Marine Corps Boot Camp during World War II: THE GATEWAY TO THE CORPS’ S U C C E S S AT I WO J I M A

Was the Marine Corps’ success at Iwo Jima a matter of leadership, bravado, or fundamental training? This article examines the efficacy of boot camp, replacement training, and unit training as it relates to the success of the U.S. Marines on Iwo Jima. During World War II, the exploits of the Marines on Iwo Jima have been commended, but the reality of wartime exigencies inevitably placed a strain on the quality of men slated for the Service. However, the Marine Corps’ emphasis on the fundamentals during boot camp proved the necessary ingredient for victory. Beyond leadership or lore, this article asserts that Marine Corps boot camp provided an elemental gateway to success on Iwo Jima.

Fighting the Phantom: 1ST VIET CONG REGIMENT IN I CORPS

The 1st Viet Cong Regiment engaged in a series of costly clashes with the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) and allied forces in Vietnam’s I Corps from 1964 to 1967. A veritable phoenix, this Communist Main Force unit was destroyed in battle 13 times in that brief span and yet repeatedly regenerated its battered formations to fight again. This article assesses how that was possible, the nature of the Communist insurgency in I Corps, and how the U.S. Marines understood and responded to its dual political and military perils. This case study underscores the challenges inherent in hybrid warfare and suggests keys to simultaneously addressing conventional and irregular threats. The 1st Viet Cong Regiment’s impressive operational resilience illustrates, in microcosm, how and why the allied counterrevolutionary strategy failed to win in Vietnam.

Hybrid Warfare in Vietnam: THE U.S. AND SOUTH VIETNAMESE SUCCESS AGAINST THE VIET CONG INSURGENCY

In the past decades, most conformist studies dedicated to the Vietnam War were overly critical of the U.S. military’s so-called reliance on conventional warfare in a country deemed to be plagued by an insurgency. Counterinsurgency programs were labeled weak and powerless to shift the Americans’ momentum against the Viet Cong, which outsmarted the U.S. military. This article opposes these theories and suggests that by 1969, the U.S. force’s reliance on conventional warfare against the guerrillas progressively morphed into a strategy that fully supported the military’s counterinsurgency initiatives. Vietnam was a hybrid warfare theater, which required the Americans to fight both the Viet Cong guerrillas and Hanoi’s conventional forces. Through the analysis of U.S. and Communist documents, this study suggests that the Americans succeeded in offsetting the Communists’ tactical approach to hybrid warfare. As they skillfully synchronized regular warfare with counterinsurgency, the U.S. and South Vietnamese forces succeeded in defeating the Viet Cong insurgency by the spring of 1972.

Doughboy Devil Dogs: U.S. ARMY OFFICERS IN THE 4TH BRIGADE IN THE GREAT WAR

World War I was the first conflict where the U.S. Marines truly entered the American consciousness, particularly through the 4th Brigade’s accomplishments at Belleau Wood in June 1918. What is generally missing from the Marines’ story is the large number of U.S. Army officers who led Marine platoons in the brigade and often paid a heavy price for their service. This article examines how Army officers came to be assigned to the 4th Brigade and the backgrounds and performance of these “doughboy devil dogs” in the unit. It also offers some suggestions for why they largely disappeared from the narrative of the brigade’s service in World War I.

The American Naval Base in Ponta Delgada, 1917–19

This article derives from a master’s thesis about the consequences of World War I in the Azores archipelago that included a chapter dedicated to the U.S. Navy facilities at Ponta Delgada on the island of São Miguel. With its two U.S. Marine Corps units, U.S. Naval Base 13 defended the port, a British wireless station near Ponta Delgada, and support structures for the assigned or passing naval units. This article offers a vision of Naval Base 13 as a U.S./Europe border during World War I that was critical to the protection of British and American military and commercial shipping and denying Germany any base of operations in the region from which to launch attacks on Allied forces.

“More Than Just Inventors”: RICHARD M. CUTTS, RICHARD M. CUTTS JR., AND THE ETHICAL CHALLENGE OF THE OFFICER-INVENTOR

This article examines the ethical decisions of two enterprising interwar period Marine officers, Colonel Richard M. Cutts and Brigadier General Richard M. Cutts Jr. Known for their development of a muzzle device used on the Thompson submachine gun, the Cuttses have been treated casually by historians as innocuous inventors. This article reveals their crucial role in generating interest in their device and energetic advocacy for official adoption of the Thompson submachine gun. Drawing support from other officers in the Marine Corps and allies in manufacturing, they eagerly pursued widespread sales of their device. Pulled by conflicting demands as Marines, inventors, and business partners, this article contends that they engaged in activity that blurred private business matters with their professional duties as Marines. Examination of the Cuttses invites scholars and practitioners to contemplate the ethical challenges faced by Marines past and present.

A Song with “Dash” and “Pep”: A HISTORY OF THE “MARINES’ HYMN” TO 1919

From its unknown nineteenth-century origins, the “Marines’ Hymn” has grown from a collection of unregulated verses into a dignified anthem reflecting the proud history of the Corps. Focusing on the song’s early history until the end of World War I, this article tells the story of that evolution. During this period, the hymn played an increasingly important role in official recruiting and publicity efforts, resulting in a growing popularity among the general public, disagreements about the need to standardize the lyrics, and the introduction of new formats and technologies to allow for wider accessibility. Together, these trends culminated in the authorization and copyright of an official version of the song in the summer of 1919. The “Marines’ Hymn” is known worldwide as a reflection of Marine Corps experiences and values, and this article aims to bring some of its forgotten history and the contributions of its strongest advocates to the attention of a modern audience.

Defining a War: INDOCHINA, THE VIETNAM WAR, AND THE MAYAGUEZ INCIDENT

Only two weeks after the fall of Saigon in May 1975, Khmer Rouge forces seized the American merchant ship SS Mayaguez (1944) off the Cambodian coast, setting up a Marine rescue and recovery battle on the island of Koh Tang. This battle on 12–15 May 1975 was the final U.S. military episode amid the wider Second Indochina War. The term Vietnam War has impeded a proper understanding of the wider war in the American consciousness, leading many to disassociate the Mayaguez incident from the Vietnam War, though they belong within the same historical frame. This article seeks to provide a heretofore unseen historical argument connecting the Mayaguez incident to the wider war and to demonstrate that Mayaguez and Koh Tang veterans are Vietnam veterans, relying on primary sources from the Ford administration, the papers of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, and interviews with veterans.

The U.S. Marine Corps’ Tank Doctrine, 1920–50

Major Joseph DiDomenico’s study of U.S. Army influence on U.S. Marine Corps tank doctrine appeared in the Summer 2018 issue of this journal, titled “The U.S. Army’s Influence on Marine Corps Tank Doctrine.” Mobilizing an impressive array of primary and secondary sources, DiDomenico laid considerable credit for the Corps’ improvements to its nascent World War II tank and amphibious tractor doctrine on the Army’s Armor School at Fort Knox as well as the improved Army doctrinal publications that had emerged by 1944. Major DiDomenico excoriated the Marine Corps’ neglect of “critical vulnerabilities for armor supporting amphibious operations.” The benchmark for Marine Corps tank doctrine’s failures to “synthesize” Army tank doctrine for Marine Corps missions is unsurprisingly the Battle of Tarawa. According to DiDomenico, the failures registered at Tarawa “indicated an institutional ignorance in the operational art of combined arms.” This article presents some common misconceptions of Marine Corps tank policy and doctrine and aims to correct those misconceptions.

The “Scholastic” Marine Who Won a Secret War: FRANK HOLCOMB, THE OSS, AND AMERICAN DOUBLE-CROSS OPERATIONS IN EUROPE

This article focuses on a little-known contribution to Allied victory in Europe after D-Day by a part of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the Special Counterintelligence (SCI) teams of the X-2 (Counterintelligence) Branch. Using a combination of private papers, unpublished studies, and OSS records, the author looks through the eyes of the commander of the SCI teams, Frank P. Holcomb, son of wartime Commandant General Thomas Holcomb. A Marine Corps reservist and OSS officer, Holcomb received a rudimentary orientation from the British in counterespionage and deception operations before creating his own highly successful units to perform those missions. In short order, the OSS went from having almost no such capability to neutralizing every German stay-behind agent in France and Belgium and turning a number of them back against the enemy to feed the Third Reich deceptive reports, accepted as genuine, thereby making a significant contribution to the security of the Allied armies. This article offers examples of OSS successes as testament to the skill and fortitude of a Marine Reserve officer serving on independent duty.