 2010.

68 Ramirez intvw.

69 Sanford intvw.

70 Mills intvw.

71 1stLt Michael D. Wright award recommendation, 2 December 2010 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA).

72 Leonard intvw; Bitonti intvw; Gregory intvw; and Rapkoch intvw.

73 Ibid.; Clauss intvw; Abrams intvw; Garcia intvw; and 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 39.

74 Bitonti intvw; and Rapkoch intvw.

75 Mills intvw.
16 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

The Marines 1st Platoon quickly 

maneuvered past the engineers, 

crossed into the objective area, and 

swung east to establish the assigned 

blocking position along the southwest side of Jumakhan. Although 

intelligence had predicted little if 

any resistance from the village of 

single-story adobe dwellings, as 

soon as the Marines pulled into position, they encountered additional 

small-arms, machine-gun, and RPG 

fire. The Marines again suppressed 

the enemy with ease.76 

With Lieutenant Walaski’s platoon shielding the mountain pass 

exit, the remainder of Task Force 

Highlander was able to flow unimpeded into the objective area.77

Company A passed through the 

British lines while skirting along the north side of 

the bazaar and then swung south to cordon off the 

southwest side of Haji Wakil.78 Master Sergeant Curtis C. Gregory, Company A’s operations chief, recalled a relative calm at that point, as flashes from 

the commandos’ infrared lights and weapons sights 

could be seen atop buildings in the bazaar79—good 

news for the Marines, who had been precluded from 

firing their weapons until they passed the British 

lines.80

Captain Bitonti established a linear blocking position, facing west toward Bahram Chah. Lieutenant 

Michael D. Mitchell’s 2d platoon was located on the 

southern flank in a low-lying, vegetated area near 

the Pakistani border. The rest of the company was 

situated on higher ground, with headquarters in the 

middle and Second Lieutenant Wright’s 3d Platoon 

to the north.81

It was dark by the time 2d Platoon pulled into position. The enemy could hear, but not see the Marines’ armored vehicles. Before long, the Marines 

spotted enemy fighters maneuvering toward their 

position, ducking in and out of buildings and crawling through the brush. The insurgents operated 

individually, as pairs, and occasionally in teams of 

three or four. Most were armed with assault rifles, 

although some carried machine guns and RPGs. 

In one instance, Gunnery Sergeant Abrams’s crew 

killed a pair of fighters who had tried to fire an RPG 

at the Marines. When the enemy fell, another fighter picked up the RPG and tried to fire, but was also 

shot. Nearby, Lieutenant Mitchell’s crew similarly 

engaged a fighter armed with an RPG who was maneuvering through vegetation about 75 meters away. 

The Marines may have killed a suicide bomber—a 

man wearing a vest appeared to explode as he ran at 

their vehicle and was shot.82

The enemy maneuvered like well-trained and disciplined soldiers, yet they were obviously unfamiliar 

with the light armored vehicles’ capabilities.83 In addition to being well armed and impervious to smallarms fire, the vehicles had thermal imagery devices 

Map by author

76 Bitonti intvw; and 1stLt Jonathan R. Walaski award recommendation, 2 February 2011 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA).

77 Ibid.

78 Bitonti intvw.

79 Gregory intvw.

80 Abrams intvw.

81 Bitonti intvw; Gregory intvw; and Abrams intvw.

82 Ibid.

83 Bitonti intvw.
Summer 2015 17

that allowed the crews to shoot accurately in the 

dark at up to 3,000 meters. According to Sergeant 

Sanford, the thermal imaging devices made night 

“as bright as day and so detailed you can determine 

what kind of weapon the enemy is carrying.”84 Gunnery Sergeant Abrams also acknowledged being able 

to see the enemy maneuvering through buildings 

and behind walls.85

After passing through British lines, Captain Haskamp established a second blocking position with 

Company B facing south along the north side of 

Haji Wakil. Second Platoon, under First Lieutenant 

Gabriel M. Lavine, was positioned on the left flank, 

with the company executive officer, First Lieutenant 

Charles L. Hostetler, and Headquarters Platoon in 

the middle. Third Platoon, under First Lieutenant 

Christopher M. Phifer, was on the right flank. Each 

platoon had to carefully observe their sectors of fire, 

because they were unable see Company A to the southeast. In addition 

to cordoning off the residential area, 

3d Platoon was also positioned to 

cover the entrance to the western 

corridor.86

Shortly after Company B passed 

the bazaar, a vehicle crew spotted 

and killed three fighters armed with 

RPGs. Once in position, other members of the company engaged small 

groups of fighters who were maneuvering among the buildings and 

through the bush. First Sergeant Jon 

D. Jerome, unimpressed by the enemy’s lack of situational awareness, 

was dumbfounded that they continued to use paths that the Marines 

covered with automatic weapons.87

Meanwhile, Lieutenant Colonel 

Leonard situated his jump command post on the edge of the objective area, north 

of the bend in the battalion’s L-shaped blocking position, about 800 meters from Haji Wakil.88 Major 

Custis established a multiuse point directly behind 

the objective area, which incorporated the casualty 

collection, maintenance collection, detainee transfer, 

and combined-operations coordination points for 

Task Forces Highlander and 210.89 Captain Rapkoch 

took control of all supporting fires and employed 

AC-130 gunships to disrupt the insurgents’ haphazard defenses.90 According to intelligence reports, 

little danger of civilian casualties existed because 

Taliban forces had driven them out the area, and 

the civilians had not returned before the Marines’ 

arrival.91 To prevent accusations of firing across the 

Pakistani border, Marines also used video to capture 

all weapons fires within the objective area.92

Taliban resistance decreased as dawn broke, alDefense Imagery 101030-M-1263P-011

Task Force Highlander’s forward command center on the morning of its 

raid against Bahram Chah on 30 October 2010 was situated on the northern outskirts of the main residential area at the base of a hill in Afghanistan 

bearing an image of the Taliban flag.

84 Sanford intvw.

85 Abrams intvw.

86 Sanford intvw; 1stSgt Jon D. Jerome intvw with LtCol R. S. Sellards, 7 February 2011 (Oral HistColl); and 1stSgt Jon D. Jerome phone conversation with author.

87 Jerome intvw.

88 Leonard award; Rapkoch intvw; and Jerome phone conversation.

89 Custis award.

90 Rapkoch award; and Rapkoch intvw.

91 Jerome intvw.

92 Grabow intvw.
18 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

though isolated individuals and locations were targeted throughout 

the day. In one instance, for example, Company B Marines observed 

an enemy spotter using a cell phone 

to direct 107mm rocket fire. Marines 

responded with a tube-launched, 

optically-tracked, wireless-guided 

(TOW) missile launched at the 

building in which the spotter was 

hiding.93

Task Force 210 cleared the 

bazaar—which measured approximately 400 meters by 700 meters 

and contained about 150 shops—

in 12 hours. First Lieutenant Buck 

A. Bradley’s 1st Platoon detached 

from Company B upon entering the objective area and assisted 

the British by providing cover as 

the commandos maneuvered forward, suppressing enemy fighting 

positions and securing high-speed 

avenues of approach.94 The commandos moved systematically from 

west to east and examined each of 

the bazaar’s shops for indications 

that its occupants were contributing 

to the insurgency. If the search failed 

to find such evidence, the shop was 

left intact. If evidence of illicit activities was discovered (e.g., weapons, 

munitions, or bomb making or drug 

processing materials), the material 

was seized for further exploitation 

or destroyed on site.95 During the clearing operation, 

commandos killed a suicide bomber before he could 

detonate his explosives.96

Captain Bitonti and Master Sergeant Gregory 

coordinated the medical evacuation of two Afghan 

soldiers injured while clearing the bazaar. As the 

two Marines moved toward the bazaar to collect the 

wounded, a HIMARS rocket struck and destroyed 

a nearby building, but they were uninjured. One of 

the Afghan soldiers had been shot in the hip, and 

the other had twisted his ankle.97 After transporting 

the wounded to the multiuse point for treatment and 

evacuation, the Marines rejoined Company A.98

Tensions grew throughout the day as a crowd of 

Photo by SSgt Jeremy Ross, Defense Imagery 379620

A 17 March 2011 photo shows the Bahram Chah bazaar, which facilitated the movement of enemy fighters, weapons, and ammunition into—and 

drugs out of—Afghanistan.

Defense Imagery 336189

British special operating forces and Marines from Task Force Highlander 

search a compound at one end of the Bahram Chah bazaar on 30 October 

2010. 

93 Jerome intvw.

94 1stLt Buck A. Bradley award recommendation, 23 November 2010 (MilAwdsBr, HQMC, Quantico, VA).

95 MajGen Richard P. Mills, “Major General Richard Mills on Afghanistan” (lecture, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, DC, 

27 April 2011), http://carnegieendowment.org/2011/04/27/major-general-richard-mills-on-afghanistan/49q.

96 Clauss intvw; Rapkoch intvw; and Leonard intvw.

97 Clauss intvw; Rapkoch intvw; and Leonard intvw. 

98 Gregory intvw; and Clauss intvw.
Summer 2015 19

unarmed men gathered on the Pakistani side of the border. The men 

moved about in groups of approximately 10–50 individuals and eventually totaled about 500 people.99 

Gunnery Sergeant Abrams recalled 

that the men sat on the ground, under trees, on walls, or in compounds. 

They watched the Marines with casual disregard, as if they were certain 

of their safety and waiting patiently 

for the Coalition forces to leave.100

The prevailing opinion was that the 

men were Taliban reinforcements, 

assembled from villages throughout 

the region, preparing for a counterattack that failed to materialize after 

the fatal morning defeat.101

Later that afternoon, the Marines 

were able to vent their frustrations 

over the growing crowd south of the 

border. A large hill mass north of the 

objective area overlooked Haji Wakil. On one slope, 

the enemy had inscribed “Taliban Pass” using white 

rocks. When A-10 aircraft destroyed the inscription 

with a 25mm cannon, Captain Bitonti likened the 

scene to “watching the eraser tool on [Microsoft] 

Paint.”102 The Marines cheered, but the Taliban were 

“livid, jumping around and slamming their fists on 

the ground.”103 Another slope held the image of the 

Taliban flag with an accompanying inscription; however, a friendly observation post was located nearby, 

and the site was left intact.

Later that afternoon, insurgent activity escalated, 

with occasional teams of two enemy fighters emerging from buildings to take potshots at the Marines. 

Once night fell, scattered engagements of growing 

intensity occurred across the Marines’ frontage.104

Originally, the combined task force was to remain 

in the objective area for a second day to clear Haji 

Wakil, but element leaders reckoned that the most 

important part of the mission was accomplished and 

that lingering any longer would tempt fate. The Coalition had suffered two casualties by that point, and 

the force had gone without sleep for 36 hours. Moreover, Haji Wakil was larger and more complex than 

the bazaar; the plan for Haji Wakil was not as well 

developed; and maintaining command and control 

would be difficult.105

At the conclusion of the clearing operation, 1st 

Platoon, under Lieutenant Bradley, escorted Task 

Force 210 to an extraction point, located about 

four kilometers from the objective area.106 The British were lifted out by helicopter around midnight. 

After confirmation of the commandos’ extraction, 

Task Force Highlander began its own move from 

Bahram Chah. Before leaving, however, the Marines 

destroyed the Taliban flag on the nearby hillside.107

Defense Imagery 336192

Flames and smoke rise from a damaged Taliban structure during Operation Steel Dawn II on 30 October 2010.

99 Bitonti intvw; and Abrams intvw.

100 Ibid. 101 Bitonti intvw; and Leonard intvw. 102 Bitonti intvw. 103 Ibid. 104 Abrams intvw; and Gregory intvw. 105 Rapkoch intvw. 106 Bradley award. 107 Bitonti intvw.
20 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

Task Force Highlander returned along the same 

route it had used to enter. The convoy departed by 

echelon, in reverse order of its arrival, while the 

cannon platoon covered its withdrawal with smoke 

rounds.108 The only thing slowing the Marines’ exit 

was the recovery of abandoned, inoperable armored 

vehicles from a platoon that had guarded the corridor during the raid.109

The convoy reached the LSA around 0500 hours 

on 31 October. Companies A and B quickly established a southward facing screen in front of the assembly area.110 While unit leaders participated in an 

operational debriefing, the Marines attended to their 

vehicles, weapons, equipment, and personal gear, 

but also found time to get much needed rest. The 

following morning, Task Force Highlander began to 

collapse the LSA. Over the next two days, the support and then the assault elements returned to their 

home stations.111

The raid on Bahram Chah was considered an unmitigated success. While no Marines had been injured, official press releases reported that Coalition 

Operation Steel Dawn II

I

n late October 2010, Coalition forces from Regional Command Southwest (RC-SW) raided the bazaar at 

Bahram Chah, which served as a Taliban logistics base along the southwestern border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Task Force 210, a conglomerate of British and Afghan special operations forces, comprised the assault element. As the operation’s main effort, Task Force 210’s initial mission was to insert under 

the cover of darkness and seize the bazaar. 

The 1st Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion (1st LAR/Task Force Highlander) served as the security element. Its role was to conduct a simultaneous road march to Bahram Chah, to link up with Task Force 210 at sunrise, and then to secure the objective area by cordoning off villages to the northeast and southwest of the bazaar. 

This would enable Task Force 210 to focus on searching for contraband and intelligence rather than fighting off 

insurgents.

The support element was primarily drawn from other I Marine Expeditionary Force (I MEF) units. It included 

a platoon from 3d Combat Engineer Battalion, which accompanied Task Force Highlander and helped negate obstacles in the convoy’s path. A groupment of light howitzers and rocket artillery from 1st Battalion, 11th Marines, 

eliminated enemy fighting positions along the route and in the objective area. Marines from Combat Logistics 

Battalion 3’s Landing Support Platoon and Motor Transport Company B provided food, water, fuel, and ammunition as well as recovered and repaired damaged vehicles during the operation. Marine Wing Support Squadron 

373 established a forward arming and refueling point. Operating from this location, pilots and aircrews from 

Marine Heavy Helicopter Squadron 466, Marine Medium Tiltroter Squadron 365, and Marine Light Attack Helicopter Squadron 369 provided logistical, medical evacuation, and close air support to the ground forces. Close 

air support included the Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 232, flying from the Kandahar International Airport, 

and U.S. Air Force Rockwell B-1 Lancer bombers, Fairchild Republic A-10 Thunderbolt attack bombers, and 

Lockheed AC-130 Spectre gunships. U.S. Army Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters were also on hand in 

case medical evacuations were required.

The raid was an unmitigated success and, according to Major General Richard P. Mills, commander of I MEF 

and RC-SW, it had a significant impact on the enemy’s warfighting ability. In addition to killing between 15 and 

25 insurgents, Coalition forces seized nearly 27 metric tons of ammonium nitrate, 60 cases of .50-caliber machine 

gun ammunition, 22 IEDs, and numerous artillery shells, automatic weapons, and assorted ammunition, as well 

as 40 kilograms of opium, 500 liters of acid, and 2,000 kilograms of precursor chemicals used to refine narcotics. 

No Marines were injured during the operation. 

108 Clauss intvw; and 1st Battalion, 11th Marines ComdC, 36. 109 Rapkoch intvw; and Abrams intvw. 110 Clauss intvw. 111 Leonard intvw.
Summer 2015 21

forces had killed between 15 and 25 insurgents. Reports also acknowledged that those numbers did not 

include dead or wounded fighters that the enemy 

might have retrieved during the prolonged action.112 

Other sources, which did account for those losses, 

estimated that the number of enemy dead might have 

been more than 70.113 In addition to seizing nearly 27 

metric tons of ammonium nitrate—enough to arm 

2,000 IEDs—the raid force also recovered 60 cases of 

.50-caliber machine-gun ammunition, 22 IEDs, and 

numerous artillery shells, automatic weapons, and 

assorted ammunition. Drug-related materials confiscated included 40 kilograms of opium, 500 liters 

of acid, and 2,000 kilograms of precursor chemicals 

used to refine narcotics.114

In November 2010, 3d LAR, under Lieutenant 

Colonel Kenneth R. Kassner, relieved Task Force 

Highlander. As Lieutenant Colonel Leonard had 

prophesized, Coalition forces returned to Bahram 

Chah in March 2011. The 3d LAR spent three days in 

the infamous border town during Operation Rawhide 

II. The Marines destroyed the bazaar, killed about 50 

insurgents, and sustained minimal casualties.115 

At the end of March 2011, Major General Mills 

turned command of RC-SW over to Major General 

John A. Toolan. After returning to the United States, 

Mills described Coalition efforts to deny sanctuary 

to the enemy and to “fight him on ground of our 

choosing” as having a “significant impact.”116

In a series of fairly aggressive movements up around 

the Sangin area and south against the border in Bahram 

Chah, we kept pressure on his lines of supply, kept pressure on his forces as they really tried to move to find areas 

to rest and relax in. We had some significant gains against 

him in that way and began to see some of his forces begin 

to crumble. As the supply lines were cut, we got excellent intelligence that showed us it was impacting him in 

the fighting holes. He was running out of money. He was 

running out of equipment, he was running out of ammunition. We saw that in things like him digging up old 

IEDs to attempt to reuse them on the battlefield. Things 

he would not have done had he had a warehouse full of 

them sitting somewhere. We saw him saving his expended ammunition in order to repack his rounds. Things like 

that showed that he was having supply difficulties. We had 

very good intel that showed his subordinate commanders were also selling personal equipment, such as cars in 

order to pay their troops. Again, something he would not 

have done had he had access to the resources that he had 

at one point in time. So I think the pressure on him, the 

constant pressure, and the ability to fight him on ground 

of our choosing had a significant impact on his success.117 

Epilogue

Despite those gains, Bahram Chah continued to 

serve as a Taliban logistics center in southwestern 

Afghanistan. One factor contributing to the site’s 

staying power was the enemy’s ability to seek sanctuary in nearby Pakistan. Major General Toolan lamented, “. . . it’s like I can’t shut the water off, I just 

keep mopping up the floor. If I could turn the water off in Pakistan, it would be a lot better.”118 The 

Pakistani Army’s XII Corps was of little help on the 

southern side of the border because its government 

was preoccupied with a separatist movement in 

Balochistan, Pakistan. 

Another factor was the aggressive withdrawal of 

American forces from Afghanistan, which began in 

July 2011 and then accelerated in 2012.119 As strategic 

priorities shifted, Task Force Leatherneck focused on 

112 U.S. Department of Defense, “Officials in Afghanistan Provide Details of Operations,” DOD News, 1 June 2010; and ISAF IJC Headquarters, 

“Afghan, Coalition Forces Wrap Up Helmand Clearing Operation,” DOD News, 8 November 2010.

113 Leonard award. 114 Carlson, “Afghan, Coalition Forces Kill Insurgents.” 115 Sgt Jeremy Ross, “3rd LAR Strikes Key Insurgent Border Hub during Operation Raw Hide II,” II MEF Marine Expeditionary Force, 19 March 

2011, http://www.iimef.marines.mil/News/NewsArticle/tabid/472/Article/529363/3rd-lar-strikes-key-insurgent-border-hub-during-operationraw-hide-ii.aspx.

116 Mills intvw. 117 Ibid. 118 Jim Garamone, “Pakistan, Corruption Affect South, West Afghanistan,” American Forces Press Service, 24 April 2012. 119 CNN Wire Staff, “Afghan Withdrawal More ‘Aggressive’ than Military Proposed,” CNN News, 24 June 2011, http://www.cnn.com/2011/

POLITICS/06/23/afghanistan.troops.drawdown/; Chris Carroll, “As Marines Leave Helmand, Focus Turns to Training Those Left Behind,” Stars 

and Stripes, 11 July 2012, http://www.stripes.com/news/as-marines-leave-helmand-focus-turns-to-training-those-left-behind-1.182699; and 

Dan Lamothe, “Taliban Make Gains as Marines Take Backseat,” Marine Corps Times, 29 October 2012, http://archive.marinecorpstimes.com/

article/20121029/NEWS/210290319/Taliban-make-gains-Marines-take-backseat.
22 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

training, advising, and turning operating areas over 

to Afghan security forces.120 Major General Charles 

M. Gurganus, who followed Major General Toolan 

as commander of RC-SW, defined success during his 

tenure “as setting the conditions for the Afghans to 

take over their own security, their own government, 

and then they have an opportunity to decide what 

to do with it.”121 Afghani Lieutenant Colonel Mohammad Rasul Qandahari, who commanded an Afghanistan Border Police battalion situated along the 

southern Helmand River, conceded that he and his 

men would need more manpower and larger weapons before they could hope to push southward into 

enemy territory.122 s1775s

120 Robert Burns, “Afghanistan: Marines to Wind Down Combat in 2012,” Huffington Post, 26 November 2011, http://www.huffingtonpost

.com/2011/11/26/afghanistan-marines-2012_n_1114239.html.

121 Dan Lamothe, “Marine General: Lethal Aid Entering Helmand Is Top Concern,” Military Times, 18 April 2013, http://archive.militarytimes.com

/article/20130418/news/304180025/Marine-general-Lethal-entering-helmand-top-concern.

122 Ibid.
Zayna N. Bizri

PhD candidate, 

George Mason University

The U.S. Marine Corps’ reputation as an 

elite outfit in the military served as the 

foundation of its World War II recruiting 

campaign. The looming manpower shortage sparked both the creation of women’s auxiliaries as well as massive recruiting drives for men and 

women. For the Marine Corps, recruiting women 

required a subtle, though significant, shift in both 

recruiting materials and strategy. Male recruits were 

encouraged to join an elite Service, to be among the 

first to the front, and to become “real men” in the 

process. Female recruits were presented with the 

same materials but with a vitally important difference. They were invited to join an elite Service with a 

grand tradition of excellence and to support the best 

fighters in the military, but they would remain “real 

women.” This subtle modification in the recruiting 

message drew highly sought-after women to the Marine Corps and, quite unexpectedly, helped reshape 

the rules of femininity in the United States.1

The foundation of Marine Corps recruiting was the 

belief that the Corps was the finest organization, only 

taking the best and making them better.2

 Since World 

War I, Marine Corps recruiting campaigns emphasized the Corps’ elite status, “portray[ing] Marines 

as the finest, toughest, most elite warriors in the U.S. 

military.”3

 The World War I recruiting campaigns solidified a recognizable image of the type of men who 

chose to join the Corps, and World War II efforts were 

consciously based on these popular constructions.4

The real challenge for recruiters was finding a balance between the Marine Corps’ staffing requirements and the culturally accepted workplaces for 

women. Civilian administrative office work was 

largely done by women in the 1940s. The Marine 

Corps needed clerks, typists, stenographers, messengers, and other office workers to make their 

administrative structure function efficiently. The 

Marine Corps’ reputation as fighters and infantrymen—before anything else—made the concept of a 

woman Marine an incongruous idea with this perceived cultural reputation. The recruiting campaign 

had to attract unique women who still fell within 

the socially accepted parameters of womanhood. 

As a result, recruiting materials aimed at potential 

women Marines layered the idea of Marine elitism 

over existing structures of femininity to create the 

image of an ideal recruit. The recruiting posters were 

designed primarily to encourage viewers to join the 

Marine Corps, make more Marines, and win the war, 

not change the rules of gender or push the boundaries between men and women.

From Making Men

to Making Marines

MARINE CORPS RECRUITING DURING WORLD WAR II

1 In the face of a looming manpower shortage, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order in late 1942 requiring that all branches 

accept draftees ages 18–35 under the Selective Service Act. Because the Corps’ status as an all-volunteer organization was key to their image 

as elite, exceptional, and selective, this requirement presented a challenge for the Marine Corps. Therefore, they took a two-pronged approach 

to their recruiting strategies during the period. One method was to accept and recruit 17-year-old volunteers who had parental permission to 

join. The other was to post Marine liaisons at induction centers to convince draftees to name the Corps as their preferred Service. As a result, 

approximately 90 percent of male recruits for World War II selected the Corps, a fact that the Public Relations Division used to support the image of the Marine Corps as an elite organization of volunteers. See Aaron B. O’Connell, Underdogs: The Making of the Modern Marine Corps 

(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012), 30.

2 Ibid., 7.

3 David J. Ulbrich, Preparing for Victory: Thomas Holcomb and the Making of the Modern Marine Corps, 1936—1943 (Anapolis, MD: U.S. Naval 

Institute, 2011), 159.

4 O’Connell, Underdogs, 27–28.

23
24 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

One of the foundational themes of the male recruiting posters was that the Marines would make 

real men out of recruits. For a number of reasons, 

including the obvious, recruiting posters directed 

at women could not take the same approach. While 

posters for male recruits promised a significant 

transformation, posters developed for female recruits argued that women would still be feminine 

even after becoming Marines. There was real concern, among southern congressmen specifically, that 

military service would draw women away from their 

traditional gender roles in the home, leading to a 

social collapse.5

 For many in the military, even the 

thought of women in uniform pushed the boundaries of gender too far. Following the creation of the 

Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC), soldiers 

wrote home with rumors that the women were prostitutes for soldiers. In some cases, concerned parents 

wrote to the WAAC leadership about their fears.6

For the Marine Corps specifically, the appearance 

of propriety and respectability was the most important factor in the design of its recruiting plan: “In 

all interpretations of activities . . . there must be the 

inference, through reflection, that the Women’s Reserve is possessed of a greater dignity and peopled 

by higher caliber personnel than any contemporary 

women’s force. Suggestions contained herein accept 

the foregoing as a primary dictate.”7

 Because joining 

the military was a direct challenge to the traditional 

American strictures of femininity and respectable 

behavior, the women’s auxiliaries and the Marine 

Corps, in particular, emphasized that their recruits 

would remain respectable ladies even as they took 

on a variety of jobs outside the home that may have 

previously been reserved for men.

In the first half of the twentieth century, women 

moved into many formerly male-coded occupations. 

The needs of the country and the demands of war had 

created a massive increase in industrial production 

requirements that precipitated a labor shortage. Concurrently, the military’s manpower needs increased 

for both combat and support roles. During World 

War I, the military fielded approximately two combat 

soldiers for every support soldier. By World War II, 

the ratio had shifted to two combat soldiers for every 

three in support roles.8

 Women filled the workforce 

gaps in industry, agriculture, and, ultimately, the 

military.9

 Women also worked in offices as secretaries, stenographers, typists, and clerks and had served 

in the U.S. Army, Navy, and Marine Corps in World 

War I.10 On 30 July 1942, President Roosevelt signed 

the legislation authorizing enlistment and commissioning of women’s naval reserves.11 The WAAC,12

Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service 

5 Judith A. Bellafaire, The Women’s Army Corps: A Commemoration of World War II Service, CMH Publication 72-15 (Washington, DC: U.S. Army 

Center of Military History, undated). 

6 Col Mary V. Stremlow, Free a Marine to Fight: Women Marines in World War II (Washington, DC: Marine Corps Historical Center, 1993), 7. For 

more on the rumor campaign, fears of lesbians in the auxiliaries, and the sexualized attacks on women in the Armed Services, see Allan Bérubé, 

Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War II (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2010); MajGen 

Jeanne Holm, Women in the Military: An Unfinished Revolution, rev. ed. (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1992); D’Ann Campbell, Women at War with 

America: Private Lives in a Patriotic Era (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984); and Marilyn E. Hegarty, Victory Girls, Khaki-Wackies, 

and Patriotutes: The Regulation of Female Sexuality during World War II (New York: NYU Press, 2007). 7 U.S. Marine Corps Public Relations Division, “Public Relations Plan” (Marine Corps History Division, Women Marines, Reserves 1 of 3, Subsection Articles, undated), hereafter “Public Relations Plan.” 

8 John J. McGrath, The Other End of the Spear: The Tooth-to-Tail Ratio (T3R) in Modern Military Operations (Fort Leavenworth, KS: Combat Studies 

Institute Press, 2007), 11–24.

9 For more information on women’s work roles during World War II, see Campbell, Women at War with America; Doris Weatherford, American 

Women in World War II: An Encyclopedia (New York: Routledge, 2010); Susan M. Hartmann, The Home Front and Beyond: American Women in 

the 1940s (Woodbridge, CT: Twayne Publishers, 1982); and Emily Yellin, Our Mother’s War: American Women at Home and at the Front during 

World War II (New York: Free Press, 2004). 10 For more information on the gender-based changes in office work, see Carole Srole, Transcribing Class and Gender: Masculinity and Femininity in Nineteenth-Century Courts and Offices (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2009). For more information on the history of women 

in the Navy and Marine Corps during World War I, see Jean Ebbert and Marie-Beth Hall, The First, The Few, The Forgotten: Navy and Marine 

Corps Women in World War I (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2002). For more information on the history of women in the Army in World 

War I (the Hello Girls of the Signal Corps), see Dorothy and Carl J. Schneider, Into the Breach: American Women Overseas in World War I (New 

York: Viking Books, 1991); and Lettie Gavin, American Women in World War I: They Also Served (Denver: University Press of Colorado, 1997). 

The last women serving with the Marine Corps and Navy left service in 1922.

11 Roosevelt authorized the creation of the Army, Navy, and Coast Guard women’s auxiliary/reserves. The Army’s female auxiliary members become known as the WAACs; their Navy counterparts become known as the WAVEs. For more information, see the Web site for the Department 

of Defense, “National Women’s History Month,” http://www.defense.gov/home/features/2015/0315_womens-history/.

12 The WAAC’s official birthday was 15 May 1942. It was converted to Regular Army status, becoming the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) on 3 July 

1943. See Bellafaire, The Women’s Army Corps at http://www.history.army.mil/brochures/WAC/WAC.HTM.
Summer 2015 25

(WAVES),13 and the Coast Guard Women’s Reserve 

(SPAR)14 were instituted in the next few months and 

immediately began advertising for not just their particular branch but the idea of women serving in the 

military. Despite the traditional view of women as 

homebound nurturers, thousands of young women 

answered the call to arms and joined.15

Military leaders were reluctant to include women 

in their branches, but the Marine Corps in particular 

was vehemently opposed to the idea. Marine Corps 

Commandant Lieutenant General Thomas Holcomb 

was determined to maintain the elite status of his 

Service, which he believed was the result of its homogeneity: a service of white men. He believed that 

including women would “ruin” the Marine Corps, 

and said as much to Congressman Melvin J. Maas, 

who introduced the Women’s Reserve legislation.16

Obeying the presidential order to integrate, Holcomb implemented far more stringent requirements 

for women than those applied to men.17 The Marine 

Corps’ standards for men were higher than the other 

branches,18 and the additional hurdle winnowed the 

women applicants even further. 

In the months between November 1942 and February 1943, the Women’s Reserve and the Procurement 

Division had to conceptualize, design, and execute 

multiple types of recruiting materials to attract the 

specific women they wanted.19 The first decision was 

“to influence the choice of women who have already, 

or who are in the process of making up their minds to 

don a uniform.”20 As a result of their efforts, the division created recruiting brochures, window placards, 

and posters for display. Some of the materials were 

destined for national distribution while others were 

distributed regionally. For the most part, the women’s 

marketing campaign modeled the men’s campaign, 

selling the elite status and tough reputation of the 

Marines Corps. Despite the intent to discourage 

women from applying, the higher standards actually strengthened the elite reputation of the Marine 

Corps. Many high-quality female applicants were 

drawn by the Corps’ reputation, so much so that the 

Women’s Reserve met its recruitment goals (18,000 

women by June 1944) six months ahead of schedule.21

The Marine Corps began structuring its Reserve in 

November 1942, searching for a woman to serve as 

director, for a small staff, and for space for training 

and housing, and for creating a regulatory structure. 

The new group was activated on Sunday, 13 February 

1943 as the Marine Corps Women’s Reserve.22

The creators of the Women’s Reserve deconstructed the ideal of Marine-hood to a few fundamental 

components: tradition, being the first to fight, group 

membership and cohesion, and an elite status. All of 

these parts were combined to form the basic structure of Marine recruitment in World War II. The ideal changed from building men to building Marines. 

Recruiting materials emphasized that the female recruits would be equal with the men, with the same 

pay, same rank, same discipline, and the same name. 

The posters recast essential markers of femininity, 

such as clothing, makeup, and hairstyle, to empha13 The WAVES official birthday is 30 July 1942. For more information, see Jessica Meyers, “The Navy’s History of Making WAVES,” 30 July 2013, 

http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=75662.

14 The SPAR’s official birthday is 23 November 1942. The abbreviation for their name comes from their motto, Semper Paretis, Always Ready. 

PA2 Robin J. Thomson, The Coast Guard & The Women’s Reserve in World War II (Washington, DC: Coast Guard Historian’s Office, 1992), http://

www.uscg.mil/history/articles/SPARS.pdf.

15 Approximately 400,000 women enlisted to support the wartime effort. For more information, see http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/rr/s01/cw

/students/leeann/historyandcollections/history/lrnmrewwii.html.

16 Ulbrich, Preparing for Victory, 164. 17 Enlisted women requirements included: U.S. citizenship, not married to a Marine, no children younger than 18 years of age, height of not less 

than 60 inches, weight of not less than 95 pounds, good vision and teeth, age between 18 and 35 years of age, and at least two years of high 

school. Officer candidates’ age range was between 20 and 49 years of age, but they must be a college graduate or have a combination of two 

years of college and two years of work experience. 

18 To meet enlistment quotas, many of the Services reduced their male enlistment standards, particularly by lowering the physical requirements 

for admission. On 16 April 1942, recruiting officers could grant waivers for slight deviations with respect to age, height, weight, character discharge from previous Service, and police records. Additional modifications were made on 24 August 1942 when the maximum age for recruits 

was raised from 33 to 36. For more information, see RAdm Julius Augustus Furer, “The United States Marine Corps: Origin, Legal Status, and 

Mission,” in Administration of the Navy Department in World War II (Washington, DC: Navy Department, 1959). 19 The Women’s Reserve was activated several months after the other women’s auxiliaries, and therefore needed to prioritize its time and budget 

for maximum efficiency.

20 “Public Relations Plan.” 

21 Strength Reports, Women Marines, Reports 1 of 5 (Washington, DC: Marine Corps University, History Division). 22 Stremlow, Free a Marine to Fight, 2.
26 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

size belonging. A prominent example can be seen in 

the emphasis placed on women wearing feminine 

skirted uniforms that were still in colors unique to 

the Marine Corps. The advertisements accessed cultural constructions of gender, social expectation, 

and ideals of masculine and feminine performance 

to successfully draw both men and women into a 

gender-integrated Marine Corps.

In the 1940s, U.S. society was still attached to the 

Victorian ideals of separate spheres and proscribed 

places for men and women. Women worked in “respectable” fields, such as nursing, teaching, and office support staff. Yet women consistently pushed 

the boundaries of acceptability and respectability, 

sometimes due to financial necessity but often for 

personal fulfillment. For example, women aviators 

(or aviatrixes) not only flew their own planes, they 

also maintained them. Women worked the counters 

at their families’ shops, worked their families’ farms, 

and worked in factories to send money back to their 

struggling families. Women also owned their own 

businesses or worked in positions of power as stockbrokers, police officers, and manual laborers.23

As women advanced into male-dominated workspaces and took their place in the public sphere in 

the 1940s, they were faced with accusations of mannishness, both mental and physical. Despite the societal changes of the previous few decades, women 

still needed to be identified as such. With the start 

of World War II and the increased need for workers in all industries, women and the businesses and 

military branches recruiting them were faced with a 

unique opportunity that was fraught with challenge: 

how to convince women to perform nontraditional 

work while preserving the traditional gender binary.24 While it seems a small thing, the crucial aspect of 

the gender binary is the sexes’ legibility to other people; that is, it must be recognizable to others. Even as 

women took jobs as mechanics, drivers, logisticians, 

and factory workers, they were actively encouraged 

to maintain feminine appearances. Subtle cues in the 

Marine Corps WWII-era posters indicate that the 

women shown fulfilled the traditional feminine space 

with things like makeup, nail polish, and fashionably 

styled hair. The emphasis in Marine Corps recruiting on the uniforms and, later, cosmetics designed 

specifically for the Marine Corps Women’s Reserve 

are both ways women could achieve what Judith Halberstam calls “a cardinal rule of gender: one must be 

readable at a glance.”25

Dramatic changes in American society opened 

new opportunities to women across a wide swath 

of industries, yet the underlying implication of the 

advertising was that women’s work during the war 

would be temporary. Once the conflict ended and 

the men came home, the women would all return 

to the domestic sphere and welcome their returning soldiers. This assumption had been in place before the war, as young single women were expected 

to work only until they married. The onset of combat required employers to hire married women and 

mothers of young children, despite the taboo against 

it. Enticing married women and homemakers to 

enter the workforce supported the connections between housework and industrial work, and women’s 

employment during World War II reinforced the 

gendered separation of labor.26

Another method used to draw women into the 

workforce was to feminize the tasks involved. No matter how heavily masculine the job had been prewar, 

when women were needed to take over vacant positions, the work was described as similar to housework, 

using the same terminology or making a direct comparison. Working a lathe was compared to an electric 

washing machine, welding to sewing, a drill press to a 

juicer. Further, newsreels and printed articles emphasized how pretty and feminine war workers remained 

despite their masculine-coded tasks: “As if calculated 

to assure women—and men—that war work need not 

involve a loss of femininity, depictions of women’s 

23 For further information on women’s professional lives between World War I and World War II, see Virginia Nicholson, Singled Out: How Two 

Million British Women Survived Without Men After the First World War (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2008). For more on American 

women’s professional activities in the early 1940s, see Weatherford, American Women and World War II. 24 Gender binary is the artificial division of the world into things that are “masculine” or “for men” and things that are “feminine” or “for women.”

25 Judith Halberstam, Female Masculinity (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1998), 23. Halberstam is the director of the Center for Feminist 

Research at the University of Southern California.

26 Ruth Milkman, Gender at Work: The Dynamics of Job Segregation by Sex during World War II (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1987), 

61–64.
Summer 2015 27

new work roles were overlaid with allusions to their 

stylish dress and attractive appearance.”27

While new workers were enticed into industry, 

the Marine Corps targeted the pool of women clerical workers. A radio announcement first made on 

13 February 1943 clearly articulates the role women 

were expected to play in the Marine Corps.

The men of the Corps are traditionally famous for outfighting the enemy anywhere on the globe . . . These 

stout-hearted men are now needed overseas. Your service will be important not only because of the military 

duty itself, but also because you will be unleashing another fighting Marine to advance against the enemies 

over there.28

Office work had become respectable work for 

women at all stages of life by this point, and professional competence was now a stoutly middle-class 

replacement for the refinement of an upper-class 

woman. Carole Srole argues that the shift in gendered office work occurred in the late nineteenth 

century, making it more acceptable for women to 

work as clerks and typists. At the height of the Industrial Revolution, women worked in factories and 

shops as domestic workers and teachers. With the 

advent of technology, such as typewriters, women 

flooded shorthand and typist positions, work previously done almost exclusively by men. The arrival 

of women into the workforce pushed both men and 

women to recreate their images as office workers and 

separate from other classes of laborers. Masculine 

and feminine traits were intermingled to create a new 

aesthetic of professionalism, one that was applicable 

to both sexes with only a few differences, including 

ambition, mental acumen, and independence. 

Women still faced challenges, created by men who 

tried to cast all working women as immoral or incompetent, and created a new, respectable image of 

the professional businesswoman. The professional 

businesswoman had all the characteristics of the 

classic image of the middle-class businessman but 

also the empathy and caring nature of an upper-class 

“lady” without the hyperfeminine weaknesses. This 

woman stood in contrast to the “typewriter girl,” or 

the “gold-digger” of questionable morals who was 

only working long enough to catch a husband. The 

businesswoman became a respectable member of 

the middle class as both men and women created 

new, “professional” identities that were distinguishable from earlier models of both masculinity and 

femininity.29

Shifts in who did the work also precipitated 

changes in how the work was perceived. Reframing 

what work entailed recast the tasks as respectable for 

women, though the job itself was devalued in the 

process. For example, in the automobile and electrical manufacturing industries, women were assigned 

jobs that were considered “light work.” Even if men 

and women performed the same task, different wage 

rates meant the men were paid more for the same 

job. However, there was no continuity across industries or geography, indicating that descriptions of 

“women’s work” varied according to each employer’s 

preconceptions of propriety and ability.30

The shifts in workplace norms also pushed a 

change in gender itself. Gender is expressed through 

behaviors, which are codified through an agreedupon performance of those behaviors. Judith Butler 

describes gender as “the repeated stylization of the 

body, a set of repeated acts within a highly rigid regulatory frame that congeal over time to produce the 

appearance of substance, of a natural sort of being.”31

Gender is created when socially agreed-upon behaviors are performed repeatedly for others and the 

self. As such, people perform behaviors they associate with their gender identities. According to Butler, there is no original gender, merely performances 

based on an individual’s perception of the socially 

described gender; it is socially created through unspoken conversations between members of a social 

group. That being said, this does not mean that gender is not real, rather, it means that no gendered 

behavior or practice is fixed, and that any gendered 

or ungendered behavior can be inscribed on a set of 

behaviors by common consensus.32

27 Ibid., 61.

28 “USMCWR Recruiting Copy,” Women Marines, General Information 1 of 2, Subsection Press Releases (Washington, DC: Marine Corps History 

Division, undated), 12–14.

29 Srole, Transcribing Class and Gender, 11–12. 30 Milkman, Gender at Work, 15–19. 31 Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1987, 2006), 45. 32 Ibid., 34–45.
28 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

Recruiters for the Women’s Reserve had to convince women that they could join the Marine Corps 

without compromising either the women’s femininity or the Corps’ reputation as the toughest outfit in 

the U.S. Armed Services. Yet the core of the Marine 

Corps advertising for both men and women shifted 

away from the prewar campaign of “making men” to 

simply “making Marines.”

USMC recruiting posters that targeted men and 

were focused on the Corps’ traditions and history. 

Some materials directly recalled historical events 

with images or direct references of the Marine Corps’ 

birthday of 10 November. Other materials showed 

Marines wearing the iconic blue dress uniform, inviting the viewer to join, or used the eagle, globe, and 

anchor emblem alone to identify the Marine Corps. 

Many posters directed toward male recruits featured action, an allusion to the first to fight reputation 

of the Marine Corps. An early poster bluntly asks the 

viewer “Want Action? Join U.S. Marine Corps!”33 The 

Marine extends his hand forward toward the viewer, 

inviting him into the picture. A plane flies in the distance, above a series of ships, most likely troop transport ships. The Marine has a welcoming expression 

on his face, as if he is identifying the viewer as a man 

worthy of becoming a Marine. Instead of encouraging the viewer to do his part—to enlist, to answer the 

call to arms—the poster instead presumes the viewer 

is already planning to join the military and the only 

question is how much “action” the man would like 

to see. Here we see the presumption of service—the 

man viewing this poster has already decided to join 

and only needs to choose his branch of Service.

The most direct recruit advertising, used to push 

the Corps’ elite reputation and history, were produced in 1942 and 1943 to both commemorate the 

Marine Corps’ birthday and to recruit in honor of 

it. The 1942 poster follows the red, white, and blue 

color scheme found in other posters and uses a twopart background image: the Marine Corps emblem 

on the right and a shipboard battle scene on the left, 

with names of famous Marine battles overlaid. A 

contemporary Marine stands in the center, holding 

a rifle with bayonet fixed, staring at an enemy to the 

right of frame. The text, “Always Advance with the 

U.S. Marines,” plays into the Marine reputation as 

the outfit that sees the most action. The battle scene 

reminds the viewer that the Marines are soldiers of 

the sea, an amphibious force. The names of battles, 

up to and including recently won island battles, emphasize both the tradition and the reputation of the 

Marine Corps without explicitly stating either. The 

poster creates a powerful image, but the open composition and lack of visual context detaches it from 

reality.34

The 1943 poster provides more visual context and 

less cheerleading. The text is simple including the 

Marine Corps motto, “Semper Fidelis,” and the anniversary date and years, “November 10, 1775–1943.” 

33 “WANT ACTION? Join U.S. Marine Corps!,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-70, World War II Posters.

34 “1775 . . . 167th Anniversary . . . 1992,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-336, World War II Posters.

U.S. National Archives

“Want Action.” A World War I-era U.S. Marine Corps recruiting poster for men. 
Summer 2015 29

Two Marines in jungle gear are charging ahead toward the viewer. The damage done to their uniforms 

indicates that they have been in battle and are continuing the fight. The background is a cloud, recalling 

the fog of war, and a Continental Marine-era drummer exhorts the Marines to further valor. The eagle, 

globe, and anchor emblem in the top right corner 

rests on a dark blue background rather than on the 

cloud. In this poster, the connection to tradition and 

history is most important. The Revolutionary-era 

Marine connects the modern Marines to the nation’s 

history, and the insignia and motto connect them to 

other Marines—a sign of group cohesion. The drummer is the driving force behind the two Marines. The 

poster illustrates the tradition and history driving 

the Marines, and it implies that the male recruit will 

be part of an organization with both a storied past as 

well as a powerful present and future.35

Other posters from the time focused on the present and future of the Marine Corps. Aviation was crucial to the war effort, especially in the Pacific theater, 

where vast distances complicated battle plans. With 

the Doolittle Raid36 and the success of Allied bombing campaigns in Europe, aviation quickly became a 

glamorous position, one that all branches advertised. 

Here, too, the Marine Corps used its first to fight reputation in the aviation-specific recruiting material.

In a departure from the generally minimalist 

posters discussed here, one aviation poster is a complex and vivid scene. A Marine aircraft hangs in the 

foreground, flying away from the viewer and firing 

on a Japanese fighter plane in the background, as a 

Japanese bomber falls in the middle range of the image. The scene is set over a Japanese village, with the 

iconic Mount Fuji in the distance. The buildings are 

traditional Japanese wooden residential structures. 

At the back of the village stands two simple Shinto 

gateways. The falling bomber appears to be about to 

crash into one of the houses. The poster invites the 

viewer to imagine himself as the aviator who takes 

35 “Semper Fidelis. U.S. Marine Corps,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-243, World War II Posters.

36 The 18 April 1942 Doolittle Raid, named for LtCol James H. Doolittle, USAAF, represented the first U.S. attack on the Japanese home islands. 

The attack came in retaliation for Pearl Harbor, and had little military but high psychological significance.

U.S. National Archives

“Always Advance with the U.S. Marines.” This 1942 Marine Corps recruiting poster was also used to mark the 

167th anniversary of the Corps.

U.S. National Archives

“Semper Fidelis.” In this 1943 Marine Corps anniversary 

poster, a Revolutionary War drummer exhorts Marines 

in battle.
30 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

the fight to the Japanese, reinforcing the Marine 

reputation as the first to fight. The text reads “HIT 

HARD and often WITH the MARINES”; this is the 

most direct reference to Japanese aerial attacks of all 

the posters.37

Part of the Corps’ elite status is also about looking the part. The iconic dress uniform is one of the 

Marine Corps’ most distinctive markers, and it was 

used as a marketing tool. The striking color scheme 

and expert use of simple design and tailoring techniques make it an almost universally flattering garment. The uniform sets the Marines apart from the 

other Services visually, making it clear that they are 

distinctive and separate. 

Several posters show a Marine in his iconic dress 

uniform. A strikingly simple poster shows a Marine 

at parade rest against an off-white background in 

front of the word “READY” in red across the top. 

The remainder of the text falls below the uniform 

belt, reading “Join U.S. Marines/Land/Sea/Air.”38 The 

minimalist design lets the uniform do the work. The 

short, sharp phrasing emphasizes each word, making them stand out, and the red, white, and blue color scheme continues that of other posters. The dress 

uniform emphasizes the Marine Corps’ uniqueness 

and acknowledges that the uniform itself is desirable 

on an aesthetic level.39

Another unique poster makes use of several of the 

methods discussed above, increasing the complex37 “Hit Hard and Often with the Marines,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-995, World War II Posters. 

38 “READY. Join U.S. Marines,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-1618, World War II Posters. 

39 “This Device on Headgear or Uniform Means U.S. Marines,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-2025, World 

War II Posters. 

U.S. National Archives

“Hit Hard and Often.” A majority of Marine recruiting posters during World War II incorporated aviation 

themes, such as a Marine attack on a Japanese village 

as portrayed in this poster.

U.S. National Archives

“READY.” The Marine uniform was a common element in 

both male and female recruiting posters during World 

War II as a way to distinguish the Corps from the other 

military branches also heavily recruiting at the time.
Summer 2015 31

ity of the composition. The poster depicts a night air 

raid. A spotlight picks out four aircraft silhouettes 

over a generalized city skyline. A Marine in dress 

uniform trousers and cover mans an antiaircraft 

gun in the foreground. The Marine is clearly firing 

upon the incoming aircraft. The text reads “Always 

on the Alert, at Sea, on Land, in the Air.” The generalized skyline could be any number of American 

cities, underscoring the fear that the U.S. mainland 

was as vulnerable to attack as Hawaii and Alaska 

had proven to be. This poster marks the individual 

as a Marine by his trousers, and implies that he was 

involved in a formal, noncombat event when the 

attack began. Because Marines are “always on the 

alert,” he was able to establish a defensive position 

in time to protect the city. Once again, this image reinforces the ideal of the Marines as elite and the first 

to fight. Instead of interacting with the viewer, the 

scene merely focuses on the individual. By telling a 

single Marine’s story, the poster reinforces Marine 

Corps values and invites the viewer to become a part 

of the storied Corps.40

These recruiting posters worked from a few basic 

assumptions. First, that the Marine Corps’ unique 

traditions were worth upholding, and that they were 

good ideals to add to one’s own. Second, that the 

viewer was already planning on joining the military, it was merely a matter of deciding where to go. 

Third, that the viewer considered himself worthy of 

the Marine Corps’ elite status. These posters imply 

that the viewer already sees Marine Corps’ virtues in 

himself, and only needs to join to bring those seeds 

to full flower. The concept was clearly carried over 

to the recruitment material directed toward women.

Recruiting posters targeting women also invoked 

tradition, using images of male Marines fighting.41

Wartime costs limited the number of poster designs 

and the types of promotional materials that could be 

produced during the war years. Therefore, the Women’s Reserve used other media along with posters, 

such as radio advertisements and sponsored spots, 

newspaper articles and fillers, and strategic use of 

posters, window signs, car placards, and booklets. 

The Women’s Reserve was also represented in the 

broader Office of War Information (OWI) campaign 

that introduced female recruits to all of the women’s 

Services.42 The Women Reserves’ main objective 

was to set it apart from the other women’s Service 

40 “Always on the Alert,” National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44-PA-339, World War II Posters. 

41 Note that, even though our focus here is on the visual recruiting materials, the same concepts were highlighted in other formats, such as radio 

spots. The elite status of the Marine Corps was implied in much of the written material. Radio spots and advertisements directly connected the 

Women’s Reserve to the assaults on Tarawa and Guadalcanal, arguing that the victories, however difficult and costly, would have been impossible without the women Marines. Each radio spot and advertisement clearly explained the enlistment requirements for women. They clearly 

explained the process of becoming a Marine and emphasized that being a Marine would be difficult but worth the effort. Radio spots also 

emphasized the more feminine aspects of life as a woman reservist, and in all cases rested on the assumption that the women wanted to be 

changed by their experience but did not want to change too much. For more, see “March of the Women Marines” radio advertisements, Marine 

Corps University History Division, Women Marines, Enlistment–Enlistment, Training–Specialist Schools, and Assignments–Miscellaneous.

42 “Public Relations Plan.”

U.S. National Archives

“Always on the Alert.” In this WWII-era poster, promoters 

played on the Marine motto “first to fight” as a selling 

point for the elite nature of the Corps, focusing on a 

male Marine in dress uniform manning an antiaircraft 

position during an air raid. 
32 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

branches. The most obvious difference was the lack 

of an official nickname. In a 1944 interview with Life

magazine, Holcomb, despite his own reservations, 

made it clear that the women were as much Marines 

as the men. “They are Marines. They don’t have a 

nickname and don’t need one. They get their basic 

training in a Marine atmosphere at a Marine post. 

They inherit the traditions of the Marines. They are

Marines.”43 In that same spirit, the women’s recruiting material was based on the same premise as the 

men’s, particularly that the materials targeted women who had already decided to join the military and 

were still deciding which branch to join.44

A common image used in female recruiting during World War II was that of the first director of the 

MCWR, Major Ruth Cheney Streeter. In her mid40s at the time, Streeter was a philanthropist and 

homemaker with sons in the military. Her biographical details were repeatedly emphasized in Marine 

Corps press releases along with her most striking accomplishment: she was an aviator with a commercial 

pilot’s license. She had applied to the Women’s Air 

Service Pilots (WASP) and was subsequently denied 

five times for being too old. She carried her passion 

for aviation with her to the Marine Corps.45 Despite 

her aviation credentials, Streeter’s main appeal as the 

director of the newly formed Reserve was her status 

as a mother, fulfilling the traditional role expected of 

women. Her entire family worked for the war effort, 

and her status as a blue-star mother made her more 

relatable to parents of potential reservists.46

By using Major Streeter’s image, the Marine Corps 

headed off hints of impropriety and deviance about 

young women joining the military ranks. Her status 

as a mother combined with her professional competence made her an ideal leader—one to whom parents entrusted their daughters, and one that enlistees 

could respect as a leader. In recruiting posters, the 

contrast between her and male Marines is subtly emphasized. She wears the uniform with red highlights 

and, while the basis of the uniform is a man’s suit, she 

appears quite feminine. Streeter wears a fashionable 

but regulation hairstyle with understated yet appro43 “Women Marines,” Life, 27 March 1944, 81–84. 44 A variety of public relations tools were used in addition to the posters. The few posters produced were placed prominently around town, 

just as were the men’s posters. The women’s procurement officers also provided car and window placards for display. Brochures were often 

distributed at meetings of local women’s groups and clubs. Procurement officers were guest speakers, though the preferred speaker was a local woman reservist. The meetings and recruitment events were announced and covered in local newspapers. Some women who attended the 

meetings were sworn in there, and the photos of their swearing-in became future promotional material for the area. See “Public Relations Plan.”

45 Stremlow, Free a Marine to Fight, 3–4. Planes were often featured prominently in recruiting imagery, and ultimately, about 50 percent of 

women reservists worked in aviation in some capacity. This statistic came from an untitled radio address given by MajGen Field Harris, director 

of Marine Aviation, for the MCWR’s second anniversary in 1945.

46 Streeter’s motherhood was both acknowledged and celebrated, and it was often presented as proof that the young women would be well 

cared for while in the Marines. The idea that the women would be properly chaperoned and their reputations would be untarnished by their 

service was important in the recruiting effort, and something that set the Women’s Reserve apart from both the men and the other women’s 

Services. Stremlow, Free a Marine to Fight, 7.

Walter Clinton Jackson Library, 

University of North Carolina at Greensboro

The image of Maj Ruth Cheney Streeter, the first director 

of the Women Reserves, was often used on recruiting 

posters for female Marines during WWII.
Summer 2015 33

priately feminine makeup. She looks to the horizon, 

over the right shoulder of the viewer. Her expression 

is resolute, showing strength without harshness. An 

easy confidence comes through, painting Streeter as 

a person comfortable with the conflicts inherent in 

her position. 

One recruiting poster featuring Major Streeter has 

a background of Marines charging a beach. The text 

below the image reads “Be A Marine . . . Free a Marine to fight.” The billboard version shows Streeter 

on a white background with the same text in red and 

blue. These strikingly simple designs are a hallmark 

of many of the Marine Corps recruiting posters. 

Used within the first months of the female recruiting 

efforts, the focus on the director and the basic function of the Women’s Reserve transmitted the Corps’ 

female recruiting message clearly and quickly. 

The short, concise slogans implied that the Marine Corps had no need to sell themselves. Rather, 

the Marines invited a select few to join them. As 

such, recruiting materials sold the Corps as an elite 

organization of singular individuals. By inviting 

viewers to see themselves through this lens, potential recruits could then take the short step to being 

Marines. Streeter further emphasized this message 

in 1943.

To those who have long wanted to be a Marine, I say: the 

door is now open. The next step is up to you. To those 

who have not yet found their post of greatest service, 

here is your opportunity.47 

Women-focused recruiting efforts clearly emphasized aviation. Posters not featuring Streeter all 

focus on a woman in front of a plane. The women 

hold clipboards, obviously taking an active role in 

aviation administration during the war. In two of the 

three posters, the female Marine stands alone. In the 

third, however, a male aviator looks to the woman 

reservist for instruction. These women are strong, 

capable, and have authority that is respected and 

accepted by their brothers in Service. Showing the 

women independent from men provides legitimacy 

to their work, quietly underscoring that these women are different than most and that their ability and 

dedication are unquestioned.

47 USMCWR Recruiting Copy, 4.

U.S. National Archives

“Be a Marine.” Maj Streeter’s image was repeatedly 

used for female Marine recruiting as an indirect assurance to possible recruits and their families that the 

Marine Corps was a safe place to entrust their daughters for military service.

U.S. National Archives

“Free a Marine to Fight.” The recruiting rhetoric behind 

this poster was similar to the “Be a stand-in for a hero” 

concept that encouraged women to take on jobs in the 

Marine Corps to free up their male counterparts for 

combat-related positions.
34 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

These three images do more than emphasize aviation as a possible occupation. They also emphasize 

freedom, strength, ability, competence, and opportunity. The female reservists all look to the right of 

the frame, slightly upward in the same direction 

as those featuring Major Streeter. While images of 

people looking to the sky are common at an airfield, 

the consistency with Major Streeter’s portrait is significant. Each of these women seems to be looking 

to the future, but they understand that there is work 

to be done now, work that may lead to careers after 

the military.

The aviation posters all reflect the goals of the female recruiting program—being a Marine does not 

mean being less of a woman. The female Marines are 

conventionally pretty and sharply dressed in their 

uniforms. Their hair and makeup is both properly 

feminine and appropriately military. The women 

are competent and strong; they are doing important 

work to support the war effort, but they have not 

lost the characteristics that make them women. The 

women Marines are a part of the larger group, with 

as little differentiation as possible. For example, they 

wear the service uniform with a coat and the Marine 

Corps emblem. Their uniforms are well tailored and 

consistent with the men’s everyday uniforms. However, even though they appear as similar to their 

male counterparts as possible, they are still clearly 

women, both feminine and attractive.

The visuals for the window placards and car cards 

followed the same conventions as the posters. A window placard for display at each procurement office 

showed a gray scale sketch of a woman Marine on 

a white background. She is facing the viewer directly, calmly, and confidently. Above her head in bold 

red letters are the words “Enlist Now,” and below, in 

black text on a red block, “Inquire Here!” The posiMarine Corps History Division

“So Proudly We Serve.” Aviation-themed recruiting 

posters were often used for female Marines during 

WWII as more than 50 percent of female reservists 

worked in aviation in some capacity during the war. 

U.S. National Archives

“Salute to the Marines.” This Washington, DC, area 

Women’s Reserve recruiting poster includes several elements commonly used during WWII to attract female 

recruits, including an aviation theme and a women 

posed in a well-tailored Marine uniform.
Summer 2015 35

tioning of the woman Marine in these materials is 

different, as she faces the viewer directly. This composition gives the viewer a sense that this image is 

not based on a portrait, but is instead an idealization 

of the woman looking at the poster, showing her a 

possible future as a female Marine. She is attractive, 

neat, fashionable, and sharp. The image starts at the 

neck, so the only part of the uniform shown is the 

headgear with the Marine Corps emblem and distinctive braid. Her gaze is almost challenging: “Are 

you coming?”48 Designed specifically to be displayed 

in a recruiting office window, the placard would have 

had a powerful impact. The placard follows the same 

lines as the “Want Action” and “READY” posters (see 

pp. 20 and 30) directed at male recruits. The Marine 

in the poster expects that the viewer has already decided to join the military, and is encouraging him or 

her to choose the Marines. 

Having reached the maximum enlistment of 

19,000 by December 1944, recruiting efforts were 

reduced to a maintenance level pace by the February 1945 birthday. A unique placard was created 

specifically for the MCWR’s second anniversary. The 

window placard featured a portrait of a woman reservist over a red, white, and blue background. The 

text reads, “Be a Stand-in for a Hero!” The slogan 

skips the subtext of earlier posters and immediately 

places the combat Marine at the top of the heap. He 

is a hero and, by implication, standing in for him in a 

noncombat job makes a woman a hero as well.49 The 

message again points to the elite status of the Marine 

and will transfer to the woman Marine. 

The MCWR recruiting materials emphasized traditional markers of femininity and womanhood and 

tied them to the uniform. The women’s uniforms 

were a major selling point, one that was actively promoted.50 In a surprising connection of the commercial and military worlds, Elizabeth Arden Cosmetics 

was contracted to create a red nail lacquer, lipstick, 

and rouge to complement the Women’s Reserve uniform. Named “Montezuma Red,” it was the same distinctive shade of red as the military issue scarf and 

flashes on the uniform, and was quickly marketed 

to the MCWR and the nation as a properly patriotic 

form of makeup.51 Connecting high-end cosmetics 

to the Women’s Reserve told women already in the 

Reserve and those considering it that the women 

of the MCWR were quite feminine, enough so that 

they had their own unique cosmetic color.52

Even without the Elizabeth Arden connection, the 

48 World War II Recruiting Center Window Placard, Women Marines Publications (3 of 3) (Quantico, VA: Marine Corps University, History Division, 

undated). 

49 Second Anniversary Recruiting Placard, Women Marines Publications (3 of 3) (Quantico, VA: Marine Corps University, History Division, undated). A photo is unavailable, as the original placard is damaged.

50 The shoes were practical but still fashionable, the pocketbook came with a removable slipcover, and the flashes of red on the “forestry green” 

uniform were mentioned repeatedly in press releases and news articles. Wearing makeup, including nail polish, was encouraged as a method 

of feminine expression.

51 See Stremlow, Free a Marine to Fight, 19; Lindy Woodhead, War Paint: Madame Helena Rubinstein & Miss Elizabeth Arden: Their Lives, Their 

Times, Their Rivalry (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, 2003), 287–88; and Elizabeth Arden advertisement, Women Marines–Wars (1 of 2), 

Subsection Articles (Quantico, VA: Marine Corps University, History Division, undated).

52 Woodhead, War Paint, 287.

Marine Corps History Division 

This female Marine recruiting window placard was used 

for display in Marine Corps procurement office windows across the nation to attract potential recruits.
36 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

female reservists understood the importance of maintaining their appearance. Wearing cosmetics meant 

they were still properly feminine, and still within 

the conventional bounds of respectability. Hairstyle 

was also important. Regulation hairstyles required 

that hair not fall beyond the collar, so shorter, fashionable styles were encouraged. Beauty parlors were 

added to military installations so the women could 

maintain fashionable and regulation-compliant hairstyles, which sometimes required chemical processing, a concession to different social rules for men and 

women in the Marine Corps, despite organizational 

efforts to make them as similar as possible.

While the Marine Corps’ internal struggles over 

presentation were not visible to the public, the results were clear in the recruiting materials. The 

women were all attractive, wore delicate makeup that 

looked lightly applied, and had painted nails where 

the hands were visible and short, practical hair that 

was still stylish. The models were typically pretty 

women in a time when “pretty” meant girly and petite. Because of this clearly marketed preference for 

delicacy, internal memos indicate that, despite the 

need for men in combat, some male Marines had to 

remain in stateside assignments to handle the heavy 

lifting for the women.53

While Marine Corps WWII recruiting materials 

were consciously based on the Marines’ reputation as 

an elite outfit in the military, which was clearly visible 

in the men’s recruitment material, the message subtly shifted when applied to female-focused materials. 

The Women’s Reserve made this conceptual leap less 

daunting by playing on both the extant Marine Corps 

reputation as an elite organization and appealing to 

the viewer’s self-image as an exceptional individual. 

Deceptively simple, this strategy required careful 

balancing of respectability, tradition, and innovation, 

moving from “You’ll become a man” to “You’ll still 

53 Marine Corps Women’s Reserve General Policies, Women Marines–Wars (1 of 2), Subsection Regulations (Quantico, VA: Marine Corps University, History Division, 25 November 1943); and Monthly Report from Assistant for Women’s Reserve, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, Survey of 

Distribution of MCWR Personnel, Camp Lejeune, as of 1 May 1944, Women Marines–Assignments, Subsection–Locations (Quantico, VA: Marine 

Corps University, History Division).

Marine Corps History Division 

Cosmetic company Elizabeth Arden joined the ranks of 

business supporting the Marine Corps’ ability to recruit 

females with the release of lipstick and nail polish in 

“Montezuma Red” that was made specifically for women Marines, as shown in this magazine advertisement 

that ran in fashion magazines of the time.

be a woman.” That simple change in recruiting strategy not only drew highly sought-after women to the 

Marine Corps, it also helped reshape societies’ views 

on femininity, the military, the workplace, and the 

woman’s place in the United States. s1775s
Charles D. Melson*

Chief Historian, History Division

Marine Corps University

The United States and Free World forces 

began withdrawing from South Vietnam 

in 1971 as a result of the Vietnamization policy envisioned by the Richard M. 

Nixon administration, which left the Vietnamese 

to conduct their own military forces with American advice and support. After the departure of the 

major U.S. Marine air and ground commands from 

Military Region 1 (MR 1), a residual force of American Marines remained in the form of advisors, communicators, fire support coordinators, and embassy 

guards. While previous incursions into neighboring 

Cambodia and Laos appeared to indicate the limitations of this approach, a major test of the concept 

took place in 1972. For the American and South 

Vietnamese Marines, this began with a head-on 

confrontation with the invading North Vietnamese 

along the demilitarized zone in conventional fighting that culminated with the loss of the provincial 

capital, Quang Tri City. 

After the acrimonious and confused fighting that 

began in April and May 1972, this singular defeat 

would be redeemed later in a singular victory. The 

combat, so late in the war, was still significant. For 

the South Vietnamese, it meant they could not hold 

their own against the North Vietnamese without 

critical American support. For the Americans, it was 

a foretaste of the impact of high-tempo conventional 

operations after the counterinsurgency era. This and 

the lessons of the 1973 October War (Yom Kippur 

War) in the Middle East would serve as important 

Vietnam Marines

and the Defense

of Quang Tri in 1972

Courtesy of author

Vietnamese Marine Corps insignia, patterned after the 

American eagle, globe, and anchor.

*The foundations for this article began at the USMC Command and Staff College Easter Offensive Symposium in December 1986. It was a paper funded by the 

Marine Corps Heritage Foundation for the Society for Military History Meeting at the Royal Military College of Canada in May 1993, along with presentations by Dale 

Andrade and How-ard Feng. The account was based on the primary information generated by the events and participants. Documentation came from the Marine 

Corps Historical Center (MCHC, Washington, DC), the U.S. Army Center of Military History (USACMH, Washington, DC), and the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA, College Park, MD). More recent secondary material was consulted to include John Grider Miller’s The Co-Vans: U.S. Marine Advisors in Vietnam

(Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2000); Dale Andrade’s America’s Last Vietnam Battle: Halting Hanoi’s 1972 Easter Offensive (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 

2001); Willard J. Webb and Walter S. Poole’s The Joint Chiefs of Staff and the War in Vietnam, 1971–1973 (Washington, DC: Office of Joint History, 2007); Stephen P. 

Randolph’s Powerful and Brutal Weapons: Nixon, Kissinger, and the Easter Offensive (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007); Ha Mai Viet’s Steel and Blood: 

South Vietnamese Armor and the War for Southeast Asia (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2008); and Robert E. Stoffey’s Fighting to Leave: The Final Years of 

America’s War in Vietnam, 1972–1973 (Minneapolis, MN: Zenith Press, 2008).

37
38 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

preparation for U.S. armed forces in the 1990–91 

Gulf War in Southwest Asia.

In 1972, both the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) and the U.S. Military Assistance 

Command, Vietnam (USMACV) asserted that the 

Vietnamese Marine Corps (VNMC) played a major part in the battlefield defeat that resulted in the 

loss of Quang Tri City and Province of the Republic 

of South Vietnam in April and May 1972. This was 

based on two observations: one, Vietnamese Marine 

commanders paid more attention to their service 

leader than their tactical commander; and two, this 

was caused by pressure from the Vietnamese Marines and their American Marine advisors to fight as 

a division command for the first time.

During the North Vietnamese spring offensive, the 

South Vietnamese 3d ARVN Division was defeated 

in a series of engagements that climaxed on 1 May 

1972 with the loss of Quang Tri City (first battle of 

Quang Tri City). The aftermath of this event was 

muddied by acrimonious disputes among American 

forces over the conduct of the defense of Quang Tri 

Province in MR 1 (or ARVN I Corps), which saw the 

U.S. Army advisors withdraw while U.S. Marine advisors remained with their Vietnamese counterparts.

The actions and motivation of the Vietnamese 

Marines were subjected to various interpretations: 

senior 3d ARVN Division advisor, U.S. Army Colonel Donald J. Metcalf, stated that the VNMC lost 

Quang Tri City; First Regional Assistance Command’s Army Major General Frederick J. Kroesen Jr. 

implied it; and USMACV’s Army General Creighton 

W. Abrams Jr. directed his ire against both VNMC 

and ARVN armored units—at least until he departed Vietnam in June 1972, which coincided with the 

beginning of the successful counteroffensive to regain both the province and city by the VNMC and 

ARVN airborne divisions supported by American 

air and naval forces. 

As early as 1974, Australian Army Brigadier Francis P. Serong repeated claims of VNMC misconduct, 

similar to those made by ARVN and U.S. Army personnel.1

 U.S. Army General William C. Westmoreland even commented on the misconduct in his 

memoirs in 1976.2

 And the debate created by Colonel Gerald H. Turley—one of the Marine advisors’ 

most vocal participants—in his 1985 book continued to fuel the unsubstantiated charges of VietnamOfficial U.S. Marine Corps photo

LtGen Le Nguyen Khang, Commandant of the Vietnamese Marine Corps, with Senior Marine Advisor Col 

Joshua W. Dorsey III. 

Defense Department (Marine Corps) A800666

Senior Marine Advisor Col Dorsey with BGen Bui The 

Lan commanding the Vietnamese Marine Division. 

1 Brig F. P. Serong, “The 1972 Easter Offensive,” Southeast Asian Perspectives, no. 1 (Summer 1974): 32–34. 2 Gen William C. Westmoreland, A Soldier Reports (Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 1976).
Summer 2015 39

ese Marine misconduct more than a decade after the 

debacle.3

In Their Own Image 

In 1954, a scattering of riverine commandos was designated as the “Marine infantry” of the Republic of 

Vietnam Navy, later known as the Vietnamese Marine Corps (VNMC or TQLC in Vietnamese). The 

Marine infantry became part of the armed forces 

general reserve and was separated from the Vietnamese Navy in 1965 and from then answered only 

to the Joint General Staff of the Republic of Vietnam 

Armed Forces (RVNAF). It expanded from a solitary 

battalion to nine infantry battalions and three artillery battalions in a multibrigade structure along with 

service and support units. Also present was a small 

advisory team of U.S. Marines as part of the Cold 

War proliferation of the Marines Corps in the area 

of the U.S. Pacific Command, which included Korea, 

Vietnam, Nationalist China, the Philippines, and 

Indonesia. American forces brought a background 

based on established naval amphibious forces, division-level employment, and a legislated structure. 

As a result, the vision of a Vietnamese Marine Division reflected the organization and doctrine that 

the United States was familiar with. This concept 

was fostered by Vietnamese attendance at Marine 

Corps schools and the material support of the advisory effort. Despite resistance from the ARVN 

and USMACV command structures, by 1968, the 

goal of a full division of Marines was a priority for 

Lieutenant General Le Nguyen Khang, the VNMC 

commandant, and his advisors. Divisional structure 

was reached by 1970, but no large scale employment 

occurred. The pressure for this structure increased 

with external operations in Cambodia in 1970 and 

Laos in 1971. Those operations deserve a closer look 

(which is not possible in this limited analysis) due to 

the friction that occurred with the respective VNMC 

and ARVN command structures. Difficulties also 

arose between the VNMC brigade commanders and 

acting division commander, Colonel Bui The Lan.4

Prelude To Defeat

By 1971, with the departure of most American combat units from MR 1, VNMC brigades were deployed 

in rotation to Quang Tri Province and placed under 

ARVN command. Even with a deployment to Laos 

in February 1971, under Lieutenant General Hoang 

Xuan Lam (who commanded I Corps) as part of Operation Lam Son 719,5

 the Vietnamese Marines did 

not operate at any greater level. General Khang and 

his American advisors felt General Lam did not support the VNMC units and gave Lam the nickname 

“Bloody Hands” for his expenditure of Marine lives 

during the failed incursion. The extent to which polDefense Department (Marine Corps) A193103

LtGen Hoang Xuan Lam, the senior South Vietnamese 

leader in MR 1, advised in 1972 by MajGen Frederick J. 

Kroesen Jr., commanding the 1st Regional Assistance 

Command in Da Nang.

3 Col Gerald H. Turley, The Easter Offensive: The Last American Advisors, Vietnam, 1972 (Novato, CA: Presidio Press, 1985). 4 Background on the Vietnamese Marine division includes American Embassy Saigon, Command Histories and Historical Sketches of RVNAF Divisions, 6 February 1973 (MCHC); Capt William D. Wischmeyer, Vietnamese Marine Corps/Marine Advisory Unit Historical Summary, 1954–1973, 

22 March 1973 (MCHC); MajGen L. Nguyen Khang oral history intvw, 30 September 1975 (MCHC); MajGen L. Nguyen Khang, “Republic of 

Vietnam Marine Corps,” Marine Corps Gazette (November 1966): 68; and Col Victor J. Croizat, “Vietnamese Naval Forces: Origin of the Species,” 

Proceedings (February 1973): 48–58. 5 Major operation into Laos by the ARVN between 30 January and 24 March 1971.
40 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

itics overrode tactical decisions was difficult to gauge 

when VNMC requests to withdraw were met by 

comments of “Now the Marines will have to fight.” 

Speculation circulated that the damage to the Vietnamese Marines was the desired result to weaken the 

Khang-Ky (South Vietnamese Vice President Nguyen Cao Ky) faction, just as the losses to the Vietnamese airborne had impacted the Lam-Thieu (South 

Vietnamese President Nguyen Van Thieu) faction in 

the Vietnamese government.6

 This was an example 

of the complex network of political, professional, 

and familial relations that shifted within the politics 

of USMACV and the Vietnamese.7

A more significant factor with Lam Son 719 was 

that the Americans provided critical control of maneuver and fire support, which should have come 

from the Vietnamese forces. The senior American 

commander in Vietnam, General Abrams, concluded in July 1971 that the Vietnamese suffered from 

weak leadership and the inability to control American firepower. Abrams did not expect American advisors to “play a major role in the improvement of 

South Vietnamese military forces.”8

 The Vietnamese 

Marines learned from combat with the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and adjusted accordingly, and 

even the ARVN noted the Marines had retained unit 

integrity regardless of losses.9

In the fall of 1971, the 3d ARVN Division, the 

Ben Hai Division, was formed and assigned the defense of the demilitarized zone. Vietnamese Marine 

units in this area of operations came under the command of Brigadier General Vu Van Giai, the division 

commander for tactical matters, but still remained 

firmly under VNMC control for material and political support. The relationship of separate military organizations was based upon the degree of support 

provided: general, direct, or attached. In theory, an 

attached unit was supposed to be given the same 

level of consideration and support as one belonging 

to the parent command; in practice, this was often 

not the case. According to General Kroesen, the senior American in MR 1, General Giai was not satisfied with Marine responsiveness to his orders, but 

the brigades were combat tested, fully reliable, and 

respected. General Kroesen observed that the brigades’ ability to rotate forces proved vital in maintaining combat effectiveness. Significantly, they were 

well supplied, equipped, and maintained at effective 

strength by Marine logistics and replacement channels.10

The Spring Offensive

This arrangement was battle tested on 30 March 1972 

when the North Vietnamese began conventional attacks coinciding with the continued withdrawal of 

American forces from the region. By this time, U.S. 

troop levels were at 69,000, leaving 11 maneuver batMarine Advisory Unit photo

LtCol Nguyen Nang Bao commanding VNMC Brigade 

147.

6 Note that these same arguments emerged again during the defense of Quang Tri in 1972.

7 Marine Advisory Unit File, Lam Son 719 Critique Folder (MCHC); Senior Marine Advisor, Combat Operations After Action Report Lam Son 719, 

21 March 1971 (MCHC); and Col John G. Miller comments to author, 19 May 1992.

8 Jeffrey J. Clarke, Advice and Support: The Final Years, 1965–1973 (Washington, DC: USACMH, 1978), 476, 508; Graham A. Cosmas and LtCol 

Terrence P. Murray, U.S. Marines in Vietnam: Vietnamization and Redeployment 1970–1971 (Washington, DC: HQMC, 1986), 195–210; and Webb 

and Poole, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 1–17. 9 For recent accounts of this action, see MajGen Nguyen Duy Hinh, Lam Son 719, Indochina Monographs (Washington, DC: USACMH, 1979), 

154; Robert D. Sander, Invasion of Laos, 1971: Lam Son 719 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2014); and James H. Willbanks, A Raid Too 

Far: Operations Lam Son 719 and Vietnamization in Laos (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2014). 10 MajGen Frederick J. Kroesen Jr., “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive” (student paper, U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, 1974), 7-4.
Summer 2015 41

talions, 3 artillery battalions, and no fighter aircraft 

squadrons in-country.11 The Communists invaded 

with an initial wave of six divisions—an effort that 

struck toward Quang Tri and Hue cities in MR 1, 

Kon-tum and Pleiku in MR 2, and An Loc and Saigon in MR 3. The People’s Army of Vietnam, or NVA, 

relied on bad weather and combined arms to defeat 

the South Vietnamese, which were believed to lack 

effective American support.12 The magnitude of the 

attack was such that ultimately up to 12 NVA divisions entered South Vietnam on these three fronts.13

The USMACV First Regional Assistance Command 

in MR 1 reported that three divisions, five separate 

infantry regiments, seven sapper battalions, three 

or more artillery regiments, and two armored regiments were used in the Quang Tri Province attacks.14

The American response was to counter with air and 

naval strikes along the demilitarized zone in South 

Vietnam and then in North Vietnam.

From 30 March to 4 April 1972, the 3d ARVN Division suffered the destruction or capit-ulation of its 

56th ARVN Regiment and division artillery group 

Map by W. Stephen Hill

11 Webb and Poole, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 395. 12 Ibid., 153.

13 USMACV, The Nguyen Hue Offensive, 7 January 1973 (NARA). ARVN accounts include LtGen Ngo Quang Truong, The Easter Offensive of 

1972, Indochina Monographs (Washington, DC: USACMH, 1979). Communist sources include People’s Army of Vietnam Military Institute, Vietnam: The Anti-U.S. Resistance War for National Salvation, 1954–1975 (Hanoi, Vietnam: PAVN Publishing House, 1980); Nguyen Khac Vien, ed., 

Indochina: The 1972–1973 Turning Point, Vietnamese Studies No. 39 (Hanoi: Xunhasaba, 1974); PAVN Senior Military Academy, “Quang Tri-Thua 

Thien Offensive Campaign,” in Collection of Sketches of Battles, trans. Robert J. Destatte (Hanoi: Ministry of Defense, 1986), 18–19; and ColGen 

Van Tien Dung, “Some Problems Concerning the Art of Military Campaigns of the Vietnamese People’s War,” People’s Army Magazine, December 1973, 61–65.

14 First Regional Advisory Command, Intelligence Summary (MCHC), 125–72.
42 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

while conducting harrowing withdrawals of the 57th 

ARVN Regiment and Marine Brigade 147. Eight 

South Vietnamese fire support bases were lost before 

the Communists paused in MR 1 to refuel and refit, 

as strong attacks continued in MR 2 and MR 3. Marine Brigade 258 and the 1st ARVN Armored Brigade 

barely held at Dong Ha as General Giai regrouped 

his division south of the Cua Viet River during the 

first week of April. With a forward command post at 

the Ai Tu Combat Base, General Giai’s main headquarters stayed at the Quang Tri City Citadel, along 

with USMACV Advisory Team 155.15 However, the 

Vietnamese Marine Division G-3 operations advisor, Lieutenant Colonel Gerald H. Turley, concluded 

that “the main North Vietnamese thrust was halted 

and the Communist army’s time schedule for seizing 

Quang Tri City within seven days was disrupted.”16

On 3 April 1972, the Vietnamese Joint General 

Staff sent the entire Vietnamese Marine division to 

MR 1, but General Khang was directed to place his 

brigades under the operational control of General 

Lam, commander of I Corps.17 While the 3d Division held Dong Ha from attacks across the demilitarized zone to the north, the emphasis of the battle 

shifted significantly to the western approaches of the 

Ai Tu Combat Base and Quang Tri City. From 9 to 

11 April, the battle swung in the balance around Fire 

Support Base (FSB) Pedro with substantial artillery 

Map by W. Stephen Hill

15 Webb and Poole, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 154. 16 LtCol Gerald H. Turley and Capt Marshall R. Wells, “Easter Invasion 1972,” Marine Corps Gazette (March 1973): 22. This article offers an excellent summary of VNMC operations in 1972 by the division G-3 advisor. 

17 Khang intvw; Senior Marine Advisor, Operations Summary Report, VNMC, 11 April 1972–4 May 1972 (MCHC); MACV Advisory Team 155, Daily 

Staff Journal, 29 April 1972–1 May 1972 (NARA); and Turley and Wells, “Easter Invasion 1972,” 18–29.
Summer 2015 43

and armored duels.18 Lieutenant Colonel Turley reported that “the invading North Vietnamese divisions continued to press their attacks toward Quang 

Tri City with enemy armor and infantry forces using 

the Cam Lo Bridge as their primary crossing point. 

Once south of the Cam Lo-Cua Viet River, NVA 

units moved on Dong Ha from the west. Other enemy forces moved south, passing FSB Carroll and Mai 

Loc, toward Route 557 and FSB Pedro.”19 There, the 

first enemy tank-infantry assaults were repulsed by 

defending Vietnamese Marines and left NVA dead 

and destroyed vehicles on the battlefield. Attempts 

by General Lam to conduct a counteroffensive from 

14 to 23 April (Operation Quang Trung 729) failed 

to get off the ground despite heavy American air 

support, including strategic B-52 bomber Arc Light 

strikes. This slow rate of advance only seemed to focus NVA attention on the westward approaches to 

Quang Tri and Hue City. 

The demands on the 3d Division command and 

control system, which was reinforced with as many 

as 36 battalion-size units, increased. Kroesen pointed out that at no time were the 3d ARVN Division’s 

logistics resources expanded and that communication links continued to be maintained with outside 

commands to ensure needed support. South Vietnamese materiel losses were estimated by MACV 

as 18 155mm and 45 105mm guns or howitzers, 37 

tanks, and 89 armored personnel carriers—a total of 

more than 240 vehicles of all kinds. Personnel losses 

through death, injury, or desertion could only be estimated. Colonel Donald J. Metcalf, the senior U.S. 

Army advisor to General Giai, believed this arrangement did not carry “the allegiance and loyalty” necessary to conduct successful combat operations.20

Despite these difficulties, Lam refused to use the two 

division-level headquarters placed at his command 

by the Joint General Staff, the Vietnamese Marine 

Division, and the ARVN Ranger Command. The 

chairman of the general staff, General Cao Van Vien, 

recalled they were “never utilized or given a mission.”21 General Kroesen wrote that Lam dismissed 

suggestions to provide a multidivision structure to 

fight the battle north of the Hai Van Pass as “unnecessary and impractical.”22

Lam’s focus on the premature counteroffensive 

prevented him and his staff from even considering 

the obvious problems of defending Quang Tri or 

Hue. The Vietnamese command issues of Lam Son 

719 were felt again when Lam and Khang refused 

to deal directly with each other. As a result, General 

Kroesen and Colonel Joshua W. Dorsey III, the senior Marine advisor to General Khang, served as the 

only means of contact between the two Vietnamese 

generals. According to the Marine Division G-3 advisor, Khang and his staff monitored every move of 

Marine Brigades 147, 258, and 369 as they waited 

impatiently to assume control of all three brigades.23

For Kroesen, the lack of effective authority within 

I Corps became obvious with the ARVN Marine Division and Ranger Command in issuing guidance, 

Marine Advisory Unit photo

LtCol Ngo Van Dinh commanding VNMC Brigade 258.

18 Webb and Poole, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 157–58. 19 Turley and Wells, “Easter Invasion 1972,” 24.

20 Col Donald J. Metcalf, “Why Did the Defense of Quang Tri Province, SVN Collapse” (student paper, U.S. Army War College, October 1972), 29.

21 Gen Cao Van Vien, Leadership (Washington, DC: USACMH, 1981), 130. 22 Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 7-7. 

23 Turley, The Easter Offensive, 231, 245.
44 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

responding to complaints and questions, and providing “unsought advice and counsel concerning 

their forces to anyone who would listen.”24 General 

Lam compounded this by going directly to 3d ARVN 

Division units—particularly the 1st ARVN Armored 

Brigade, whose advisor, U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Louis C. Wagner Jr., complained about receiving 

orders from the corps commander, the corps commander’s deputy, and his operations officer.25 General Kroesen concluded that all this undercut the 

authority of General Giai by planting the seeds of 

distrust and disobedience that would culminate at 

the end of the April in near mutiny.26

At this stage, by 24 April 1972, the 3d ARVN Division was organized around five mixed task forces. 

The 1st ARVN Armored Brigade along with the 57th 

ARVN Regiment held the area from Highway 1 to 

five kilometers east, bounded by the Cam Lo River in 

the north and the Ai Tu Combat Base in the south. 

Marine Brigade 147 was at the Ai Tu Combat Base 

with the division forward command post, conducting defensive operations in an arc to the west. The 2d 

ARVN Regiment defended the area southwest of Ai 

Tu to the Thach Han River. The 1st ARVN Ranger 

Group was located south of the Thach Han River, and 

Marine Brigade 369 was farther south near Hai Lang 

on FSBs Nancy and Jane while Marine Brigade 258 

was refitting at Hue.27 General Kroesen described 

Map by W. Stephen Hill

24 Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 7–9; and Vien, Leadership, 132. 25 LtCol Louis C. Wagner, 1st ARVN Armor Brigade After Action Report, May 1972 (NARA), 16. 26 Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 7–9.

27 Metcalf, “Defense of Quang Tri Province,” 18–20; and Marine Advisory Unit (MAU) Command Chronology, May 1972 (MCHC), hereafter MAU 

ComdC.
Summer 2015 45

a pattern of action then established within the 3d 

ARVN Division’s area where “no orders, threats, 

or exhortations” were able to force subordinates to 

move or stay if they disagreed. Both Generals Lam 

and Giai were losing control on the battlefield to 

this general state of confused inertia because each 

appeared willing to let American airpower win the 

fight for them.28 Consequently, the North Vietnamese Army moved to cut off Dong Ha and Quang Tri 

City in order to collapse the ARVN defenders.

Confusion at Quang Tri City

On 27 April 1972, the North Vietnamese renewed the 

general offensive throughout the Quang Tri Front. 

The 308th NVA Division attacked Dong Ha and “liberated” it on the afternoon of 28 April. Communist 

forces pushed the defenders back toward Highway 1 

and south toward Quang Tri City using 122mm and 

130mm artillery, T54/55 tanks, and infantry. The 

304th NVA Division attacked toward the Ai Tu Combat Base and, at the same time, the 324th NVA Division struck farther to the south. As a result, Highway 

1 was blocked and Quang Tri City was cut off from 

the rest of I Corps.29 This situation was compounded 

as NVA artillery hit the ammunition dump at Ai Tu 

Command Base, and stocks went up in blazes. On 

29 April, Giai issued orders for a general withdrawal 

to positions along the O’Khe and My Chanh Rivers 

but was overruled by Lam.30 The various accounts 

of events made Giai and Lam’s command dynamics 

difficult to analyze and explain. General Vien commented that the Quang Tri debacle involved some 

intricacies “that only the principals could clarify.”31

Early Sunday morning, on 30 April, a regimentsize NVA force supported by armor was assembled 

southwest of Ai Tu. Up to this point, Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Nang Bao’s Marine Brigade 147 (with 

brigade advisor Major James R. Joy) had been able 

to use artillery and tank support to halt the North 

Vietnamese’s attacks. But then, ammunition supplies were low, and the 20th ARVN Tank Squadron 

(a battalion-size unit) was being parceled out south 

of the Thach Han River in an effort to keep Highway 

1 open. American naval gunfire could not be used 

effectively against the enemy staging area, because it 

was at maximum range. The Marines called in aircraft with attack sorties striking close to the front 

lines, but even heavy air attacks could not save the 

untenable salient that had developed north of the 

Thach Han River.32 Upon seeing the armor moving 

to the south, the remaining ARVN infantry drifted 

away from their positions; all types of vehicles began 

running out of fuel, and rumors were rampant. Colonel Metcalf recalled that several thousand troops 

and hundreds of vehicles were bunched up on Highway 1 with no escape route except into withering fire 

and panic. At this stage, according to Metcalf, the 

higher headquarters—for I Corps, South Vietnamese Marines, and Rangers—all added to the confusion by passing contrary orders, which Giai and his 

staff were unable to sort out.33

A critical move occurred with the decision to pull 

Viet Nam magazine wartime photo, courtesy of Capt Edwin W. Besch

North Vietnamese soldiers on a T54/55 tank are welcomed by civilians as they move south during the 

Spring Offensive.

28 Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 7–9.

29 Webb and Poole, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 159–60. 30 LtCol Louis C. Wagner Jr., 3dARVNDiv Special Message, DTG212529, April 1972, encl. 4 (MCHC). 31 Vien, Leadership, 132. 32 Senior Marine Advisor, Personal Evaluation of the NVA Easter Offensive, n.d. (MCHC); Maj James R. Joy, Memorandum, 3 May 1972 (MCHC), 

16, hereafter Joy memo; Col Charles J. Goode Jr. and LtCol Marshall R. Wells oral history intvw, 19 January 1984 (MCHC); and Maj Glen Golden 

oral history intvw, 3 July 1975 (MCHC).

33 Metcalf, “Defense of Quang Tri Province,” 25–26.
46 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

Marine Brigade 369 off of FSB Jane and to reopen 

Highway 1, which exposed the 3d ARVN Division’s 

whole southern flank. At daybreak on 30 April, 

South Vietnamese Colonel Pham Van Chung of Marine Brigade 369 (with brigade senior advisor Major 

Robert F. Sheridan) sent a battalion north to Highway 1 in an attempt to break through to Quang Tri 

City on orders from the division and I Corps. The 

battalion met heavy automatic weapon and recoilless 

rifle fire along the way and waited for these enemy 

positions to be hit by Allied air strikes. The Marine 

battalion then reached a bottleneck between the 

O’Khe River bridge and Hai Lang, where the Communists were positioned along the highway. With 

the destruction of this enemy force, the exodus of 

refugees fleeing south came down the road, and the 

prospect of the battalion linking up with the units in 

Quang Tri City faded. The Marine battalion was low 

on ammunition, overextended, and unable to move 

up the road through the flow of refugees. Colonel 

Chung directed the battalion to return to the O’Khe 

River bridge and hold it for the units breaking out 

from the north.34

The best chance of holding Quang Tri City fell to 

Marine Brigade 147, the only tactical unit remaining 

in any condition to fight; Metcalf called the unit “our 

last ditch defense.”35 At noon on 30 April, General 

Giai ordered Brigade 147 from the Ai Tu Combat 

Base into the city proper. The remaining 3d ARVN 

Division units could then form a defensive line 

south of the Thach Han River, while the 1st ARVN 

Armored Brigade tanks and armored personnel carriers were to be used to keep Highway 1 open toward 

Hue. General Lam was notified of this plan and acknowledged it, but no specific approval was provided and no orders were issued by I Corps.36

Lieutenant Colonel Bao and Major Joy were 

briefed by the 3d Division staff, and the plan began smoothly enough as the brigade headquarters 

and artillery battalion departed Ai Tu. The Marine 

advisors effectively directed and controlled tactical 

air strikes and artillery and naval gunfire missions, 

slowing the pursuit of the NVA forces and permitting the brigade’s orderly and covered withdrawal. 

The withdrawal went well until the column reached 

the approach to Quang Tri City and discovered that 

division engineers had already destroyed the bridges 

across the Thach Han River. The Marine infantry 

waded or swam across the river at the bridge site and 

moved directly into their fighting positions. The brigade artillery tried to tow its howitzers across a ford, 

but the swift current and soft bottom of the river 

slowed the effort; 18 howitzers and 22 vehicles were 

lost in the attempt. The 1st ARVN Armored Brigade 

fared worse than Brigade 147 when its recently assigned commander had to destroy 12 tanks, 18 howitzers, and numerous armored personnel carriers for 

lack of fuel and ammunition. Fortunately, the 20th 

ARVN Tank Squadron forded the river north of the 

bridges with 16 of its remaining M48 Patton battle 

tanks. By nightfall, Brigade 147 and remnant forcMarine Advisory Unit photo

Col Phan Van Chung commanding VNMC Brigade 369.

34 Col Donald L. Price, comments on author’s manuscript for The War That Would Not End: U.S. Marines in Vietnam, 1971–1973, 10 October 1990 

(MCHC).

35 Col Donald J. Metcalf, intvw by USMACV, 15 September 1972 (NARA), 8; and Vien, Leadership, 133. 36 Metcalf intvw, 8–9; Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 7–10; and Maj David A. Brookbank, USAF, Special Report of Air Liaison Officer, 

31 July 1972 (MCHC), 20. 
Summer 2015 47

es occupied the defenses that were planned to hold 

Quang Tri City.37

Collapse

On the morning of 1 May 1972, General Lam informed General Giai that all Quang Tri positions 

were to be held, and no withdrawal of any kind was 

authorized. This directive came from Saigon with 

Lam receiving his orders from President Thieu.38 Intelligence reports indicated the city would be hit again 

that evening by a heavy artillery attack estimated at 

10,000 rounds of munitions. With this assessment in 

hand, General Giai decided that any further defense 

of Quang Tri City would be fruitless. “To protect the 

lives of all of you,” Giai authorized units to fall back 

farther south because, at this point, he was in no position to stop them. Giai and Metcalf were in conflict 

with Metcalf insisting that the Vietnamese Marines 

could hold the Citadel “indefinitely” with American 

supporting arms. This had been his advice the previous month when Marine Brigade 258 was left to 

cover the division’s withdrawal through Dong Ha.39

At 1215 on 1 May, the chief of staff of the 3d Division walked into Advisory Team 155’s bunker and, 

using the American radio circuits, called all subordinate commanders: “General Giai has released all 

commanders to fight their way to the My Chanh 

River!” Within 30 minutes, the I Corps commander, 

General Lam, again sent his “stand and die” orders. 

At this point, all of General Giai’s subordinate senior commanders refused to obey, stating Giai could 

withdraw with them or be left behind; a threat that, 

according to General Kroesen, they proceeded to 

carry out. Other units did not respond to the change 

or refused to deviate from their original orders to 

pull back.40 Metcalf was left to watch his counterparts on the division staff pack their belongings, totally unaware or concerned by the situation. Shortly 

afterward, Colonel Metcalf radioed Marine Brigade 

147 and said, “The ARVN are pulling out; advisors 

may stay with their units or join me” for evacuation 

by helicopter. Major Joy responded that the Brigade 

147 Marines would stay with their units.41

Recalling the division’s previous abandonment of 

the brigade at Mai Loc, Lieutenant Colonel Bao declined to defend what all others were now abandoning. The sight of the 3d Division soldiers departing 

with their families did nothing to engender the desire 

for a last stand. Luckily for the Marines, their dependents were in MR 3, unlike most ARVN units whose 

soldiers fought and lived in the same area. A little 

after 1430, the brigade headquarters was southwest 

of the Citadel where the unit expected to be joined 

by General Giai and his staff before pushing south 

to link up with Marine Brigade 369 at My Chanh. 

The move had been coordinated earlier by Joy and 

Metcalf. In the confusion, the division commander 

and staff did not arrive. Metcalf stated Giai left him 

and the other advisors at the Citadel while Kroesen 

stated the Marines had left Giai with Bao holding the 

bag for both.42 Metcalf then radioed Joy to inform 

him that the linkup would not be made and that the 

American advisors should resort to their own devices; Joy declined. In what was taken as proforma, 

Metcalf reiterated that the Marine advisors could 

join him for the helicopter evacuation from Quang 

Tri City. Major Joy again declined, and the departing 

Team 155 senior advisor responded, “Good luck!” 

At 1635, Brigade 147 moved east toward the coast 

and then turned south. After making several difficult 

stream crossings, the column arrived in the vicinity 

of Hai Lang, 10 kilometers south of Quang Tri City.43

The intermingled civilian and military stragglers 

prevented maneuver on the highway, and the crosscountry route used by Brigade 147 was extremely 

difficult for attached M48 tanks and vehicles, most 

of which were lost trying to ford the Nhung River. 

37 MAU ComdC; Joy memo, 14; and LtGen D’Wayne Gray, comments on the author’s manuscript for The War That Would Not End, 9 December 

1989 (MCHC).

38 Gen Frederick J. Kroesen Jr., comments on the author’s manuscript for The War That Would Not End, 3 January 1990 (MCHC); and Vien, 

Leadership, 133. 39 Metcalf, “Defense of Quang Tri Province,” 27. 

40 MajGen Frederick J. Kroesen Jr., message to Gen Creighton W. Abrams, 2 May 1972, Abram’s Papers (USACMH). 

41 The evacuation was accomplished by USAF Sikorsky HH-3 Jolly Green Giant search and rescue helicopters, although the offshore U.S. Navy 

and Marine amphibious ready group was alerted as a backup.

42 Metcalf intvw, 9; Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 19; and Joy memo, 17.

43 Ibid., 11–12.
48 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

The South Vietnamese and Americans thought that 

at least a reinforced North Vietnamese regiment 

held Highway 1 at Hai Lang and had engaged the 

fleeing South Vietnamese, halting all movement to 

the south.44 The interdiction of the road by artillery 

and infantry weapons earned it the title “Highway 

of Horror” for the estimated 2,000 civilian and military dead left along the three-quarter-mile stretch of 

road. One North Vietnamese soldier reported, “The 

people were moving on bicycles, motorbikes, and 

buses . . . No one was able to escape.”45

After a long and heated discussion with his battalion commanders, Lieutenant Colonel Bao established a tight perimeter for the night and planned to 

resume the march the next day. During the morning 

reorganization, the brigade commanders ascertained 

that all of their units were still organized and combat 

effective. Brigade 369’s senior advisor, Major Sheridan, had closely followed Major Joy’s radio traffic in 

the days preceding the mass exodus.46 Brigade 369’s 

efforts were directed at keeping the bridges across 

the O’Khe and My Chanh rivers open for withdrawing troops and civilians. But farther to the south, 

Brigade 369 had been unsuccessful in keeping the 

road open between Quang Tri and Hue, although it 

had inflicted heavy losses on the Communists and 

had not become pinned down.47

As the last position in Quang Tri Province, FSB 

Nancy fell the next day on 2 May 1972. General 

Khang and the Marine division headquarters were 

ordered by the Joint General Staff to assume command of all Marine units and to defend along the 

My Chanh River. Two Marine brigades, 147 and 369, 

were engaged with the enemy, and the situation was 

confused as to who and what, if anything, were left 

to aid in the defense. Brigade 258 was still held in 

reserve, as Khang, his staff, and their advisors went 

into action defending Hue City.48

In light of this crisis, the Vietnamese National Security Council met with President Thieu and took 

drastic action to restore order. Outside of Hue along 

Highway 1, military police units with highly visible 

sandbagged posts for firing squads acted as a draconian reminder of duty for stragglers from Quang 

Tri City. The next day, General Lam and his deputy 

were relieved, and on 4 May, President Thieu went 

to Hue to place Lieutenant General Ngo Quang 

Truong in command of I Corps. General Khang was 

moved to the Joint General Staff as J-3 operations 

officer after turning down command of II Corps. 

The Vietnamese Marine Division remained under 

his deputy, Brigadier General Bui The Lan, to hold 

the province, lost in part to American and Vietnamese interservice rivalry.49 For the first time since the 

invasion began, the Vietnamese Marines had their 

own area of operations. Even as they began digging in, the North Vietnamese continued building 

up their forces to attack toward Hue. By 6 May, the 

3d ARVN Division could only account for 2,700 of 

its men, and General Giai was arrested and later 

brought to trial for disobeying orders and abandoning his position in the face of the enemy. He claimed 

that, with food, fuel, and ammunition gone, he saw 

“no further reason why we should stay on in this 

ruined situation.”50

Finale

U.S. operations, including Linebacker (aerial bombing), Freedom Train (continued air strikes), and 

Pocket Money (mining of ports in North Vietnam), 

did not have an immediate effect on the Communist offensive; the tipping point militarily for this 

effort came in May 1972.51 In an interesting final 

note, General Kroesen felt the North Vietnamese’s 

inability to pursue and destroy routed South Vietnamese forces was evidence that if defended, Quang 

Tri City might not have fallen. The Communists did 

44 Maj Anthony P. Shepard, comments on the author’s manuscript for The War that Would Not End, 11 January 1990 (MCHC). 45 Government of South Vietnam, The Communist Policy of Terror (Saigon: RVN Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 1972), 41–42; and Government of 

South Vietnam, La Route De L’Horreur (Saigon: RVN Ministry of Information, 1972). 46 LtCol Robert F. Sheridan, comments on the author’s manuscript The War That Would Not End, 20 March 1990 (MCHC). 47 Maj William T. Sweeney, memorandum, 8 May 1972, Senior Marine Advisor Evaluation Folder (MCHC).

48 Senior Marine Advisor, Historical Summary 1972, 13; Brigade 258 Advisor’s Log, 2 May 1972, Marine Advisory Unit File (MCHC); and Price 

comments.

49 Vien, Leadership, 134. 50 Turley, The Easter Offensive, 203. 51 Webb and Poole, The Joint Chiefs of Staff, 161–62.
Summer 2015 49

not have the resources or organization to do what 

ARVN forces had done to themselves with American counsel.52 The North Vietnamese doggedly held 

the Quang Tri Citadel for five months. Claims arose 

that Marine Brigade 147’s withdrawal on 1 May precipitated the collapse of Quang Tri, even though the 

unit was the last to leave and stayed long enough for 

the division commander and his advisors to escape. 

The brigade actually maintained itself as an effective 

force by saving lives and equipment, the same logic 

given by General Giai in his trial. 

Real questions should have been directed at the 

performance of South Vietnamese Army units, particularly the 2d and 57th ARVN Regiments, and General Lam’s conduct. The presence of the Vietnamese 

Marine division staff and General Khang provided 

only a backdrop to these events, and even the U.S. 

Army belatedly recognized the Marines’ drive for 

division status was correct and valuable.53 Later, the 

American embassy in Saigon concluded that “Marine units recaptured Quang Tri City on September 

16, 1972, after its abandonment by ARVN troops in 

May 1972.”54 In recognition of this, U.S. Ambassador 

Ellsworth F. Bunker and the Commanding General 

of USMACV, Army General Frederick C. Weyand, 

proposed that the Vietnamese Marine Division receive an American Presidential Unit Citation, which 

was not approved.55s1775s

52 Kroesen, “1972 Vietnam Counter-Offensive,” 7–11.

53 A Study of Strategic Lessons Learned in Vietnam, vol. 6, Conduct of the War: Book 1 Operational Analyses (New York: BDM Corp., 1980). 54 Embassy of the United States of America, Saigon, Vietnam, Marine Division, 6 February 1973 (MCHC).

55 Embassy of the United States of America, Saigon, Vietnam, Unit Award Recommendation, 1 December 1973 (MCHC), 1–3.
Nicholas J. Schlosser, PhD

U.S. Army Center of Military History 

S

hortly after his term as Commandant of the 

U.S. Marine Corps came to an end, General 

Wallace M. Greene Jr. recorded an extensive 

oral history for the Marine Corps History 

Division. During one session, Greene discussed the 

difficulties of advising President Lyndon B. Johnson. Recalling that the task often had the feel of a 

game of poker, Greene said of the president, “He had 

that look in his eye, as if he was wondering why I 

played that card.”1

 As a member of the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff, Greene believed his duty was to provide the 

president with honest and frank military advice. At 

the same time, Greene was continually frustrated by 

what he believed to be the president’s failure to adequately come to terms with what the United States 

needed to do to win the war in Vietnam.

Although they were officially the president’s principal military advisors, the Joint Chiefs often had a 

contentious relationship with Johnson, who favored 

consulting civilian officials such as Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara and National Security 

Advisor McGeorge Bundy on national security matters.2

 For the Joint Chiefs’ part, Service parochialism 

often led them to give less than frank advice to the 

Counselor of War

GENERAL WALLACE M. GREENE JR. AND THE ESCALATION 

OF THE VIETNAM WAR, 1964–65

Official U.S. Marine Corps photo A411928

Gen Wallace M. Greene Jr. became the 23d Commandant of the Marine Corps on 1 January 1964.

1 Gen Wallace M. Greene Jr. Oral History collection conducted for Marine Corps History Division (Gray Research Center (GRC), Quantico, VA); 

Wallace M. Greene Papers: Notes on the Situation in South Vietnam (GRC, Quantico, VA). Greene’s personal papers exist in two collections. The 

first collection contained unclassified material covering his entire career in the Marine Corps. The second, designated Notes on the Situation in 

South Vietnam, entails 12 boxes focusing only on the Vietnam War. This material has only recently been declassified. Since the Marine Corps Archives is currently working on organizing the two collections, the author refers to the collections as Greene Papers and Greene Papers: Vietnam 

Notes to simply, but clearly, differentiate between the two sets.

2 George C. Herring, LBJ and Vietnam: A Different Kind of War (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994); H. R. McMaster, Dereliction of Duty: 

Lyndon Johnson, Robert McNamara, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Lies that Led to Vietnam (New York: Harper Collins, 1997); David M. Barrett, 

Uncertain Warriors: Lyndon Johnson and His Vietnam Advisers (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1993); David Halberstam, The Best and the 

Brightest (Greenwich, NY: Fawcett Publications, 1972); and Robert Buzzanco, Masters of War: Military Dissent and Politics in the Vietnam Era (New 

York: Cambridge University Press, 1996).

50
Summer 2015 51

president, and both Johnson and his predecessor, 

John F. Kennedy, often felt that their counsel was 

neither reliable nor constructive.3

 However, while 

Johnson and McNamara (and most historians of the 

Vietnam War) treated the Joint Chiefs as a unitary 

body, it was in fact made up of five individuals whose 

positions on national security often differed. The 

chiefs held opposing views not only on the Vietnam 

War but also on what the actual purpose and role 

of their body was. Although they were the highest 

ranking military officials in their respective Armed 

Services, the Joint Chiefs were technically outside of 

the chain of command and consequently occupied 

an ambiguous position within the U.S. national security structure. 

This problem became particularly pressing as 

the Johnson administration rapidly Americanized 

the U.S. commitment to South Vietnam between 

1964 and 1965.4

 A committed cold warrior, Greene 

believed that the United States needed to take a 

decisive stand in South Vietnam and counter the 

insurgency there by using American military power 

against North Vietnam. However, Greene frequently 

felt that his advice was not reaching the president, 

despite what he believed to be his statutory duty 

to serve as an advisor to the commander in chief 

on military matters. The Commandant blamed 

structural shortcomings in the advisory system for 

effectively blocking access to the president. These 

systemic problems could be traced to the Kennedy 

administration and that president’s preference for 

relying on close personal advisors to make ad hoc 

national security decisions.

To confront this issue, Greene proposed substantially restructuring the National Security Council 

with the addition of a National General Staff. The staff 

would include a joint military-civilian staff tasked 

with both advisory and operation responsibilities. 

Such an organization, Greene believed, would overcome the obstacles that prevented President Johnson 

from receiving sound and effective military advice 

on the situation in South Vietnam. At the same time, 

Greene hoped the plan would force Johnson to make 

a firm commitment on the Vietnam crisis. 

General Wallace M. Greene

and the Joint Chiefs of Staff

General Greene became Commandant in 1964. The 

appointment was the capstone to a long career as 

a dedicated and effective staff officer and planner. 

A graduate of the United States Naval Academy, 

Greene’s career before World War II mirrored that 

of many Marine officers in the 1930s: postings to 

ships’ detachments and service with the 4th Marines 

in Shanghai, China. During the critical months before the America’s entry into the war, Greene served 

in the 1st Marine Division’s operations section and 

in the United Kingdom, where he observed British 

commando units—later using lessons learned from 

that experience to strengthen and improve U.S. amphibious warfare techniques. 

Throughout World War II, Greene’s billets gave 

him considerable experience as a planner and organizer. He served as the operations and training officer for the 3d Marine Brigade—as operations officer 

for the Tactical Group 1 during the Marshall Islands 

campaign in early 1944 and as operations officer for 

the 2d Marine Division during the Mariana Islands 

campaign in the summer of 1944. During the latter 

operation, he first worked under Colonel David M. 

Shoup, who served as the division’s chief of staff. In 

the postwar period, Greene continued to serve in operations billets with both the Marine Corps and Joint 

Staff, working as a representative on the staff of the 

National Security Council. In 1956, as the new commanding general of the Recruit Training Command 

at Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, South 

Carolina, Brigadier General Greene once again found 

himself working with Shoup. Greene and Shoup, who 

was then serving as inspector general of recruit training, were tasked with investigating the recent accidental drowning of six recruits at Ribbon Creek, 

Parris Island, and also with reforming Marine Corps 

recruit training. Following this, Greene worked as the 

operations officer for Headquarters Marine Corps as 

deputy chief of staff of Plans, and following Shoup’s 

appointment as Commandant in 1960, served as the 

new Commandant’s chief of staff.5

3 McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 326–33. 4 Fredrik Logevall, Choosing War: The Lost Chance for Peace and the Escalation of War in Vietnam (Oakland: University of California Press, 1999). 5 The best scholarly account of Greene’s life is the chapter by Allan R. Millett in Commandants of the Marine Corps, ed. Allan R. Millett and Jack 

Shulimson (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2004), 381–401.
52 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

By the time President Kennedy nominated Greene 

to succeed Shoup in 1963, Greene had built a career 

as an adept staff officer capable of working with “vocal, volatile extroverts.”6

 He had earned two Legions 

of Merit for his planning work during the Marshalls 

and Marianas campaigns. He had also learned to 

pursue goals regardless of whether or not he would 

alienate senior officers in the process, notably during the time he was tasked with reforming Marine 

recruit training. This, along with his experience 

working for the Joint Staff and the National Security 

Council, gave him ample experience navigating the 

halls of power in Washington, DC. In short, Greene 

represented in the Joint Chiefs of Staff the shift away 

from officers with experience leading large formations in combat to those who had spent most of their 

careers working as staff officers.7

According to the amendments of the National Security Act of 1947 passed in 1952, the Commandant 

was allowed only to attend Joint Chiefs’ meetings in 

which matters relevant to the Marine Corps were on 

the agenda.8

 Since most matters of relevance to the 

combined Service chiefs concerned joint operations 

of some kind, this provision proved to be a technicality, and Greene always acted as an equal to the 

chiefs of staff of the U.S. Army and Air Force and to 

Official U.S. Marine Corps photo 530841

Like many Marines commissioned in the early 1930s, Greene served with the 4th Marines in Shanghai. Then 1st Lt 

Greene is pictured here (front row, third from left) with other officers and noncommissioned officers of the 2d Battalion, 4th Marines, in front of the Kawamura Tower in Shanghai in 1937.

6 Ibid., 384.

7 McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 108–9. 8 An act to fix the personnel strength of the United States Marine Corps, and to establish the relationship of the Commandant of the Marine 

Corps to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Pub. L. No. 82-416, 66 Stat. 677 (1952). 
Summer 2015 53

the chief of naval operations. In accordance with this 

status, Greene believed the Commandant needed to 

participate equally in the task of advising the president on matters of national security.

Greene’s vision of the duties and roles of the Joint 

Chiefs, however, was not necessarily shared by his 

colleagues. In particular, the chairman at the time 

Greene became Commandant, Army General Maxwell D. Taylor, had a conception that was in many 

ways diametrically opposed to the Commandant’s. 

For his part, Greene did not believe that the Service 

chiefs were required to speak with one voice or that 

the chairman’s voice should carry more weight than 

those of the other chiefs. He argued that

[the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff] is not a man 

who votes and breaks a deadlock, but he is the man who 

is supposed to organize and run the Joint Staff and also 

to present the views of the Chiefs. If the views differ from 

his own or among the Chiefs, then these views should be 

presented for final decision by the Secretary of Defense 

or the President.9

In contrast, Taylor saw the chairman as a personal 

advisor to the president whose voice carried greater 

weight than the other chiefs. His position could be 

traced to his close relationship with President Kennedy, who had recalled Taylor to active duty in 1961. 

Following the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion in 

1961, Kennedy became convinced that the Service 

chiefs had failed to adequately prepare him for the 

possibility that the clandestine attempt to depose 

Cuban dictator Fidel Castro would fail. Already uncomfortable with the military, Kennedy asked the 

then-retired General Taylor to serve as his representative to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.10 It was a curious 

and confusing approach to managing national security affairs, effectively creating a parallel advisory 

Photo by Alfred W. Rohde Jr., courtesy of U.S. Marine Corps Photographic Section

In this undated photograph, BGen Greene sits with senior noncommissioned officers during his term as commanding general, Recruit Training Command. 

9 Wallace M. Greene Jr. Oral History, 21 September 1971, Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes (GRC, Quantico, VA), hereafter Greene Oral History, 

21 September 1971.

10 Douglas Kinnard, The Certain Trumpet: Maxwell Taylor and the American Experience in Vietnam (New York: Brassey’s Inc., 1991), 56–73.
54 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

system. If Taylor was to serve as the personal advisor to the president, then what was the role of the 

chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Army General 

Lyman L. Lemnitzer? The approach, however, suited 

Kennedy well. Inexperienced and somewhat unsure 

of himself, the president was more at ease receiving 

advice from those with whom he had developed a 

close rapport, most notably the U.S. attorney general, his brother Robert F. Kennedy.

During the first two years of Kennedy’s presidential term, Taylor served closely with Kennedy and 

grew to believe that the president needed a close, informal relationship with his chief military advisor. 

In his memoir, Taylor set forth a vision of the chairman’s responsibility that strongly contrasted with 

General Greene’s.

With the opportunity to observe the problems of a President at closer range, I have come to the understanding 

of an intimate, easy relationship, born of friendship and 

mutual regard, between the President and the Chiefs. It is 

particularly important in the case of the Chairman, who 

works more closely with the President and Secretary of 

Defense than do the service chiefs. The Chairman should 

be a true believer in the foreign policy and military strategy of the administration which he serves or, at least, feel 

that he and his colleagues are assured an attentive hearing on those matters for which the Joint Chiefs have a 

responsibility.11

In 1962, Kennedy replaced Lemnitzer with Taylor. 

In making Taylor chairman, the president resolved 

the awkward dual-track system created shortly after 

the Bay of Pigs invasion. However, by appointing his 

personal advisor, the president also undermined the 

effectiveness of the Joint Chiefs as a corporate body; 

Taylor firmly believed that the chairman’s personal 

assessments of national security matters carried 

greater weight than the other chiefs’ assessments. 

Consequently, Taylor tended to present his views 

to the president as if they were the chiefs’ combined 

views, creating the impression of unanimous consent when none perhaps existed.12

These diverging opinions ultimately led to considerable distrust on Greene’s part regarding Taylor. 

As Greene noted, “I always had the feeling that he 

[Taylor] was not properly presenting either the views 

of the Joint Chiefs to the National Security Council 

and to the president, but instead favored them with 

his own views, and also he never accurately reported 

back to the Joint Chiefs his conversations with the 

president and with the National Security Council.”13 

Frequently in his recollections, Greene noted his conflicting attitudes concerning Taylor, always following 

up remarks on the chairman’s brilliance and intelligence with more critical comments about the general’s 

dishonest and untrustworthy behavior as head of the 

Joint Chiefs. “There is no doubt about his outstanding 

capability as far as his brain was concerned, but not as 

far as his motives sometimes were concerned.”14

Kennedy’s death in November 1963 elevated Vice 

President Johnson to the presidency. Although in 

most ways the rough-hewn, outwardly confident 

Texan was a stark contrast to the polished and cautious Kennedy, the two presidents shared a preference to rely on advisors outside official channels to 

make national security decisions. Thus, Greene began his term as Commandant of the Marine Corps 

already facing obstacles that would thwart his wish 

to play an active and energetic role in national security policy planning.

Greene’s Assessment

of the Vietnam War in 1964

As Shoup’s chief of staff, General Greene delivered 

an address to the U.S. Army War College in May 

1963. During the question-and-answer period, he 

was asked about his position on U.S. involvement in 

South Vietnam (then largely advisory in nature). He 

described the situation as a quagmire and expressed 

concern about the United States becoming bogged 

down in the country. He also expressed the hope that 

the Marine contingent operating in Vietnam would 

remain small for fear that a larger commitment to 

Southeast Asia would sap the Corps’ ability to fulfill 

its duties as a contingency force.15

11 Gen Maxwell D. Taylor, Swords and Plowshares (New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 1972), 252. 12 See McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 14–17; Kinnard, The Certain Trumpet, 74–79; and Mark Perry, Four Stars (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1989), 

121–22.

13 Greene Oral History, 21 September 1971.

14 Ibid.

15 “A Marine Corps View of Military Strategy,” question-and-answer session (audio file), HD 6276 (Marine Corps History Division: Quantico, VA).
Summer 2015 55

Scholars of the Vietnam War have cited comments 

like this as evidence that Greene “explicitly rejected” 

American intervention.16 Actually, the chief of staff ’s 

attitude was more lukewarm and ambivalent. While 

he criticized the character of the American involvement, Greens also stressed that “if we were, could, 

go into South Vietnam and do it our way, I think 

we could maybe clear that situation up within a reasonable time.” Yet, on the whole he was skeptical of 

what the United States could achieve in the country. When another participant asked about bombing North Vietnam, Greene stated he did not think 

such a move would make a significant difference: “I 

mean, there’s just so many of them that I feel that 

if you were to bomb Hanoi [Vietnam], you wouldn’t 

stop them from doing what they are doing. And you 

Official U.S. Marine Corps photo

Gen David M. Shoup, Commandant of the Marine Corps, passes the Marine Corps battle color to his successor, 

LtGen Wallace M. Greene Jr., during change of command ceremonies at the Marine Barracks Washington, DC, on 

31 December 1964.

16 Buzzanco, Masters of War, 157. Buzzanco makes two mistakes when citing this particular speech: he states it was delivered at Headquarters 

Marine Corps when it was in fact delivered at the Army War College, and he states it was delivered in “late 1963.” It was delivered in May 1963. 

See, Wallace M. Greene Jr., “A Marine Corps View of Strategy” (address delivered at the Army War College, Carlisle, PA, 8 May 1963). The mistakes are understandable in light of the lack of information appended to the audio recordings on file in the Greene Papers at the Marine Corps 

History Division.
56 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

might well bring the Chinese Communists in on 

there. And then what are you going to do, use atomic 

weapons?”17

Pointing out that the American public would not 

accept a significant number of casualties to defend 

the South, he made a prediction that proved to be 

eerily accurate: “Now, that old grindstone starts 

turning faster and faster. That means more and more 

casualties, more and more of the money and treasure of the United States going to be spent there, and 

maybe in 10 years, we’ll either clean up the situation 

or we’ll have to get out like the French did.”18 Thus, 

a member of Greene’s audience could have left with 

the reasonable belief that the future Commandant 

was against escalating American involvement in the 

Vietnam War.

Yet, by the following January, he had become 

much more hawkish. In a January 1964 report on 

an inspection trip to Southeast Asia submitted to 

President Johnson, now-Commandant Greene described morale amongst anti-Communist forces in 

South Vietnam as good, described U.S. advisors as 

“capable and enthusiastic,” and recommended that 

the “destruction of economic targets in North Vietnam designed to bring Ho Chi Minh to the council 

table should be initiated immediately.”19 A month 

later, he once again advocated increasing American involvement, stating in a staff study to the Joint 

Chiefs that “first, there must be a clear-cut decision 

either to pull out of South Vietnam or to stay there 

and win. If the decision is to stay and win—which 

is the Marine Corps recommendation—this objective 

must be pursued with the full concerted power of 

U.S. resources.”20

What caused the change in attitude, from “explicitly” warning against escalation to calling for the use 

of “the full concerted power of U.S. resources” in 

Southeast Asia? First, one should be cautious about 

pinning down Greene and other advisors with overly reductive labels, such as “hawks,” “doves,” “true 

believers,” “doubters,” etc. As Secretary of Defense 

Clark M. Clifford responded when asked if he was 

a hawk or a dove, “I am not conscious of falling under any of those ornithological divisions.”21 Other 

government officials felt the same way, and their attitudes and positions were often fluid. From his May 

1963 comments, Greene clearly had not yet fully 

formulated his thoughts on the Vietnam conflict. 

The speech he delivered did not mention Vietnam 

at all, and only in the question-and-answer session 

did Greene address the matter in (what sounds like) 

an off-the-cuff manner. Also of note in 1963, Greene 

was speaking as the representative of General Shoup, 

an opponent to expanding the U.S. involvement in 

Vietnam.22

Second, the situation in South Vietnam had dramatically changed between May 1963 and January 

1964. The summer of 1963 was a troubled time for 

the government of South Vietnamese President Ngo 

Dinh Diem, as Buddhist-led protests against his 

Catholic-dominated regime garnered world attention. The image of Buddhist monks self-immolating 

on the streets of Saigon poisoned American public 

support for Diem’s government, and the Kennedy 

administration soon concluded that the counterinsurgency effort in South Vietnam would be more 

effective if the South Vietnamese president was removed from power. Just weeks before Kennedy’s 

death, Diem was murdered during a U.S.-backed 

coup led by a group of South Vietnamese generals. 

Effects of that putsch were still being felt in January 

1964 when the military council that had replaced 

Diem was deposed in yet another coup, this one led 

by South Vietnamese General Nguyen Khanh. 

Greene’s inspection tour of South Vietnam took 

place shortly before Khanh seized power. The inspection was one of Greene’s first acts as Commandant 

and seemed to leave an indelible mark on his posi17 “A Marine Corps View of Military Strategy,” HD 6276.

18 Ibid.

19 “Commandant of the Marine Corps Trip Report for Visit to South Vietnam, January 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.

20 “Outline Staff Study, Subj: Alternate Courses of Action, Vietnam, 21 February 1964,” attached to “Memorandum for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 

Subj: Alternative Courses of Action, Vietnam, 13 March 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC, hereafter “Outline Staff Study,” 21 February 

1964. Emphasis by author.

21 “Clark M. Clifford: 9th Secretary of Defense,” Department of Defense, accessed 8 September 2014, http://www.defense.gov/specials/secdef_

histories/SecDef_09.aspx.

22 For Shoup’s opposition to the Vietnam War, see Howard Jablon, “General David M. Shoup, U. S. M. C.: Warrior and War Protester,” Journal of 

Military History 60, no. 3 (1996): 513–38.
Summer 2015 57

tion regarding the war. Upon returning to the states, 

he became a firm advocate for bombing North 

Vietnam. Throughout the first months of his term, 

Greene repeatedly pressed for launching military 

attacks against the north. At the same time, he also 

believed that the United States could never guarantee the independence or viability of South Vietnam 

unless the Americans made it clear to the world that 

the United States was committed to destroying the 

Viet Cong’s ability to wage its insurrection. In the 

February study quoted above, Greene saw five possibilities open to the United States: (1) a complete 

withdrawal of American forces; (2) the neutralization of South Vietnam; (3) intensification of current 

operations; (4) extension and expansion of operations into North Vietnam without U.S. involvement; 

or (5) expansion of operations into North Vietnam 

with U.S. forces.23 Greene dismissed the first three 

options, believing that withdrawal and neutralization would harm American interests. 

Greene believed that the final two options provided the best course to follow. Expanding the war 

but continuing to limit U.S. involvement would provide the possibility of a military victory, demonstrate 

America’s determination to win the war, and maintain the “face of a Vietnamese war being fought by 

Vietnamese.” However, the Commandant admitted 

that this course did not “insure [sic] an early victory.”24 Direct involvement would provide even clearer evidence of American determination to win the 

war, allow the South Vietnamese to draw on superior American air and naval forces, and speed up the 

“timetable for winning the war.”25 The open commitment of forces carried considerable risks, however, 

including provoking intervention from the People’s 

Republic of China. Direct involvement could also 

potentially alienate neutral allies, create strains with 

European powers, and further drain U.S. resources. 

Pointedly, a staff study acknowledged that direct 

involvement would commit the “U.S. to an ‘unpopular’ war” and carry no guarantee that militarily defeating North Vietnam would in any way increase 

support for South Vietnam’s “unpopular and autocratic regime.”26 Greene subsequently concluded that 

the best course was to expand the war using South 

Vietnamese forces and continue indirect American 

involvement. However, the United States needed to 

reserve the option of taking direct action if required.

Despite his exhortation that the United States 

needed to “indicate unequivocally” that it was not 

going to abandon South Vietnam, Greene expressed 

uncertainty about whether any of his proposals 

would achieve victory, given the limited means at 

America’s disposal. Greene believed that the president’s administration needed to “make clear to Congress and to the American people that the U.S. policy 

is to win in South Vietnam.”27 At the same time, however, the Commandant recognized that a firm commitment did not guarantee victory, did not ensure 

the legitimacy or stability of South Vietnam, and did 

not present a clear course of action. 

Despite this ambivalence, Greene pressed for 

a more aggressive campaign against the North 

Vietnamese involving both air strikes and a naval blockade. He recommended transforming the 

commander of U.S. Military Assistance Command, 

Vietnam (MACV) into a true theater commander 

with authority over all U.S. efforts in the region. He 

also called for a range of new security measures in 

South Vietnam: censorship, a national identity card 

program, and curfews. He envisioned a bombing 

campaign that would, “in a rising crescendo,” carry 

out the “systematic destruction” of targets in North 

Vietnam using both the South Vietnamese Air Force 

and U.S. air assets. It was, in all but name, a recommendation for a campaign of graduated pressure 

against the North. Commando raids, covert operations, and naval bombardment could also be utilized 

in support of the operation. The Commandant also 

recommended that the United States warn Laos and 

Cambodia to cease allowing Viet Cong forces to use 

the countries’ territories for logistical support.28

The subject of Vietnam came up during a meeting with President Johnson and the Joint Chiefs held 

on 4 March 1964. As the participants reviewed an 

impending inspection trip to South Vietnam by Mc23 “Outline Staff Study,” 21 February 1964. Emphasis by author.

24 Ibid.

25 Ibid.

26 Ibid. The quotes around “unpopular” are in the original document.

27 Ibid.

28 Ibid.
58 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

Namara and Taylor, the president solicited the opinion of each chief. Taylor recommended expanding 

the war to include selective strikes against North 

Vietnamese targets. When Johnson responded that 

such an action would “almost certainly” spark an 

intervention by China and the Soviet Union, Taylor 

stated that he did not think such a response would 

occur. Greene said that he did not subscribe to Taylor’s view and argued that expanding the war north 

would likely spark a Chinese response.

I told the President that, in my opinion, this would result in a major campaign, smaller perhaps, but similar 

to that which had taken place in Korea, and that there 

was risk of a possible escalation into another world war. 

However the bitter fact was that we were going to have to 

take a stand somewhere and the decision which he was 

going to have to make, as President, was whether or not 

SVN [South Vietnam] was the location where this stand 

should be made.29

Was Greene stating that escalating efforts in Vietnam was worth the risk of a potential third world war? 

Or was he exaggerating the potential consequences in 

order to convince President Johnson not to expand 

American involvement? Based on the recommendations he made in February to the other Joint Chiefs, 

one can reasonably conclude that Greene firmly beOfficial U.S. Marine Corps photo

Commandant Greene reviews an evening parade at the Marine Corps Barracks Washington, DC, alongside the 

surviving Commandants on 9 July 1964. From left: Gen Greene, Gen Thomas Holcomb (Ret), Gen Alexander A. 

Vandegrift (Ret), Gen Clifton B. Cates (Ret), Gen Lemuel C. Shepherd (Ret), and Gen David M. Shoup (Ret).

29 “Meeting Summary, Joint Chiefs White House Conference with the President, 4 March 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC, hereafter 

“Meeting Summary,” 4 March 1964.
Summer 2015 59

lieved that a war with the major Communist powers 

was inevitable and that aggressively taking the fight 

to North Vietnam was a necessary step in the broader struggle against international Communism. 

Johnson responded that he “subscribed to the analysis of ‘The Marine General’’’ and that he felt either 

outright withdrawal or an expansion of operations 

were the best options available to the United States. 

However, the president immediately declared that, 

while he agreed expanding the war was the best option, he did not want the United States committed to 

a war until after the November presidential election, 

when the political situation “would be stabilized” 

and the “President and the new Congress could then 

actively advocate a stepped-up campaign.” Greene 

recorded in his meeting notes that he suspected 

Johnson was “indirectly telling General Taylor that 

he did not want him to return from [South Vietnam] 

with a recommendation that the campaign there be 

expanded to include [North Vietnam] to the extent 

that the risk might arise of a Korean-type war, or allout war with the Communists.”30

Johnson, the consummate politician, kept his cards 

close to his chest, leaving the chiefs with little sense 

of where he stood on the war. On the one hand, he 

expressed concern about Chinese intervention. On 

the other, he agreed that the war would likely have 

to be expanded to North Vietnam if South Vietnam 

was to survive as an independent state. Ultimately, 

Greene concluded that President Johnson wanted 

to delay making any major decisions about the war 

and consequently pressured both Taylor and McNamara not to recommend escalation. Greene’s notes 

from a Joint Chiefs’ meeting held the next day recorded that “the Chairman said that he didn’t know 

what he might recommend at this time; however, he 

knew that his neck and the [secretary of defense’s] 

neck were on the chopping block.”31 The meeting 

with Johnson and the comments by Taylor led the 

Commandant to draw the conclusion that both the 

chairman and secretary of defense were going to 

withhold their honest assessments of the situation in 

South Vietnam and not recommend taking what he 

believed were the necessary steps for achieving victory in Southeast Asia. 

Upon returning from his visit to South Vietnam, 

McNamara submitted a memorandum that confirmed Greene’s worries. The memo laid out a number of measures for the United States to take that 

McNamara believed would help stabilize the war 

situation. The measures focused on strengthening 

South Vietnam’s ability to fight the war, without a 

significant increase in U.S. involvement. Thus, McNamara recommended increasing the size of the 

South Vietnamese armed forces through national 

mobilization, furnishing new armored personnel 

carriers and attack aircraft, and continuing American reconnaissance flights over the Cambodian and 

Laotian borders.32 Although McNamara did propose 

that the United States be authorized to conduct air 

attacks against Viet Cong forces across the border 

“for the purpose of border control,”33 the secretary of 

defense’s recommendations were largely designed to 

maintain the status quo. 

The chiefs were near unanimous in their belief 

that the measures were inadequate.34 “Half-measures 

won’t win in South Vietnam,” Greene declared, further noting that, “I do not believe that the 12 recommendations discussed above offer little more than 

a continuation of the present programs of action in 

Vietnam.”35 He also stated that the proposals placed 

too many restrictions on the United States and left 

the initiative with China and North Vietnam. The 

drive to maintain the status quo would continue to 

drain American resources and increase, rather than 

reduce, “dissatisfaction amongst the American people.”36

Despite the chiefs’ protests, McNamara submit30 Ibid.

31 “Notes for JCS Meeting, 5 March 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.

32 “Memorandum from the Secretary of Defense to the President, 16 March 1964.” McNamara’s memorandum went through several iterations. 

The final version, which is annotated to reflect how it changed from its first version, is reproduced in Edward C. Keefer and Charles S. Sampson, 

ed., Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Vol. I, Vietnam, 1964 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1992), 153–67. 33 Ibid., 167.

34 McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 76–77; and Graham A. Cosmas, The Joint Chiefs of Staff and the War in Vietnam, 1960–1968, Part 2 (Washington, 

DC: Office of Joint History, Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, 2012), 36–38.

35 Marine Corps memorandum to the Joint Chiefs of Staff (CMCM 31-64/AO38B8-jd), “Comments on the Secretary of Defense Draft Memorandum for the President, South Vietnam, dated 13 March 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.

36 Ibid.
60 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

ted the memorandum to President Johnson without 

change, and the proposals were adopted as National 

Security Action Memorandum 288.37 Greene later 

criticized both McNamara’s and Taylor’s handling 

of the process, recalling that “it was noteworthy that 

at no time did the Secretary of Defense invite the 

Chiefs to discuss his memorandum with them. In 

other words it was a fait accompli. He accepted without comment the Chiefs’ memorandum which covered his own memorandum to the President, but he 

never at any time had discussed his final paper.”38 In 

Greene’s view, the secretary and chairman presented 

Johnson with the range of options that the president 

wanted to hear, not the options he needed to hear. In 

short, Greene was convinced that Johnson was not 

receiving sound or honest advice.

Even more frustrating was that Taylor and McNamara were possibly misconstruing the positions of 

the Joint Chiefs. Just days after Johnson had accepted 

McNamara’s recommendations, Greene learned that 

Central Intelligence Agency Director John A. McCone had expressed doubts about the proposals and 

that General Taylor deliberately withheld McCone’s 

comments from the chiefs. Even more surprising, 

Taylor apparently inked out references to annotations McCone had made on the draft of McNamara’s 

memorandum that had been submitted to the chiefs 

for comment.39 Greene called the chairman’s actions 

“unethical” and “dishonest” and confronted Taylor 

on the matter the next day. In a heated exchange, 

Greene asked whether the chiefs’ views were being 

presented in their entirety to Johnson. Taylor angrily 

retorted that if the chiefs had concerns, they could 

take their personal views to the president themselves, but he would not submit any memorandum 

drafted by other members of the Joint Chiefs to McNamara that he did not agree with.40 The chairman 

also claimed that the chiefs’ views and estimates of 

the situation in South Vietnam had been submitted “over a period of time and appeared in parts in a 

number of papers.”41

Taylor’s attitude unnerved Greene, who believed 

that the chairman was deliberately misconstruing 

his positions to President Johnson. Just as troubling 

was Taylor and McNamara’s efforts to paint a picture 

for the president about South Vietnam that Greene 

believed did not match the reality on the ground. 

McNamara’s dominance of the advisory process was 

particularly frustrating for the Commandant as he 

believed that the secretary of defense “appeared to 

think that he knew more about all the military aspects of the problems in Vietnam and the cures 

therefore than any of the military persons present.”42

The Joint Chiefs of Staff, in short, were not being 

used as they should. The Commandant believed that 

President Johnson was far too reliant on a small coterie of advisors, and neither McNamara nor Taylor 

saw any fault with this particular approach.

Photo by Abbie Rowe, courtesy of White House photographs,

 John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston

President John F. Kennedy meets with Chairman of the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff Maxwell D. Taylor and Secretary of 

Defense Robert S. McNamara on 2 October 1963. 

37 Memorandum to the president from the secretary of defense, “South Vietnam,” 16 March 1964, LBJ Presidential Library, http://www.lbjlib

.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/nsams/nsam288.asp. 

38 Greene Oral History collection, Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC. For the Joint Chiefs of Staff memorandum laying out their criticisms of 

McNamara’s memorandum, see memorandum from the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the secretary of defense, “Draft Memorandum for the President, 

Subject ‘South Vietnam’,” 14 March 1964, Foreign Relations of the United States (Document no. 82), 149–50. 39 “Summary of Discussion with Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans and Programs (LtGen Henry W. Buse Jr.) and Chief of Staff of the United States 

Air Force (Gen Curtis E. LeMay, USAF),” teleconference, 17 March 1964, Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC, hereafter “Summary of Discussion 

with Deputy Chief of Staff,” 17 March 1964.

40 “Summary of Action in JCS Meeting, 18 March 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.

41 Ibid.

42 “Summary of Discussion with Deputy Chief of Staff,” 17 March 1964.
Summer 2015 61

Reforming the Advisory System: 

Greene’s Proposals for a

National Staff

At this early stage in his term, Greene clung to the 

idea that if his positions on the situation in Southeast 

Asia could be effectively and accurately relayed to 

the president, then a true shift in American strategy 

could take place. He pursued this task as the consummate staff officer. Having served on various national 

security posts during three presidential administrations, Greene was convinced that the informal advisory system used by both Kennedy and Johnson was 

the root cause of the Joint Chiefs’ inability to provide adequate and effective advice on the Vietnam 

War. As a member of the National Security Council staff during Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidency, 

Greene had gained firsthand knowledge and experience with the formal advisory structures used by 

that administration. Kennedy saw these structures, 

in particular the National Security Council’s Planning Board and Operations Coordinating Board as 

well as the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as ineffective and unwieldy. Consequently, he dissolved the two boards 

and relied on personal military advisors rather than 

the Joint Chiefs.43

Greene believed rebuilding these planning organizations would not only strengthen strategic planning but also ensure that the president could make 

a firm decision on the situation in South Vietnam. 

Throughout 1964, Greene repeatedly pushed for a 

solution he described as a “National Staff ” or “National General Staff.” Greene promoted his concept 

in meetings with presidential advisors, in speeches, 

and in formal memoranda submitted to the Joint 

Chiefs. The Commandant elaborated on this concept 

in a May 1964 speech at the Armed Forces Staff College. In the address, Greene noted that the executive 

branch did not have a mechanism to ensure continuity between different administrations in regard to 

planning for impending national security crises and 

emergencies. While the National Security Council 

had a staff, the staff lacked “an operational function, 

as all executive authority is vested in the President 

Photo by Yoichi Okamoto, courtesy of LBJ Presidential Library

President Johnson meets with the Joint Chiefs at his ranch in Texas in December 1964. Clockwise from the president: Secretary of Defense McNamara, the president’s military aid MajGen Chester Clifton, Air Force Chief of Staff 

Gen Curtis E. LeMay (with signature cigar), Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen Earle G. Wheeler, Deputy Secretary 

of Defense Cyrus R. Vance, Army Chief of Staff Gen Harold K. Johnson, Chief of Naval Operations Adm David L. 

McDonald, and Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen Greene.

43 McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 4–5. 
62 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

and in the Heads of the several departments and 

agencies of the Government.”44

The United States, Greene argued, lacked an interdepartmental organization capable of coordinating 

how national security decisions made by the president could be implemented by the various executive 

agencies and departments. “Because of the lack of 

such a body with interdepartmental membership, 

programs must be implemented through so-called 

‘normal coordination’—or, as is most usually the 

case, through ad hoc arrangements devised for individual problem areas.” Greene proposed resurrecting the National Security Council’s Planning Board 

and creating a National General Staff “composed 

of representatives of all departments and agencies 

concerned with overall national security.”45 The staff 

would be a civilian organization tasked with the 

same responsibilities and empowered with the same 

authority as a military general staff. The staff would 

even include a National Command Center, which 

would serve a similar function as the National Military Command Center.46

Greene continued to press his idea of a National 

General Staff throughout 1964. He found an ally in 

the chief of staff of the Air Force, General Curtis 

E. LeMay. Toward the end of August 1964, LeMay 

submitted his own memorandum to the chiefs and 

McNamara recommending the resurrection of the 

National Security Council’s Planning Board. In a 

statement that reflected many of the same arguments 

made by Greene, LeMay criticized the ad hoc nature 

of security planning and the basic problem that the 

professional recommendations of the United States’ 

military leadership were not reaching the president 

in a systematic manner.47 Responding to LeMay’s 

proposal, Greene used a lengthy memorandum to 

appraise the chiefs of his National General Staff concept. 

The memo restated most of the major arguments 

of his speeches from the spring of 1964: the current 

National Security Council lacked the capability and 

mission “to maintain a continuing appraisal over all 

events and happenings which have impact on security policies.”48 The Joint Chiefs also were unable 

to fulfill this role, being comprised only of military 

personnel and serving only as advisors to the president. Again, Greene suggested reconstituting the 

Planning Board “as a full-time agency with a Chairman and members appointed by the President, who 

would have no other duties in the Government.” The 

Planning Board would manage the National General Staff in much the same way that the Joint Chiefs 

managed the Joint Staff. The staff would then “coordinate and direct the implementation of all Executive departments and agencies of approved policies 

and programs.”49

Greene’s proposal involved an ambitious and 

radical restructuring of the national security advisory system. Thus, while it may have streamlined 

the manner in which presidential decisions were 

implemented, the likelihood of such an organization coming to pass was improbable. Critically, the 

concept did little to address Johnson’s own preferred 

method of operating. When Greene brought up the 

concept during a meeting with Bromley K. Smith, 

the National Security Council staffer pointed out the 

difficulties of creating such an organization. In the 

course of the session, Greene noted that the failure 

of the Bay of Pigs invasion had convinced him that 

the advisory systems used by President Kennedy 

was an ineffective means for making national security strategy and policy. Greene went on to argue that 

the Johnson administration threatened to make the 

same mistakes with Southeast Asia, in large part due 

to the administration making decisions “without 

proper advice” and with “poorly rounded estimates 

of the situation.”50

As Greene laid out his vision of a national staff, 

44 “Remarks of Gen Wallace M. Greene Jr., USMC” (speech at Armed Forces Staff College, Norfolk, VA, 21 May 1964). The entirety of the document can be found in Greene Papers, GRC.

45 Ibid.

46 Ibid.

47 “Memorandum to Gen Greene from Gen Curtis E. LeMay, Chief of Staff, USAF, 19 August 1964,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.

48 Ibid.

49 Memorandum to Gen LeMay from Gen Wallace M. Greene, “Re-Activation of the Machinery of the National Security Council, 27 August 1964, 

Enclosure 1: Organization of a National Staff,” Greene Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.

50 “Summary of a Meeting with Mr. Bromley Smith, Special Assistant to the President for National Security Council Affairs, 17 June 1964,” Greene 

Papers, Vietnam Notes, GRC.
Summer 2015 63

Smith pointed out how President Kennedy would 

never have agreed to such an arrangement. While 

he noted Johnson might be more receptive, Smith 

nevertheless observed that National Security Advisor Bundy’s centralized White House staff was better 

suited to the type and detail of advice the current 

president wanted. According to Smith, 

. . . the President was interested in a great deal of detail; 

e.g., during the recent air strike against Viet Cong targets 

in Laos, he wanted to know when and where each of the 

strike planes had landed and when they were all safely 

home, even though it might be necessary to wake him in 

the middle of the night to acquaint him with these facts.51 

While Smith recognized that excessive reliance on 

Bundy and his staff was a problem, Smith was also 

skeptical that the president would be able to get so 

many agencies and individuals to surrender their 

prerogatives to a National General Staff.

Greene’s concept of a National General Staff attested to his abilities as a creative and ambitious planner. He saw himself not only as the senior officer of 

the Marine Corps, but also as a senior advisor to the 

president. Furthermore, Greene acknowledged that 

the Joint Chiefs of Staff were limited in the kind of 

advice they could provide to help the president deal 

with the almost constantly changing and emerging 

national security threats of the Cold War. Greene 

recognized that confronting these threats required 

close coordination and cooperation between civilian 

and military agencies. Consequently, he admitted 

that the Joint Chiefs would only serve as a supporting element to the National General Staff. 

However, while the idea of a national staff may 

have been ambitious and would potentially place 

a rational structure that would help organize the 

seemingly chaotic constellation of advisory agencies, 

committees, and departments serving the president, 

Photo by Frank Hall, courtesy of Department of the Army

The Joint Chiefs of Staff in February 1965. From left: Chief of Naval Operations Adm McDonald, Air Force Chief of 

Staff Gen John P. McConnell, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen Wheeler, Commandant of the Marine Corps 

Gen Greene, and Chief of Staff of the Army Gen Johnson.

51 Ibid.
64 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

by proposing a national staff Greene demonstrated 

a basic misunderstanding of how influential a president’s personality and personal style were in shaping how decisions were reached and implemented. 

Greene was convinced, for example, that the failure 

of the Bay of Pigs invasion was due to the Kennedy 

administration’s overreliance on an informal, ad hoc 

advisory system. Yet Kennedy drew the exact opposite conclusion, feeling that the Joint Chiefs of Staff 

had failed to provide him with a frank assessment 

of the consequences of the operation and placed the 

blame for the failure at their feet.52 Kennedy saw the 

large, formal advisory systems of the Eisenhower era 

as slow, ungainly, and potentially more interested in 

their own prerogatives than in serving the president.

In his 1964 speech to the Armed Forces Staff College, Greene argued that “an organization such as the 

one proposed would so prove its usefulness that it 

would be perpetuated and strengthened by any Chief 

Executive who had to face the tangle of problems that 

will continue to confront our nation as the Free World 

leader.”53 Greene failed to acknowledge that certain 

presidents would potentially have a different view. 

As scholars of his presidency have shown, Johnson 

preferred receiving advice from a tight-knit group of 

advisors who would reinforce, rather than challenge, 

his preconceptions.54 Believing this approach to be 

detrimental to strategic planning, Greene hoped his 

National General Staff would both strengthen America’s ability to cope with national security challenges 

and ensure that the president would make appropriate and effective policy decisions. 

The system was never created because the proposals did not move beyond the Joint Chiefs of Staff. 

President Johnson never changed his approach; he 

continued to carry out foreign policy using close, 

personal advisors in an often, improvised manner. 

Beginning in 1965, Greene’s attention began to shift. 

The South Vietnamese government continued to 

be afflicted by coups and instability. The Viet Cong 

also seemed to be taking the initiative in the conflict, and the commander of the MACV, Army GenLBJ Presidential Library

In this meeting held in July 1965 concerning the Vietnam War, President Johnson is flanked by some of his principal 

advisors. From left: Gen Greene, Gen Johnson, Secretary of the Army Stanley R. Resor, National Security Advisor 

McGeorge Bundy (standing), President Johnson, and Secretary of Defense McNamara.

52 McMaster, Dereliction of Duty, 5–7; Buzzanco, Masters of War, 19–20; and Michael R. Beschloss, The Crisis Years: Kennedy and Khrushchev 

1960–1963 (New York: Edward Burlingame Books, 1991), 146. 53 “Remarks of Gen Wallace M. Greene Jr., USMC,” 21 May 1964.

54 Herring, LBJ and Vietnam; Buzzanco, Masters of War; Barrett, Uncertain Warriors; McMaster, Dereliction of Duty; and Logevall, Choosing War.
Summer 2015 65

eral William C. Westmoreland, became concerned 

that South Vietnam’s collapse could be imminent. 

In March 1965, following General Westmoreland’s 

requests for U.S. troops to protect American installations in South Vietnam from Communist attacks, 

the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade landed two 

assault battalions at Da Nang, Vietnam. General 

Greene was responsible for raising and equipping 

the Marine Corps forces that were then operating in 

increasing numbers in South Vietnam. Unsurprisingly, concerns about a National General Staff became less of a concern for the Marine Corps Commandant.

Conclusion

In the period between the passage of the National 

Security Act of 1947 and the Goldwater-Nichols Department of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986, the 

Joint Chiefs of Staff occupied an ambiguous position 

within the United States’ national security system.55

Neither the chairman nor the Service chiefs were in 

Official U.S. Marine Corps photo A184014

Gen Greene visits the headquarters of the South Vietnamese Marine Brigade in April 1965. He is accompanied by 

BGen Le Nguyen Khang, commanding general of the South Vietnamese Marines.

55 Douglas T. Stuart, Creating the National Security State: A History of the Law that Transformed America (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 

2008); and Adrian R. Lewis, The American Culture of War: The History of U.S. Military Force from World War II to Operation Iraqi Freedom (New 

York: Routledge, 2007).
66 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

the official chain of command and, while they were 

tasked by statute with providing the president and 

secretary of defense with military advice, the commander in chief could accept or dismiss the advice 

as he saw fit. For a number of reasons, this limitation 

on the Joint Chiefs’ authority was reinforced during the Johnson administration. Johnson personally 

preferred drawing advice from a limited number of 

advisors to reinforce his own viewpoints. Seeing the 

conflict in Vietnam as a Cold War emergency, both 

Johnson and McNamara believed the situation could 

be managed through a mixture of diplomatic and 

military pressure. The two men believed the Joint 

Chiefs only saw potential military solutions to the 

problems. Consequently, the chiefs saw their advice 

as potentially irrelevant.

Greene believed that Johnson’s advisory system 

was fundamentally flawed. Although Greene was 

not adverse to the principles of graduated pressure, 

he conceived of Vietnam as a military problem that 

required military solutions. If there is one constant 

throughout his comments on Vietnam, it is that a 

piecemeal, limited approach would be ultimately 

fruitless. He also firmly believed—even when he suggested a certain reticence about the conflict in 1963—

that the United States could only achieve a quick 

victory if it Americanized the conflict. Greene and 

many senior Marine officers maintained this position 

throughout the first three years of direct American 

involvement in the conflict.56 Consequently, Greene 

believed that the Service chiefs, rather than civilians, should serve as Johnson’s principal advisors on 

Southeast Asia. Unsurprisingly, he was continually 

frustrated with the president’s tendency to defer decisions and avoid firm commitments when presented 

with difficult choices. 

Thus, the proposal for a National General Staff 

was not only an attempt to improve the national security advisory system but also a means designed 

to force President Johnson to make a decision on 

Vietnam, which would have favored Greene’s own 

conclusions. Greene felt that the deactivation of the 

National Security Council’s formal planning boards 

and committees had allowed the president to defer 

difficult decisions. A rational and organized advisory system would force the president to take what 

the Commandant believed to be the best course of 

action in the Vietnam War. 

However, as a number of scholars have demonstrated, the presence of a coherent foreign policy advisory structure would not guarantee that successive 

presidential administrations came to the best decisions concerning Vietnam.57 While Greene’s proposal was never implemented, it is difficult to imagine 

Lyndon Johnson using such an organization or allowing such an organization to force him to make a 

decision regarding the Vietnam War. The efforts of 

this most consummate professional military staff officer to engage the most consummate of politicians 

had decidedly mixed results. s1775s

56 Nicholas J. Schlosser, “Reassessing the Marine Corps’ Approach to Strategy in the Vietnam War, 1965–1968,” International Bibliography of 

Military History 34, no. 1 (2014): 27–52. 57 Barrett, Uncertain Warriors, 190–94; and Leslie H. Gelb and Richard K. Betts, The Irony of Vietnam: The System Worked (Washington, DC: 

Brookings, 1979), 1–6.
James A. Smith

Military Historian

Victory Fever on Guadalcanal: Japan’s First Land Defeat of World War II. By William H. Bartsch. (College 

Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2014. Pp. 360. 

$35.00 cloth.)

As World War II battles go, the misnamed 

battle of the Tenaru River in Guadalcanal 

was a small-scale affair. In the predawn 

hours of 21 August 1942, Japanese Colonel Kiyonao Ichiki’s first echelon of the Imperial 

Japanese Army—a regiment reduced to a reinforced 

battalion by the inadequacies of Japanese logistics—

attacked a battalion of the 1st Marine Division entrenched on the west bank of Alligator Creek. William H. Bartsch has written a definitive account of 

this battle in his Victory Fever on Guadalcanal.

In the foreword, 

noted Pacific war 

historian Richard 

B. Frank describes 

the battle at Tenaru as “the smallest 

American battle of 

World War II with 

the greatest effects” 

(p. xi). The Marines’ 

ability to hold Henderson Field, tested 

for the first time at 

Tenaru, spelled the difference between victory and 

defeat in the Guadalcanal campaign. Moreover, this 

battle was the Pacific War’s first substantial encounter between the Marines and the Imperial Japanese 

Army. The Marines facing Colonel Kiyonao Ichiki 

were post-Pearl Harbor recruits who had undergone abbreviated training. The Ichiki first echelon, 

by contrast, was an elite, combat-tested unit, which 

would have the advantage of numbers at its chosen 

point of attack. Ichiki’s plan of attack—a stealthy advance leading up to a sudden attack with minimal 

prior preparation, but maximum emphasis on shock 

and speed—was basic Japanese doctrine. As Eric M. 

Bergerud observed in Touched with Fire, his 1996 

study of the land war in the Pacific:

In a very real sense, Ichiki was acting on assumptions that 

had to be true if Japan was to prevail in the war. If the enemy was their equal in skill, if spirit could not overcome 

BOOK REVIEW

Victory Fever on Guadalcanal: 

Japan’s First Land Defeat of

World War II

67

James A. Smith received his BA in history from 

Washington College, Chestertown, Maryland, in 

1973 and was that year’s winner of the college’s 

award for distinguished studies in history. A lifelong student of military history, Smith received 

his MA in military history in September 2014 from 

Norwich University in Northfield, Vermont. He has 

concentrated his studies on the naval history of 

World War II in the Pacific, particularly the Guadalcanal Campaign. He wrote the article “Admiral 

William Pye’s 1943 Evaluation of the Naval Battle 

of Guadalcanal, November 13–15, 1942” in U.S. 

Military History Review (December 2014): 44–65. 

His other works include: “The U.S. Navy and The 

Tokyo Express at Guadalcanal, August–December, 

1942: A Battle That Required ‘Every Conceivable 

Weapon’”; “The Influence of Alfred Thayer Mahan 

upon the Imperial Japanese Navy”; and “Naval 

Gunfire Support from Gallipoli to Tarawa.” Smith is 

currently working on a book about the Tokyo Express in the campaign for Guadalcanal. 
68 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

material, if night attack could not neutralize firepower, 

Japan would lose at Guadalcanal. Japan would also lose 

in the South Pacific. The Tenaru Battle was far more than 

a single assault. It was a clash of doctrine and of assumptions concerning the enemy. The stakes were very high. 

The result of this clash was a lopsided American 

victory that stripped the Japanese of their aura of invincibility, gave a huge lift to American morale, and 

set the terms upon which larger future battles on 

Guadalcanal and beyond would be fought.

Firsthand accounts of the battle for Tenaru exist 

from such participants as Robert Leckie, Richard 

W. Tregaskis, and Merrill B. Twining. Workmanlike 

narratives are available from a number of historians, including Samuel E. Morison, Richard B. Frank, 

Samuel B. Griffith II, and Eric M. Hammel. Indeed, 

Bergerud’s superb synopsis of this battle, quoted in 

part above, is one of many reasons why his book is 

required reading for anyone seeking to understand 

the land war in the South Pacific. These accounts, 

however, describe the battle as part of a larger story. 

In Victory Fever on Guadalcanal, Bartsch provides 

the first full-length monograph devoted solely to 

the battle, allowing him to furnish the reader with 

a wealth of detail about the battle from both sides. 

Though not a trained historian or political scientist, Bartsch has written extensively and exclusively 

on the Pacific War. Most of his prior books dealt with 

the desperate early days of the Japanese offensive 

against the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies. 

In The Old Breed of Marine: A World War II Diary

(2003), Bartsch annotated the diary of a member of 

the 11th Marines, one of the units at Tenaru. In these 

earlier works, Bartsch perfected the technique of 

telling the events he was writing about as “bottomup” history told from what Bartsch describes as “the 

human standpoint.” This is participant-driven history with a vengeance, and Bartsch has gotten very 

good at it. 

Applying this technique to the Tenaru battle in 

Victory Fever on Guadalcanal, Bartsch relies on oral 

histories, letters, and diaries to trace the involvement 

of individual participants. The resulting narratives 

give the book a strong sense of presence and immediacy. Significantly, Bartsch is able to employ the 

same approach toward the Japanese forces. Working from previously unknown or untapped Japanese 

sources, Bartsch provides a hitherto-unseen look at 

life as a soldier serving in Ichiki’s first echelon. Considering how completely Ichiki’s force was destroyed, 

this is a notable testament to Bartsch’s doggedness 

and determination as a researcher. 

The prologue follows the 1st Marine Division 

from the spring of 1942 to its invasion of Guadalcanal. Bartsch writes this part of the story primarily 

from the viewpoint of Major General Alexander A. 

Vandegrift, the division’s new commander. On Vandegrift’s shoulders fell the burden of converting the 

large influx of post-Pearl Harbor recruits into combat-ready Marines at a primitive training camp in 

New River, North Carolina. By the summer of 1942, 

this was still very much a work in progress. To employ this force as the spearhead for America’s first 

Pacific offensive, therefore, would have seemed to an 

informed outsider, a premature and ill-advised adventure. 

Bartsch then switches the focus of his narrative 

style from generals to privates. The succeeding chapters form a series of parallel narratives between the 

men of the 1st Marines and the Ichiki detachment 

from the spring of 1942 onward as they approach 

their fateful collision in Guadalcanal. 

In the first three chapters, Bartsch focuses on the 

Marines training at New River, deploying to New 

Zealand, and invading Guadalcanal. By the end of 

chapter 3, the Marines have seized the airfield but 

watched with dismay as their transports, half-unloaded, sailed away after the disastrous defeat at Savo 

Island. 

In chapter 4, the Ichiki forces come into sharper 

relief. They are the only force immediately available to carry out the Imperial general headquarters’ 

orders to recapture the airfield on Guadalcanal. At 

Seventeenth Army headquarters in Rabaul, Papau 

New Guinea, bad intelligence, overconfidence, and 

a reluctance to impose meaningful restraints on an 

impetuous officer lead to the Ichiki detachment’s annihilation. Fanciful intelligence reports suggest the 

U.S. Marines are withdrawing. The headquarters 

staff knows that reinforcements are 10 days away, 

but drafts Ichiki’s orders immediately giving him 

the option of attacking with his small detachment. 

Ichiki’s transportation arrangements form a further 

link in his ultimate destruction: six destroyers with 

room for only 900 of his soldiers and virtually none 

of his artillery. When Ichiki advises Rear Admiral 
Summer 2015 69

Raizo Tanaka, the destroyer force commander, that 

he intends to seize the airfield with a bayonet charge, 

Tanaka is dismayed by the thought of such “bamboo spear” tactics, but he says nothing. Ichiki’s force 

lands east of the Marine lines at Taivu Point on 18 

August. Meanwhile, tipped off by radio intelligence, 

coast watchers, and missionaries, the Marines shift 

their main line of resistance from the beach facing 

“Ironbottom Sound” (Savo Sound) to the line of the 

mislabeled Tenaru.

Bartsch graphically communicates the closeness 

and intensity of this combat. A key component of 

the Marines’ defense was the nests of water-cooled 

.30-caliber Browning machine guns, which inflicted 

murderous casualties on the Japanese. These nests, 

in turn, became the foci of the fighting as the Japanese began counterfire with their own heavy machine guns:

While it was firing, Fincher’s gun took a hit in the jacket, 

and the water soon started boiling inside. His assistant 

gunner, Pfc. [Private First Class] Joe Fontaine, passed 

Fincher the spare barrel. While Fincher was changing the 

barrel, another flare burst overhead. Fincher turned and 

saw a Japanese [soldier] coming into his gun emplacement. Overcoming his initial shock, he reacted by hitting 

the unarmed man with the old barrel several times until 

he was sure his nemesis was dead (p. 183).

Chapter 10 addresses the last act of the battle, 

which took place after daylight, when the 1st Battalion, 1st Marines, crossed the river farther south, 

encircling and annihilating the disorganized remnant of Ichiki’s now-leaderless force, with the aid of 

a squad of light tanks crossing the sandbar. The new 

Marine arrivals at Henderson Field strafe Japanese 

soldiers trying to escape the encirclement on the 

beach or by boat. Bartsch tells some harrowing tales 

from the Japanese side, as the few survivors manage 

to avoid death (often by feigning it) and make their 

escape back to Taivu Point.

The epilogue returns to the sand spit at Alligator 

Creek, now a scene of indescribable, odious carnage. 

Amidst this horror, Bartsch, with his eye for detail, 

catches a moment of humor and gives an example of 

how to weave the many participant accounts, upon 

which he has relied, into a smooth-flowing narrative:

Earlier, when the POWs [prisoners of war] had come 

marching down the beach road, four abreast, in step, 

guarded by Marine MPs [military police], they appeared 

to Phillips “like midgets” compared to the MPs, all of 

whom seemed to be over six feet tall. Armed with their 

submachine guns, the MPs were calling cadence from the 

flanks, a scene that to Phillips was reminiscent of Parris Island days. One bit MP would bellow, “in cadence 

count,” which was followed by a chorus of Oriental voices 

shouting “Roosevelt good man, Tojo eat s——t!” Phillips 

and the others watching the procession nearly split their 

sides in laughter at the sight (p. 214).

As the Marines collect their few prisoners, the 

Japanese at Taivu Point muster their few survivors—

of the 900, which Ichiki had led ashore a few days 

earlier, only 100 remain; Ichiki himself is not among 

them. The exact circumstances of his death is one of 

the few mysteries of this battle, which Bartsch does 

not conclusively resolve, choosing instead to present 

conflicting accounts. 

While the surviving Japanese report the dolorous 

news to Rabaul, the Marine commanders on Guadalcanal are taking stock—34 Marines dead and 75 

wounded, a pittance for the losses they inflicted on the 

Japanese. The Marine Corps commanders are pleased 

by their troops’ performance, but aware that they were 

lucky and aided by the enemy’s mistakes. Ichiki had 

not reconnoitered the Tenaru farther south, where the 

defenses were less substantial, and had not awaited his 

reinforcements, which the Marines now knew were 

coming. In committing these mistakes, Twining concluded, Ichiki suffered from “victory disease.”

At this point, Bartsch shifts his narrative back 

from Marine privates to that of generals. He demonstrates that Ichiki, far from being “an eager beaver who saw a chance to grab the glory,” as Twining 

thought, was thoroughly versed in, and acting in full 

accord with, Japanese tactical doctrine which he, as 

an instructor at the Infantry School in Tokyo, was 

completely familiar with (p. 222). Bartsch identifies 

five factors contributing to Ichiki’s defeat: (1) his decision to attack immediately rather than waiting for 

reinforcements; (2) his decision to rely on the infantry to spearhead an attack; (3) his decision to attack 

at the point of the Marines’ greatest strength; (4) his 

failure to attack, or even to reconnoiter, upstream; 

and (5) his failure to commit the firepower available to him—heavy machine guns and two 70mm 

battalion guns—at the onset of the attack. While 

these factors tend to put the lion’s share of responsibility for the loss on Ichiki’s shoulders, one sees a 
70 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

fair share of responsibility resting on the Japanese 

high command and on larger Japanese attitudes. 

The high command pushed for a speedy attack 

over a well-prepared or strong one. The command 

drafted Ichiki’s orders loosely; it transported only a 

fraction of his overall command without his heavy 

equipment; and it left Ichiki high and dry at Taivu 

Point with only four-days’ rations. Even if Ichiki had 

not believed in the superiority of Japanese fighting 

spirit over Western material advantages, he could 

hardly have done anything other than attack quickly, 

though he might have attacked better. In retrospect, 

what was supposed to be an elite commando-style 

operation turned into a fiasco. 

Bartsch’s narrative is well supported by the book’s 

appendices, references, and visual aids. Four appendices identify the officers of the 1st Marines involved 

in the battle, the Marine casualties, and the officers 

and staff of the Ichiki detachment. Notes are copious 

and clearly identify sources. Five maps and a wealth 

of photographs give the reader ample visual orientation and illustration. 

As Bartsch himself notes, the opportunity to do 

participant-driven history, such as Victory Fever on 

Guadalcanal, has now all but ceased to exist, due to 

the passing of “The Greatest Generation.” Bartsch’s 

book is a fine last hurrah for this type of narrative 

history and a worthy addition to the shelf of anyone 

interested in the Guadalcanal campaign or the Pacific War. s1775s
BOOK REVIEW

History Division’s Publications:

Marines in the Vietnam War

Paul W. Westermeyer

Historian, History Division

Marine Corps University

F

rom 1962 to 1975, more than 800,000 men 

and women served in the U.S. Marine 

Corps. Of these, 500,000 served in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War, with 

13,091 Marines killed and 88,594 wounded. During 

the conflict, Marines earned 57 Medals of Honor, 44 

posthumously. In duration and scale, the Vietnam 

conflict ranked amongst the largest in the history 

of the Marine Corps. Because of this, interest in the 

war is only natural and compounded by the conflict’s 

many controversies. Since 1968, the Marine Corps 

History Division has produced more than a score of 

studies on the conflict, telling the story of Marines in 

the Vietnam War. 

The foundation for studying the Marine Corps’ role 

in this conflict is the U.S. Marines in Vietnam series, 

the definitive official histories (sometimes referred 

to as the Green Books). This was a 20-year project, 

with the first work published in 1977, while the last 

work—The Defining Year, 1968—was published in 

1997. The chronological series includes nine volumes 

covering 26 years of Marine involvement in Vietnam. 

Each book in the series provides an operational narrative of its period, along with appropriate appendices that include a chronology, command and staff 

lists, unit lists, Medal of Honor citations, and other 

material. Maintaining consistent quality and style for 

more than 20 years of scholarship is a daunting task. 

This series should be the first stop for anyone studying the Marine Corps’ role in the Vietnam War.

In addition to operational narrative definitive histories, the History Division produced several anthologies and monographs examining specific aspects of 

the Vietnam conflict. The division reprinted thenCaptain Francis J. “Bing” West Jr.’s Small Unit Action 

in Vietnam, Summer 1966 (first published in 1967) 

and a study of the battle of Khe Sanh (first published 

in 1969). Before the war ended, the History Division 

also produced two studies, published as historical 

monographs, written by Marine Reserve officers, 

who were scholars in their civilian lives. The officers 

studied Marine civic action and civil affairs in Vietnam during the late 1960s. In 1974, before work began on the definitive histories, the division published 

an anthology and annotated bibliography, highlighting the best articles on Marines and Vietnam from 

publications such as the Marine Corps Gazette and 

the U.S. Naval Institute’s Proceedings. Later, as the 

definitive histories were being written, the branch 

produced two monographs covering the specialized 

histories of Marine military law and chaplains who 

served with Marines in Vietnam.

In the 1980s, the History Division published three 

occasional papers on Vietnam: Leadership Lessons 

and Remembrances from Vietnam; Bibliography on 

Khe Sanh USMC Participation; and Vietnam Revisited: Conversation with William D. Broyles, Jr.

*

 The 

Vietnam Revisited publication is the transcript of a 

1984 seminar discussion involving multiple History 

Division staff, journalists, and other Vietnam War 

veterans. The publication is remarkable for its candor and the wide range of the discussion. In contrast, 

Leadership Lessons is a series of articles written by 

Lieutenant General Herman Nickerson Jr. in 1969–

70 while he was commanding general of III Marine 

Amphibious Force (III MAF). These articles had 

71

*

 Occasional papers are works considered of intrinsic worth to the study of Marine Corps history but not intended for mass publication.
72 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

previously been published in Sea Tiger, the weekly 

III MAF newspaper.

In 2009, the History Division published four more 

occasional papers on the Vietnam War. These included a collection of primary source documents on the 

Vietnamese Marine Corps and its American Marine 

advisors, a short history of Marine advisors with the 

Vietnamese provincial reconnaissance units, a study 

of Operation Millpond, and a master’s thesis examining close air support during the battle of Khe Sanh. 

The Vietnam War was long and complicated. Marine participation spanned decades but was concentrated in the years from 1962 to 1975. As part of the 

U.S. Department of Defense observance of the 50th 

anniversary of the introduction of ground troops, 

the History Division is publishing a series of commemorative histories on the conflict. The Marines in 

the Vietnam War commemorative series are written 

by scholars and retired Marines on a variety of Vietnam War topics. The first of these works, The Path 

to War: U.S. Marine Corps Operations in Southeast 

Asia, 1961 to 1965 was published in 2014. Additional titles are in production, including a chronology of the conflict illustrated with Marine combat 

art and histories of Con Thien, Operation Starlite, 

Operation Harvest Moon, Khe Sanh, Hue City, and 

the Special Landing Force. Other commemoratives 

are expected to be released during the course of the 

commemorative period. 

In addition to the commemorative histories, the 

History Division is publishing The Greene Papers: 

General Wallace M. Greene Jr. and the Escalation of 

the Vietnam War, January 1964–March 1965. Compiled and edited by Dr. Nicholas J. Schlosser, this recently declassified trove of documents will provide 

fodder for historians on all aspects of the Vietnam 

War, especially those interested in the Corps’ contributions and the inner workings of the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff during the critical early stages of direct U.S. 

military involvement in the Vietnam War. 

The Vietnam War ended 40 years ago. Since the 

end of that conflict, the History Division has produced an impressive body of scholarly histories and 

documentary collections on this pivotal event in 

American history.*

 The war’s significance in the ongoing development of the Marine Corps demands 

such attention, and the ongoing commemorative series will ensure that the Vietnam War and the Corps’ 

role therein will be neither forgotten nor ignored. 

U.S. Marines in Vietnam Series

The Advisory & Combat Assistance Era, 1954–1964.

Capt Robert H. Whitlow, USMCR. 1977. 1982

reprint. 190 pp. 

The Landing and the Buildup, 1965. Jack Shulimson

and Maj Charles M. Johnson, USMC. 1978.

261 pp. 

An Expanding War, 1966. Jack Shulimson. 1982.

390 pp. 

Fighting the North Vietnamese, 1967. Maj Gary L.

Telfer, USMC, LtCol Lane Rogers, USMC, and

V. Keith Fleming Jr. 1984. 338 pp. 

The Defining Year, 1968. Jack Shulimson, LtCol

Leonard A. Blaisol, USMC, Charles R. Smith,

and Capt David A. Dawson, USMC. 1997.

805 pp. 

High Mobility and Standdown, 1969. Charles R. 

Smith. 1988. 403 pp. 

Vietnamization and Redeployment, 1970–1971.

Graham A. Cosmas and LtCol Terrence P.

Murray, USMC. Maj William R. Melton, USMC,

and Jack Shulimson, editors. 1986. 487 pp. 

The War That Would Not End, 1971–1973. Maj

Charles D. Melson, USMC, and LtCol Curtis G.

Arnold, USMC. 1991. 311 pp. 

The Bitter End, 1973–1975. Maj George R. Dunham, 

USMC, and Col David A. Quinlan, USMC.

1990. 315 pp. 

Monographs and Anthologies

Marines and Military Law in Vietnam: Trial by Fire.

LtCol Gary D. Solis, USMC. 1989. 295 pp. 

The Marines in Vietnam, 1954–1973: An Anthology 

and Annotated Bibliography. 1974. 1983

reprint. 277 pp. 1985 rev. ed. 373 pp. 

*

 Marine Corps History Division books can be downloaded for free in PDF format at http://www.history.usmc.mil under the Publications link. The 

site also includes instructions for obtaining print versions of the publications. 
Summer 2015 73

Chaplains with Marines in Vietnam, 1962–1971.

Cdr Herbert L. Bergsma, CHC, USN. 1985. 

240 pp. 

U.S. Marine Corps Civil Affairs in I Corps,

Republic of South Vietnam, April 1966–April

1967. Capt William D. Parker, USMCR. 1970.

131 pp. 

The Battle for Khe Sanh. Capt Moyers S. Shore,

USMC. 1969. 1977 reprint. 203 pp. 

U.S. Marine Corps Civic Action Effort in Vietnam,

March 1965–March 1966. Capt Russel H. 

Stolfi, USMCR. 1968. 96 pp. 

Small Unit Action in Vietnam, Summer 1966. Capt

Francis J. West Jr., USMCR. 1967. 1977

reprint. 123 pp. 

Occasional Papers

Close Air Support and the Battle for Khe Sanh.

LtCol Shawn P. Callahan, USMC. 2009. 179 pp. 

Marine Advisors With the Vietnamese Marine Corps.

Charles D. Melson and Wanda J. Renfrow,

compliers and editors. 2009. 188 pp. 

Operation Millpond: U.S. Marines in Thailand, 1961.

Col George R. Hofmann Jr., USMC (Ret). 2009.

36 pp. 

Marine Advisors With the Vietnamese Provincial

Reconnaissance Units, 1966–1970. Col Andrew

R. Finlayson, USMC (Ret). 2009. 72 pp. 

Leadership Lessons and Remembrances from

Vietnam. LtGen Herman Nickerson Jr., USMC

(Ret). 1988. 93 pp. 

Bibliography on Khe Sanh USMC Participation. Ray

W. Stubbe, compiler. 1985. 54 pp.

Vietnam Revisited: Conversation with William D.

Broyles, Jr. Col John G. Miller, USMC, editor.

1984. 48 pp. 

Marines in the Vietnam War

Commemorative Series

The Path to War: U.S. Marine Corps Operations in

Southeast Asia, 1961 to 1965. Col George R.

Hofmann, USMC (Ret). 2014. 97 pp.

The First Fight: U.S. Marines in Operation Starlite,

August 1965. Col Rod Andrew Jr., USMCR

(forthcoming).

Operation Harvest Moon, December 1965. Dr.

Nicholas J. Schlosser (forthcoming).

Marines in the Vietnam War: A Chronology. Paul W.

Westermeyer (forthcoming).

Forthcoming Titles

The Greene Papers: General Wallace M. Greene Jr. 

and the Escalation of The Vietnam War, January

1964–March 1965. Dr. Nicholas J. Schlosser,

editor (forthcoming). s1775s
BOOK REVIEW

Defend and Befriend:

The U.S. Marine Corps and Combined

Action Platoons in Vietnam

Lieutenant Colonel Edward T. Nevgloski

Operations Officer, The Basic School

Marine Corps Base Quantico 

Defend and Befriend: The U.S. Marine Corps and 

Combined Action Platoons in Vietnam. By John 

Southard. (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 

2014. Pp. 232. $40.00 cloth, epub, and pdf.)

F

rom 1965 to 1971, while U.S. Marine infantry battalions and regiments waged 

large-unit operations against the Viet Cong 

and the North Vietnamese Army across the 

five northern-most provinces of South Vietnam, a 

smaller contingent of U.S. Marines waged a different kind of war against Communist political and 

guerrilla cadres embedded within the villages and 

hamlets of South Vietnam’s I Corps. This was part 

experimentation and part lessons learned from past 

counterinsurgency experiences in Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Nicaragua in the 1920s and 1930s. 

The U.S. Marine Corps recognized that winning the 

war in South Vietnam was as much about the people as it was forcing elusive enemy formations into 

set-piece battles. Beginning in August 1965—not 

long after the III Marine Amphibious Force arrived 

in South Vietnam to begin its campaign to clear and 

hold the enclaves—overextended Marine battalions 

searched for a way to protect the gains made through 

small-unit civic actions and other population-centric 

counterinsurgency techniques. 

The challenge confronting these battalions was 

how to effectively distribute Marines across large 

swaths of land dotted with villages and hamlets—all 

under the observation, influence, or control of local 

Viet Cong elements. A plan to integrate Marine rifle 

squads with local 

South Vietnamese 

Popular Forces won 

out. In Defend and 

Befriend: The U.S. 

Marine Corps and 

Combined Action 

Platoons in Vietnam, John Southard 

provides a historical 

account and analysis of how this 

program and subsequent combined 

action platoons (CAPs), originated and evolved to 

the point of being essential to winning the war, as 

many military officers believed.

Southard is not the first to write about the CAP 

and the “other war” that Marines fought in South 

Vietnam. Bing West first introduced the world to 

this innovative approach in his seminal book The 

Village (1972). In 1989, Michael E. Peterson wrote 

on CAP Marines in The Combined Action Platoons: 

The U.S. Marines’ Other War in Vietnam. Al Hemmingway described his time in a CAP in Our War 

Was Different: Marine Combined Action Platoons in 

Vietnam (1994), followed three years later by Barry 

L. Goodson’s CAP Mot: The Story of a Marine Special Forces Unit in Vietnam, 1968–1969 (1997). Aside 

from Peterson, the authors wrote from firsthand 

experience as members or observers of the CAP. 

Southard, like Peterson, elected to write about the 

CAP because of its uniqueness but mostly due to its 

relevance to military operations at the time. Unlike 

the others, Southard’s book provides a useful analy74
Summer 2015 75

sis of the CAP concept and its inner workings, considering more than operational history or narrative. 

Southard considers the rarely discussed racial and 

cultural aspects associated with the war and the environment. 

A true academic study, Defend and Befriend offers a 

great depth of analysis with meticulous research, operational statistics, and interviews, whereas authors 

of the previous books profited mainly from recounting their own personal experiences and memories. 

This does not diminish the value of previous efforts 

to tell the CAP story. Rather, it strengthens each and 

provides more substantive perspective for students 

and veterans of the Vietnam War to evaluate and 

consider.

Southard’s first two chapters carefully and thoroughly examine the purpose and scope of the CAPs 

and how the program came to be. One chapter compares CAPs with their perceived U.S. Army equivalents, the Special Forces (SF) and Mobile Advisory 

Teams (MAT). Southard dispels the belief that CAPs 

are much like SF and MAT by highlighting their differences in “length of tenure in Vietnam, the overall purpose of the units, their training, the military 

composition” to name a few (p. 33). The next few 

chapters detail how a Marine became a member of a 

CAP, his training and daily existence in a CAP within a village or hamlet, the Popular Forces, and CAPs’ 

roles within III Marine Amphibious Force’s plans to 

clear and hold the enclaves and within overall U.S. 

military strategy in South Vietnam.

Of significant interest is Southard’s presentation of the two U.S. military strategies—search and 

destroy for the Army and the “hearts and mind” 

campaign waged by the Marines. In this, Southard 

revives the interservice rivalry that plagued the U.S. 

military during the war, one in which the Viet Cong

and North Vietnamese politically exploited in South 

Vietnam and in the United States by way of the media. He recounts the historical perspectives of both 

Services and the events that led up to formation of 

the two strategies. Southard focuses on the principal 

figures including Army General William C. Westmoreland and Army Lieutenant General William 

E. DePuy—both opponents of the CAPs and the 

Marine Corps’ approach to the war—and Lieutenant General Victor H. Krulak and General Lewis W. 

Walt. Southard recalls their positions on the CAPs, 

based on their experiences and appreciation for the 

war itself. He does not identify a single factor as to 

why the CAP program did not excel the way proponents of the program expected it to other than to 

note that it was a matter of differences in thinking 

between the Services on how best to approach the 

war and that the “war itself proved to be the chief 

instigator of the program’s demise” (p. 143). 

The author summarizes his and others’ assessments of the program and what might have been 

had the U.S. military seriously invested in CAPs. 

This leads to a short discussion on the program’s use, 

or similar concepts, in future operations. Although 

subjective and speculative, which is common in an 

academic study of this magnitude, Southard raises 

several interesting issues worthy of discussion and 

should not be discounted, regardless of the accepted 

outcome of the war. His points are particularly interesting and relevant as he considers the U.S. military’s 

most recent experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Defend and Befriend is a well-researched, historical, and academic study that deserves the attention 

of students and veterans of the Vietnam War. Not 

only has Southard produced a study that complements earlier works on the CAPs, he enhances the 

reader’s appreciation for one of the more dangerous, 

yet interesting and unique, missions of the Vietnam 

War. s1775s
BOOK REVIEW

Da Nang Diary:

A Forward Air Controller’s

Gunsight View of Flying With SOG

Fred H. Allison

Oral Historian, History Division

Marine Corps University

Da Nang Diary: A Forward Air Controller’s Gunsight View of Flying With SOG. By Tom Yarborough. 

(Havertown, PA: Casemate Publishers, 2013. Pp. 

376. $32.95 cloth.) 

U.S. Air Force Colonel Tom Yarborough 

(Ret) flew more than 600 combat missions in Vietnam (1970–71) as a forward 

air controller (airborne) (FAC[A]) in the 

North American OV-10 Bronco aircraft. In his book 

Da Nang Diary: A Forward Air Controller’s Gunsight 

View of Flying With SOG, Yarborough details his first 

combat tour as a pilot with Operation Prairie Fire. 

Prairie Fire was the code name for the joint, covert 

operations conducted by the Studies and Observation 

Group (SOG) unit, “the most clandestine U.S. military unit to serve in the Vietnam War” (p. 9). Its roots 

can be traced to the 

World War II Office 

of Strategic Services 

(OSS). As a FAC(A), 

Yarborough directed 

air support for the 

SOG teams, conducting reconnaissance and raid operations along the Ho 

Chi Minh Trail in 

Laos and Vietnam’s 

Demilitarized Zone. 

Yarborough uses 

his own extensive diary from the era and 

audio recordings of cockpit communications as source 

material. Originally published in 1991, the book’s latest version (published in 2013) also includes recently 

declassified information on SOG operations. The new 

sources and the author’s writing give an authentic feel 

to the narrative and accomplishes Yarborough’s goal 

of an “investigation of my personal experiences as a 

vehicle for examining the extraordinary events surrounding . . . SOG” (p. 9). 

The book is not overly aviation centric and, therefore, most readers will be able to understand the 

narrative. Yarborough handles the combat action 

account well and gives a sensitive and thoughtful 

treatment of the interpersonal relationships extant 

in the close-knit squadron at Da Nang, which included nonaviator U.S. Army Special Forces soldiers 

who rode the OV-10 as observers. Yarborough also 

recounts off-duty, leave, and rest and relaxation ac76

Fred H. Allison is an oral historian for Marine 

Corps University and a retired Marine major and 

aviator with a subspecialty in aviation history. A 

Texas native, he has a PhD in military history from 

Texas Tech University. His dissertation is entitled 

“The Black Sheep Squadron: A Case Study in U.S. 

Marine Corps Innovations in Close Air Support.” 

Allison received the Marine Corps Heritage Foundation’s Dissertation Fellowship and the Roy S. 

Geiger Aviation Writing Award. He coedited and 

compiled a Marine Corps History Division book 

entitled Pathbreakers: U.S. Marine African American Officers in Their Own Words.
Summer 2015 77

tivities that often included the heavy drinking and 

rowdy behavior that was part of Vietnam aviators’ 

“play hard, fly hard” mentality—something that 

sharply contrasts with the current social climate in 

the military. 

The book reiterates the utility of aviation in the 

ground combat equation. With aircraft overhead, 

the SOG teams enhanced situational awareness and 

assured that tremendous firepower and rescue and 

evacuation resources were available to troops, if 

necessary. The enemy’s capabilities conversely were 

restricted and their options limited. The North Vietnamese were forced to remain hidden, meaning they 

could not act with boldness or in mass for fear of being detected and attacked. They were forced into the 

shadows and the sanctuary of night. 

As a result of this dynamic, according to Yarborough, an air-ground bond was established by the close 

air support mission. Pilots flying air support—whether they were FAC(A)s, strike pilots, helicopter gunship crews, or transport flyers—pulled out the stops 

to help their fellow warriors engaged in ground combat. An affinity developed for the troops supported. 

Yarborough expresses this sentiment in a diary entry 

he made at the end of his first combat tour: “I seem 

to have found, as incomprehensible as it may seem, 

more pure love in Vietnam than in any other place 

I have ever lived or visited. . . . I am proud to count 

these warrior-friends as my knights in shining armor—forever the quintessential heroes of my memory . . . and I would rather die than let them down” (pp. 

330–31). Indeed, does this not express the air-ground 

bond institutionalized by the Marine Corps? 

This book should be recommended reading for 

active military members and those interested in a 

fast-paced and revealing account of a little-known 

aspect of the Vietnam air war. The reader can learn a 

great deal about special operations in Vietnam from 

the perspective of an aviator who went to battle with 

them. s1775s
BOOK REVIEW

Al Gray, Marine:

The Early Years, 1950–1967, Vol.1

Charles D. Melson

Chief Historian, History Division

Marine Corps University

Al Gray, Marine: The Early Years, 1950–1967, Vol. 1. 

By Scott Laidig (Arlington, VA: Potomac Institute 

Press, 2012. Pp. 440. $29.95 cloth; $19.95 paperback.)

General Alfred M. Gray, 29th Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, is best 

known for serving during a critical time 

in the Corps’ history—the 1990–91 Gulf 

War. However, he also participated in the Korean 

and Vietnam conflicts of the Cold War. Scott Laidig’s 

biography on Gray explores the experience of those 

two wars and how they shaped “Al” Gray’s background for his final assignment. In Al Gray, Marine: 

The Early Years, 1950–1967, Laidig looks at Gray’s 

roles as an artilleryman, infantryman, communicator, and cyberwarrior. The focus of this review is the 

five chapters that focus on Gray’s early Vietnam experiences (176 pages of the book). 

As a captain at Headquarters Marine Corps in 

1961, Gray was instrumental in sending Marines 

to South Vietnam in support of signals intelligence 

activities with the U.S. Army Security Agency at Pleiku in the II Corps 

Tactical Zone and 

later to Phu Bai in 

I Corps. Gray also 

took part in the 1962 

Cuban missile crisis 

and negotiated Pentagon politics and 

in-country tactical 

realities before leaving Headquarters for 

Vietnam in 1964. He 

joined the so-called 

Marine Detachment 

Advisory Team One 

from the 1st Composite Radio Company (the predecessor of the 1st Radio Battalion) along with an 

infantry detachment from 3d Marines, which became the initial Marine Corps ground force to arrive 

since air units did not arrive until 1962. Their mission 

was to monitor Communist infiltration along the Ho 

Chi Minh Trail from an isolated location in northeast 

South Vietnam, Tiger Tooth Mountain (Dong Voi 

Mep), and then farther south at Dong Bach Ma. 

In 1965, even with a hazardous duty restriction 

due to his intelligence background, then-Major Gray 

served in South Vietnam with the 12th Marines as 

the artillery regiment’s communications officer, a fire 

direction officer, and then regimental operations officer. By 1966, 3d Marine Division and 12th Marines 

moved to the demilitarized zone in the north. As the 

Marines moved closer in 1967, the North Vietnamese responded with heavy artillery and rocket fire. 

78

Charles D. Melson, major, USMC (Ret), is chief 

historian for the U.S. Marine Corps History Division, Quantico, VA. He is an official historian of 

the Vietnam War and an oral historian for General Gray, and has published works on military 

history, the Journal of Slavic Military History and 

the award winning Operation Knight’s Move.
Summer 2015 79

The artillery of III Marine Amphibious Force (III 

MAF) fired about 281,110 rounds along the demilitarized zone against 42,190 incoming rounds from 

the North Vietnamese Army. This created a command for Gray, a composite Marine Corps and U.S. 

Army artillery battalion that was part of the firepower attrition slugfest. The composite artillery battalion had a mix of tubes, tanks, antitank, direction 

finding, and aeroscout aircraft at Firebase Gio Linh. 

As noted in the official history, some batteries were 

minibattalions, and some battalions were miniregiments with a mix of weapons types and calibers. 

Despite Gray’s combat arms assignment, III MAF 

still sought Gray’s intelligence insights. This led Major Gray back to the war with signals intelligence 

and the radio battalion in 1967. Volume one ends 

with personal and professional recognition for Gray, 

who earned a Silver Star for heroism and was part 

of the 1st Radio Battalion, which received the National Security Agency’s Travis Trophy for best service cryptologic unit of the year. Lieutenant Colonel 

Gray’s subsequent experiences in Vietnam between 

1968 and 1975 are set to appear in a second volume 

of work.

For the first volume of this biography, Laidig uses 

a combination of oral memoir and a life-and-times 

approach. The switch from the personal to the objective may make it an uneven read. The length rather 

than the subject matter likely led to the narrative 

ending with several more years of fighting to go before the 1971 departure of the III MAF. Even so, the 

book is interesting and insightful for the Vietnam 

period (1961–67) while Gray was still a captain and 

then a major. 

For this volume, the Marine Corps Heritage 

Foundation awarded Laidig the Colonel Joseph 

Alexander Award for a distinguished book of biographical literature. The foreword and preface were 

written by General Anthony C. Zinni (Ret) and Professor John F. Guilmartin Jr., respectively. The book 

also includes blurbs from former Senator James H. 

Webb Jr. and retired Generals James L. Jones and 

James T. Conway. Laidig was also a Marine, serving during both the Cold War and Vietnam. Shaping his view of the subject, these experiences bring 

a personal interest to bear on the narrative. This was 

Laidig’s first published book, with a second volume 

expected to carry the story forward. Despite expert 

advice on the project, more developmental editing 

was needed to integrate the personal with the historical perspectives. In present form, the narrative 

was awkward. s1775s
Underdogs: The Making of the Modern Marine Corps.

By Aaron B. O’Connell. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2012. Pp. 400. $29.95 cloth.)

Aaron O’Connell’s Underdogs is at once 

fascinating and compelling, as well as 

frustrating and conflicting. He attempts to 

show how and why the U.S. Marine Corps 

became “modern” in the years between 1940 and 1965. 

He defines this term in an endnote in his introduction: 

“I use the word ‘modern’ generically here, meaning 

the present-day Marine Corps. The principal characteristics of the Corps today are its force-in-readiness 

mission, its aggressive public relations infrastructure, 

its deep-seated political influence, and its elite position in American society” (p. 284). O’Connell believes 

that these characteristics grew out of the Marines’ 

experiences in World War II, and became deeply entrenched during the early Cold War. For O’Connell, 

the pre-World War II Marine Corps either displayed 

no aspects of the narrowly defined characteristics of 

modernity, or they were so underdeveloped as to warrant no discussion in this book. At times, the reader 

may be left with the impression that the pre-1940 Marine Corps is hardly worthy of study.

O’Connell sets out to make three major points. First, 

between 1940 and 1965, Marines saw themselves differently from the other Armed Services. Deep lines of 

division were created by the Corps between the other 

Services, the American public, and itself. Insularity and mistrust combined with exceptionalism and 

self-promotion were 

manufactured by 

mid- to senior-level 

officers to ensure the 

Marine Corps’ existence. To this end, 

the Corps sought 

to make itself more 

appealing to the 

public, recruits, and 

active-duty Marines 

through a compelling public relations 

narrative that touted their elite status. 

Second, this sense of 

exceptionalism originated in World War II and grew 

stronger over the two succeeding decades. Indeed, for 

O’Connell, this produced a uniquely “Marine” culture. 

That self-created, self-imposed culture buttressed the 

Corps from such external threats as military unification and nuclear weapons-focused national security 

strategies, as well as from such internal problems 

as alcohol abuse and domestic violence that threatened that elite public image. Third, Marines’ unique 

culture helped the Corps grow more influential in 

the United States military establishment over time. 

Marines portrayed themselves as the nation’s only 

legitimate force-in-readiness, able to complete any 

combat, peacekeeping, or humanitarian operation. 

Their influence, according to the author, extended 

beyond the military sphere and into American politics and society, where the Corps enjoyed supporters 

that were both powerful and numerous. As a paralUnderdogs*

BOOK REVIEW

David J. Ulbrich 

(Rogers State University and 

Norwich University)

80

When did the Marine Corps

become “Modern”?

* While Underdogs was previously reviewed by Dr. Nicholas Schlosser in Fortitudine, Vol. 37 No. 4, 2013 issue, we 

felt the title and the topic warranted consideration from this reviewer’s perspective.
Summer 2015 81

lel theme throughout the work, O’Connell seeks to 

debunk several Marine Corps myths by highlighting 

the realities behind those myths that were sometimes 

repulsive.

The book’s title “underdogs” fits the author’s purpose well because he sees the Marine Corps in a 

perpetual state of conflict, fighting enemies that were 

sometimes real and sometimes imagined. There is a 

certain amount of credibility to this institutionalized 

paranoia among Marines. Their struggles against 

undisciplined recruits, unhappy parents, unsupportive politicians, and bitter sister Services were, in fact, 

real. To substantiate his major points, O’Connell explores how culture functioned in the Corps. His use 

of the term “culture” takes on many forms by referring to organizational structures, ideological default 

settings, and motivational mythologies. In so doing, 

O’Connell draws on works by T. J. Jackson Lears, 

Michael G. Kammen, Michel Foucault, Clifford J. 

Geertz, Warren I. Susman, and Benedict Anderson. 

Among military historians who deal with cultural 

studies, O’Connell cites books by Craig M. Cameron, John A. Lynn II, and Martin L. van Creveld.

Underdogs takes the reader through a part-chronology, part-thematic examination of the cultural 

history of the Marine Corps. The first two chapters 

examine the Corps in World War II where, according to O’Connell, the war established the “modern” 

Marine Corps as the nation’s amphibious force of 

closely-knit, ferocious, elite warriors. A new recruit 

left his civilian world and endured an often painful 

process to become a “marine” in basic training. The 

recruit becomes entrenched in the belief that the 

Marine Corps was different from and better than the 

U.S. Army. Proceeding temporally, the author next 

examines combat operations during the Pacific War. 

He focuses on Wake Island and Guadalcanal as two 

emblematic experiences that shaped the Marines’ 

sense of self and public image. For O’Connell, these 

battles in 1941 and 1942 marked the beginning of the 

Corps’ incredibly effective publicity machine, which 

was run at the time by Brigadier General Robert L. 

Denig and supported by active-duty Marine combat 

correspondents.

In the third chapter, O’Connell delves into the 

Marines’ efforts to fend off military unification in 

the late 1940s. For this reviewer, chapter 3 stands as 

the most intriguing part of the book. It covers the 

attempts of the “Chowder Society,” composed of 

active-duty, retired, and veteran Marines, to fend 

off attempts to fold the Marine Corps into a single 

American military Service. This unofficial group included the likes of Robert Debs Heinl, Merritt “Red 

Mike” Edson, Victor “Brute” Krulak, and Gerald C. 

Thomas. The author ably tells how these Marines 

worked legally and sometimes illegally to generate 

support for their Corps among the American people 

and especially their senators and representatives in 

Congress. The Chowder Society used rhetoric that 

painted the Corps as not only the force-in-readiness 

in an uncertain future, but also as the necessary bulwark against possible tyranny of a completely unified 

military establishment.

O’Connell then turns to the early Cold War and 

the Korean War in his fourth and fifth chapters. He 

offers useful commentary on how and why most 

Americans and most American military personnel 

chose to forget the Korean War. They did not view 

this conflict as an American victory, and they found 

the nation’s limited warmaking during the Cold War 

to be uncomfortable. Marines, however, did not see 

Korea as a defeat. Conversely, they appropriated the 

battlefield heroics from the Chosin Reservoir and 

the Inchon landing to bolster the Corps as a warrior elite and premier amphibious assault force. The 

Marines did not concern themselves with the issues 

of nuclear strategy. Instead they focused on preparing themselves to be a versatile force-in-readiness 

as envisioned in the Marine Air-Ground Task Force 

(MAGTF), which is still in existence today. As the 

foundational warfighting unit of the Marine Corps, 

the MAGTF, as an organizational structure, gives the 

Marine commander control of ground, aviation, and 

logistical components necessary to accomplish farranging missions from humanitarian operations to 

full-scale war. Following this discussion, O’Connell 

moves to a different topic—the 1950s on the home 

front during and after the Korean War—and analyzes several examples of poor discipline, rude behavior, 

violence, and alcohol abuse by Marines. Significantly, the author accurately links the physical and 

alcohol abuse. In addition, he properly spotlights 

the untold thousands of Marines who suffered from 

post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other invisible wounds cause by brutal combat in World War 

II and the Korean conflict. 
82 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

O’Connell’s conclusion also serves as an epilogue. 

He extends the Corps’ underdog mentality to the 

twenty-first century after briefly looking at the Marine Corps in the Vietnam War and more recent 

conflicts. He tries to connect public relations, forcein-readiness, and other topics covered in World War 

II and the early Cold War with the contemporary 

Marine Corps. 

While there are commendable sections of 

O’Connell’s Underdogs, several others raise serious questions regarding definitions, time periods, 

arguments, and sources in this book. First, what 

is meant by the book’s subtitle The Making of the 

Modern Marine Corps? O’Connell’s answer is not effectively substantiated in its pages, in part, because 

he is too selective in examples and evidence, ignoring divergent perspectives that may problematize or 

altogether discredit his thesis. As such, the author 

comes close to making teleological arguments, because his arguments and conclusion are informed so 

conspicuously by a contemporary view of the Corps, 

rather than by careful theoretical and historiographical examinations of the past in context. 

The breakdown of time periods in this work is 

flawed. Did the Marine Corps only start looking 

“modern” at the end of the interwar years? Was the 

Corps never seen as elite or as a flexible fighting force 

before 1940? Are readers to believe that the Marine 

Corps had no well-conceived public relations campaigns before World War II? O’Connell devotes only 

a few pages and several notes to the four decades of 

Marine Corps history before that conflict. He offers 

no detailed coverage of such iconic battles as Belleau 

Wood, Château-Thierry, and the Argonne in World 

War I; nor does he analyze the profound impacts of 

the Great War’s memory on the Corps over the last 

century. Many World War I veterans went on to become senior Marine leaders in the interwar years, 

World War II, the Korean War, and the Cold War. Is 

it unreasonable to think, as O’Connell asserts, that 

Marines’ experiences in World War I and the interwar years had profound effects on their actions 

during World War II and thereafter? Major General 

John A. Lejeune, for example, recognized the value 

of France’s modern staff organization during World 

War I. Later, as Commandant of the Marine Corps, 

Lejeune instituted similar structure reforms in the 

1920s. His contributions began the modernization 

process, which was continued by John H. Russell, 

Thomas Holcomb, and others. 

Elsewhere, O’Connell does not account for the 

roots of Marine Corps’ amphibious doctrine that he 

argues establishes the Service as unique and elite. 

The operational successes of World War II can be 

traced back to Earl H. “Pete” Ellis in the 1920s, if 

not to the Marine Corps advanced base force of the 

pre-World War I era. Ellis and others like him were 

forward-looking and modern in their amphibious 

doctrines. Later, Ben H. Fuller, John Russell, and 

subsequent Commandants of Marine Corps spurred 

the development of the Corps’ amphibious doctrines 

and capabilities throughout the 1930s. The collective 

efforts culminated in the Tentative Landing Operations Manual (1934) and the Tentative Manual for 

Defense of Advanced Bases (1936), all of which were 

compiled at the Marine Corps Schools in Quantico, 

Virginia, and codified into Marine doctrine years 

before World War II.

Additionally, the author provides no in-depth coverage of the thousands of Marines serving in Latin 

America, or the effects of their deployments on the 

Corps’ public image as the Service that is “First to 

Fight.” Most of the Corps’ future senior leaders spent 

time fighting these so-called “Banana Wars” in the 

early twentieth century. These constitute significant 

cultural forces that they felt later in their careers and 

that helped shape beliefs about the Corps, its future 

missions, and its place within the American armed 

forces and the nation. In addition, lessons learned 

and doctrines for fighting counterinsurgencies were 

eventually compiled in the Small Wars Manual

(1935, 1940). This manual’s insights into insurgency, techniques for fighting counterinsurgencies, and 

tactics for overcoming terrain and elusive enemies 

have reverberated through the decades and affected 

recent American counterinsurgency efforts in Iraq 

and Afghanistan.

Adding to the difficulties associated with clumsy 

definitions and blurry timeframes are holes in historiography. In his preface completed in May 2011, 

O’Connell explains that he wrote chapters between 

2002 and 2010. It is unclear, however, why there are 

no citations to many important pre-2010 works that 

may or may not contest his conclusions. Several other 

historians have recently wrestled with what constituted “modern”-ness in Marine Corps’ publicity and 
Summer 2015 83

symbolism, including Heather Pace Marshall’s dissertation “‘It Means Something These Days to be a 

Marine’: Image, Identity, and Mission in the Marine 

Corps, 1861–1918” (2010) and Colin M. Colbourn’s 

thesis “Esprit de Marine Corps: The Making of the 

Modern Marine Corps through Public Relations, 

1898–1929” (2009). Additional perspectives on publicity can be drawn from Gary L. Rutledge’s thesis 

“The Rhetoric of United States Marine Corps Enlistment Recruitment” (1975); and broader context 

can be found in Daniel Pope’s The Making of Modern Advertising (1983). Beyond the study of public 

relations, O’Connell makes no mention of the Corps’ 

amphibious development as explored in Timothy 

Moy’s War Machines: Transforming Technologies in 

the U.S. Military, 1920–1940 (2001), among several 

other works. Although these authors may differ on 

dates and definitions, they assert that facets of a 

decades-long evolution toward a modern Marine 

Corps actually culminated in the Service that fought 

World War II and the Cold War. 

There are several other relevant secondary sources 

missing from O’Connell’s endnotes. In sections devoted to the Marines on Wake Island in December 

1941, there are no citations for Gregory J. W. Urwin’s 

Facing Fearful Odds: The Siege of Wake Island (1997) 

or Robert J. Cressman’s “A Magnificent Fight”: The 

Battle for Wake Island (1995). These books would 

have bolstered O’Connell’s legitimate point about 

the great value of Wake Island to Marine publicity 

and American morale early in World War II. Similarly, Richard B. Frank’s Guadalcanal: The Definitive 

Account of the Landmark Battle (1990) and Stanley Coleman Jersey’s Hell’s Island: The Untold Story 

of Guadalcanal (2007) are absent from the author’s 

endnotes. O’Connell also does not deal in sufficient 

depth with the historiography of when, how, and 

why the MAGTF concept emerged. 

It is worth noting that Underdogs contains no bibliography. This made evaluating the book’s research 

a cumbersome process. However, the backmatter 

content may have been a decision made by Harvard 

University Press and thus beyond the author’s control. 

Still more lapses can be seen in primary sources. 

O’Connell draws on more than 20 collections at 

the National Archives in College Park, Maryland, 

and more than 25 collections at the Marine Corps 

University in Quantico, Virginia. He also makes use 

of several oral history interviews, two of which he 

conducted with veterans and their families in 2007 

and 2008. Unfortunately, these research efforts do 

not provide a preponderance of evidence for some 

of his key arguments about cultural history. Additional testimony is available in the Marine Corps 

University Archives’ several hundred oral history 

transcriptions and personal paper collections of Marines serving between 1940 and 1965. Regardless, 

the author also does not filter the few interviews in 

this book through the lenses of memory studies and 

oral history methodology, both of which have wellestablished and sophisticated processes to interpret 

interviews. It is all the more important to include 

these processes of evaluating interview when dealing 

with incredibly delicate issues like PTSD and alcohol 

abuse.

Inadequate documentation ultimately leads to 

unfounded arguments. For example, in chapter 5 on 

the Marine Corps in the 1950s, O’Connell states that, 

“The Corps’ loudest supporters were primarily men; 

opposition came most often from women” (p. 189). 

This quote relates to the Ribbon Creek incident and 

alcohol abuse, the second such example that, according to the author, correctly represented and 

remains a major problem for Marines. In early 1956, 

an intoxicated Marine drill instructor took some 

recruits on an unsanctioned night march through 

swamps, where six of them died in an accident. This 

shocking event caused negative publicity that doubtlessly tainted opinions of some American men and 

women. Illuminating the dark side of Marine Corps 

culture seems reasonable, especially when that institution so carefully crafts its image for its members 

and the public at large. However, O’Connell provides 

no statistical evidence to justify this statement about 

the Corps’ varying support among men and women 

in the 1950s. There are several other instances where 

the author makes sweeping claims without adequate 

primary or secondary source evidence.

In closing, Aaron O’Connell offers important observations about Marine Corps history, especially 

relating to the activities of the “Chowder Society.” 

Nevertheless, weaknesses in breadth and depth of 

his research and in selection of his evidence undermine other arguments in Underdogs. s1775s
84 MCH Vol. 1, No. 1

U.S. Marines in Afghanistan, 2001–2009

Anthology and

Annotated Bibliography

Major David W. Kummer

This anthology and bibliography presents a collection of 37 articles, interviews, and speeches describing many 

aspects of the U.S. Marine Corps participation in Operation Enduring Freedom 

from 2001 to 2009. This History Division 

publication is intended to serve as a general overview and provisional reference 

to inform both Marines and the general 

public until monographs dealing with 

major Marine Corps operations during 

the campaign can be completed. The accompanying annotated bibliography provides a detailed look at selected sources 

that currently exist until new scholarship 

and archival materials become available.

Marine Corps History Division is actively searching for contributors to Marine Corps History (MCH). MCH is a scholarly, 

military history periodical published twice a year (Summer and 

Winter). Our focus is on all aspects of the Corps’ history, culture, 

and doctrine. Articles should be no less than 4,000 words and footnoted according to Chicago Manual of Style. For more information 

about submitting an article or writing a book review, please email 

history.division@usmc.mil with the subject line of “Marine Corps 

History Submission.”

Submissions
The History Division is moving!

History Division will be moving to the Simmons Marine Corps History Center, part of the Marine Corps University. The new state-of-the-art wing will bring together all of the Marine Corps University schools into one 

unit. The structure will offer many new features and amenities for the student body, faculty, and staff at Marine 

Corps Base Quantico.

New History Division Publication!

U.S. Marines and Irregular Warfare

Training and Education, 2000–2010

Dr. Nicholas J. Schlosser

U.S. Marines and Irregular Warfare covers 

a period of considerable intellectual activity for the U.S. Marine Corps. The initial 

fighting during the Iraq and Afghanistan 

Wars convinced many Marine leaders 

that it needed to strengthen and enhance 

how it trained and educated Marines 

in counterinsurgency (COIN) operations. This book recounts the work of 

Marines and educators in the field and 

at home at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, and at Marine Corps Air 

Ground Combat Center, Twentynine 

Palms, California.
Marine Corps History

Issues of Marine Corps History can be found on the History Division 

Website at https://www.history.usmc.mil under Publications.