Usmc Quotes

“In the simple moral maxim the Marine Corps teaches

— do the right thing, for the right reason

— no exception exists that says: unless there's criticism or risk. Damn the consequences.”
― Josh Rushing, Mission Al-Jazeera: Build a Bridge, Seek the Truth, Change the World

“In my experience, Marines are gung ho no matter what. They will all fight to the death. Everyone of them just wants to get out there and kill. They are bad-ass, hard-charging mothers.”
― Chris Kyle, American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History

“Show me a hero and I'll show you a bum.”
― Gregory "Pappy" Boyington, Baa Baa Black Sheep

“The purpose of bayonet training is to awaken your killer instincts. The killer instinct will make you strong. If the meek ever inherit the earth the strong will take it away from them. The weak exist to be devoured by the strong. Every Marine must pack his own gear. Every Marine must be the instrument of his own salvation.”
― Stanley Kubrick

“Take your time.
Stay away from the easy going.
Never take the same way twice.

Gunny Arndt's rules for successful reconnaissance; Guadalcanal 1942”
― GYSGT Charles C. Arndt

“It takes thousands of bullets to kill an army but one to end a war.”
― Michael Martinez

“Then, as now, it was just uncomfortable. Now, as then, it was a lifted chin and a crooked smile that said more than they would ever allow themselves to communicate.”
― Sandi Layne, Romantic Interludes

“Great Marine commanders, like all great warriors, are able to kill that which they love most -- their men.”
― Nathaniel Fick, One Bullet Away: The Making of a Marine Officer

“We are trained fighting machines. Peace is not an option for us. We’re jarheads. What the hell do we know about peace?”
― Jason Medina, No Hope For The Hopeless At Kings Park

“Yet if he had been asked… if he were happy… He would have admitted readily enough that he was uncomfortable, that he was cold, and badly fed, and venomous; that his clothes were in rags, and his feet and knees and elbows raw and bleeding through much walking and crawling; that he was in ever-present peril of life, and that he really did not expect to survive the adventure he was about to thrust himself into voluntarily, but all this had nothing to do with happiness: that was something he never stopped to think about.”
― C.S. Forester

“...he couldn't help but wonder what Hannah might have looked like if...he'd answered that question April had asked him years ago.”
― Sandi Layne, Romantic Interludes

“The purpose of the bayonet training, Sergeant Gerheim explains, is to awaken our killer instincts. The killer instinct will make us fearless and aggressive, like animals. If the meek ever inherit the earth the strong will take it away from them. The weak exist to be devoured by the strong. Every Marine must pack his own gear. Every Marine must be the instrument of his own salvation. It's hard, but there it is.”
― Gustav Hasford, The Short-Timers

“Do or Die”
― USMC Development-Education Command Staf

“A Face on the Flag is a tribute to veterans and the friendships they carry through life. Vets young and old will find someone they know in A Face on the Flag.”
― Kevin Horgan, A Face on the Flag

“No matter
how hard you train them,
how deliberately you plan,
or how much support you send their way;
to lose Marines
is to watch as fires flicker out
beneath a torrent of rain.”
― Brendan Bigney, War, What Comes After

“He set down the coffee and placed another log for splitting. Another biting cold wind blew through the trees, and he pulled his red stocking cap down more over his ears, and pulled up the collar of his wool-lined denim jacket. He had neglected to shave for a few weeks now, and was sporting a beard; and his light brown hair was even beginning to grow over his collar.
If my old drill instructor from Parris Island could see me now, he’d kick my ass across the barracks, Jeff mused.”
― C.G. Faulkner, Solitary Man

“... [Howlin' Mad] Smith was the" Patton of the Pacific.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“Unlike all the other combatants in World War II, including the U.S. Army, Smith and his Marines never lost a battle.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“... the island had to be taken at almost any cost.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“The Army Air Force was doing its part to soften up Iwo Jima for the Marines. Beginning December 8, B-29 Superforts and B-24 Liberators had been pummeling the island mercilessly. Iwo Jima would be bombed for seventy-two consecutive days, setting the record as the most heavily bombed target and the longest sustained bombardment in the Pacific War. One flyboy on Saipan confidently told Easy Company's Chuck Lindberg," All you guys will have to do is clean up. No one could survive what we've been dropping.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“Some optimistically hoped the unprecedented bombing of the tiny island would make the conquest of Iwo Jima a two- to three-day job. But on the command ship USSEldorado,Howlin' Mad shared none of this optimism. The general was studying reconnaissance photographs that showed every square inch of the island had been bombed. "The Seventh Air Force dropped 5,800 tons in 2,700 sorties. In one square mile of Iwo Jima, a photograph showed 5,000 bomb craters." Admiral Nimitz thought he was dropping bombs "sufficient to pulverize everything on the island." But incredibly, the enemy defenses weregrowing.There were 450 major defensive installations when the bombing began. Now there were over 750. Howlin' Mad observed: "We thought it would blast any island off the military map, level every defense, no matter how strong, and wipe out the garrison. But nothing of the kind happened. Like the worm, which becomes stronger the more you cut it up, Iwo Jima thrived on our bombardment.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“Kenneth Milstead, a 2nd Platoon buddy of Mike, Ira, Franklin, and Harlon, had just dropped into a shallow foxhole he'd dug when a shell landed beside him and blew him out again. Blood streamed from the embedded fragments in his face." I could have been evacuated, "Milstead recalled," but the Japanese had pissed me off. I went from being scared to being angry. That was the day I became a Marine.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“For most of the young boys, it had not fully sunk in yet that the defenders were notonIwo, they wereinIwo, prowling the sixteen miles of catacombs.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“December 1944. The last Christmas for too many young boys. Then off for the forty-day sail to Iwo Jima. The boys of Spearhead had been expertly trained for ten months. They were proficient in the techniques of war. But more important, they were a team, ready to fight for one another. These boys were bonded by feelings stronger than they would have for any other humans in their life.

The vast, specialized city of men — boys, really, but a functioning society of experts now, trained and coordinated and interdependent and ready for its mission — will move out upon the Pacific. Behind them, in safe America, Bing Crosby sang of a white Christmas, just like the ones he used to know. Ahead lay a hot island of black sand, where many of them would ensure a long future of Christmases in America by laying down their lives.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“It would be forty-four years before physicist Donald Olson would discover that D-Day at Tarawa occurred during one of only two days in 1943 when the moon's apogee coincided with a neap tide, resulting in a tidal range of only a few inches rather than several feet.

The actions of these Marines trapped on the reef would determine the outcome of the battle for Tarawa. If they hesitated or turned back, their buddies ashore would be decimated.

But they didn't hesitate. They were Marines. They jumped from their stranded landing crafts into chest-deep water holding their arms and ammunition above their heads.

In one of the bravest scenes in the history of warfare, these Marines slogged through the deep water into sheets of machine-gun bullets. There was nowhere to hide, as Japanese gunners raked the Marines at will. And the Marines, almost wholly submerged and their hands full of equipment, could not defend themselves. But they kept coming. Bullets ripped through their ranks, sending flesh and blood flying as screams pierced the air.

Japanese steel killed over 300 Marines in those long minutes as they struggled to the shore. As the survivors stumbled breathlessly onto shore their boots splashed in water that had turned bright red with blood.

This type of determination and valor among individual Marines overcame seemingly hopeless odds, and in three days of hellish fighting Tarawa was captured. The Marines suffered a shocking 4,400 casualties in just seventy-two hours of fighting as they wiped out the entire Japanese garrison of 5,000.”
― James Bradley, Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima

“No matter
how hard you train them,
how deliberately you plan,
or how much support you send their way,
there is one constant that does not change;
to lose marines
is to watch as fires flick out
beneath a torrent of rain.”
― Brendan Bigney, War, What Comes After

“A clear expression and understanding of intent is essential to unity of effort. The burden of understanding falls on senior and subordinate alike. The seniors must make their purposes perfectly clear but in a way that does not inhibit initiative. Subordinates must have a clear understanding of what their commander expects.”
― U.S. Marine Corps, Warfighting

“There are two basic military functions: waging war and preparing for war. Any military activities that do not contribute to the conduct of a present war are justifiable only if they contribute to preparedness for a possible future one. Clearly, we cannot afford to separate conduct and preparation. They must be intimately related because failure in preparation leads to disaster on the battlefield.”
― U.S. Marine Corps, Warfighting

“Critiques are an important part of training because critical self-analysis, even after success, is essential to improvement. Their purpose is to draw out the lessons of training. As a result, we should conduct critiques immediately after completing training, before memory of the events has faded. Critiques should be held in an atmosphere of open and frank dialogue in which all hands are encouraged to contribute. We learn as much from mistakes as from things done well, so we must be willing to admit mistakes and discuss them. Of course, a subordinate’s willingness to admit mistakes depends on the commander’s willingness to tolerate them. Because we recognize that no two situations in war are the same, our critiques should focus not so much on the actions we took as on why we took those actions and why they brought the results they did.”
― U.S. Marine Corps, Warfighting

“The Marine Corps’ style of warfare requires intelligent leaders with a penchant for boldness and initiative down to the lowest levels. Boldness is an essential moral trait in a leader for it generates combat power beyond the physical means at hand. Initiative, the willingness to act on one’s own judgment, is a prerequisite for boldness. These traits carried to excess can lead to rashness, but we must realize that errors by junior leaders stemming from overboldness are a necessary part of learning.”
― U.S. Marine Corps, Warfighting