The Right Coast |
|
|
Thoughts from San Diego on Law, Politics, and Culture
Right Coasters
Gail Heriot Saikrishna Prakash Michael Rappaport Maimon Schwarzschild Thomas Smith Christopher Wonnell Email Us Gail Heriot Saikrishna Prakash Michael Rappaport Maimon Schwarzschild Thomas Smith Christopher Wonnell Links Andrew Sullivan Atlantic Blog The Buck Stops Here Corporate Law Blog Crescat Sententia Crooked Timber Curmudgeonly Clerk Daniel Drezner En Banc EveTushnet.Com FreeSpace How Appealing Instapundit Law and Econ Blog Little Green Footballs Legal Theory Blog The Leiter Reports Marginal Revolution Overlawyered Pejmanesque ProfBainbridge.Com Punishment Theory Rasmusen Weblog SFA Politics & Relig Southern Appeal SpoonsExperience USS Clueless The Volokh Conspiracy The Yin Blog Archives The Bear Flag League Aaron's Rantblog (LA) Absinthe & Cookies Accidental Jedi (Fres) Angry Clam (LA) Baldilocks BlogoSFERICS (Expat) BoifromTroy (LA) CalBlog (Los Angeles) California Republic Citizen Smash(SD) Cobb (Los Angeles) Daily Pundit (SF) Dale Franks e-Claire(Northern CA) Fresh Potatoes(Orang) Infinite Monkeys The Interocitor (LA) The Irish Lass (Sacra) Left Coast Conserv. Lex Communis (Fres) Master of None (LA) Miller's Time (Sac) Molly's Musings (SD) Mulatto Boy (LA) Howard Owens (Vent) Pathetic Earthlings) Patio Pundit Patterico's Pontifications(LA) PrestoPundit (Orange) QandO Right on the Left Beach Shark Blog (Expat) Slings and Arrows (SD) So. Cal Law Blog (LA) Tone Cluster Window Manager Xrlq (Orange) 
|
March 11, 2004
The Corps By Tom Smith This is San Diego, so I've known quite a few Marines over the years. Some random impressions. My dad, who missed all of WWII except for the Battle of Okinawa, had mixed feeling about Marines. He thought they cut through Japanese (they didn't use that term) so fast that they left too many behind who still had to be fought. Yet my father's outfit, the 77th Infantry Division, US Army, gladly accepted the ulitmate compliment paid to them by the Marines, who called them "the 77th Marines." In combat situations in which other fighting organizations would use armor or artillery, the Marines often seem to wade in, preferring rifles and bayonettes and pappy's bowie knife pulled from a boot. They did this on the outskirts of Baghdad, to which they got with impressive speed. Marines seem to enjoy their work. Their training seems to emphasize the blunt fact that war is about fighting and killing people. It's good to know that. People don't realize how small the Marine Corp is compared to the Army, Navy or Air Force. I agree with general Smith (no relation except of admiration), I think it's useful to keep them around, just to scare our enemies. I want the response to "the Marines have landed" to be however you say "Oh Shit" in Arabic. |