Talking About Ethics In The U.S. Marine Corps

Photo: Gen. James Amos. Wikipedia

Marine Corps To Discuss Ethics With Generals After Scandals -- USA Today

Publicity over Petraeus' resignation and extramarital affair have prompted meetings on how to avoid ethical challenges.

The Marine Corps' top officer is meeting with all the service's generals to talk ethics in the wake of recent scandals that have taken a toll on the reputation of the nation's military leaders.

Gen. James Amos, the commandant, told USA TODAY he doesn't believe standards among the Marine Corps' top officers are slipping, but said the recent publicity has presented an opportunity to discuss standards and the public perceptions recent scandals have generated.

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My Comment: They are cutting the liquor .... so I guess they are serious.

The Making Of The Marine Corps

After The Sands Of Iwo Jima -- Max Boot, Wall Street Journal

The Marines had the idea of enlisting journalists, making their story far more compelling to the civilians back home.


The Marines are the most celebrated but least understood of our four military services. They have done a brilliant job of burnishing their martial image, from the days of the 1949 John Wayne movie "The Sands of Iwo Jima" to today's "The Few, the Proud, the Marines" commercials. With nearly 200,000 personnel and their own aircraft, tanks and artillery, they comprise one of the most capable military forces in the world. But so adept have the Marines become at telling their story—somehow the even less-than-heroic portrayals in "Gomer Pyle, USMC" and "Heavy Metal Jacket" have enhanced their reputation—that it isn't always easy to separate myth from reality.

That is a task that Aaron B. O'Connell, a history professor at the Naval Academy and himself a Marine reservist, tackles with brio in his absorbing account of the Marines between 1941 and 1965, "Underdogs: The Making of the Modern Marine Corps." Prior to World War II, Mr. O'Connell notes, the Corps "was tiny, unpopular and institutionally disadvantaged"—it had just 50,000 men, and it was seen as an adjunct of the Navy. Its commandant was a two-star general who didn't even merit a seat on the newly created Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1942.

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My Comment: Oohrah!

2012 United States Marine Corps Birthday Message

Go Daddy's United States Marine Corps 237th Birthday Tribute 2012

Hat Tip: Theo Spark

Marine Air-Ground Support

Hat Tip: Prairie Pundit

Commandant James Amos: Marines Must Live With 'Good Enough'

Photo: Marine Commandant James F. Amos. Wikipedia

Marines Must Live With 'Good Enough' As Budget Shrinks: Amos -- Aol Defense

NATIONAL PRESS CLUB: As war funding goes away, Marines must learn to live with "good enough" in an era of austerity, Commandant James Amos declared today at the National Press Club, saying that even top-priority programs like the F-35B Joint Strike Fighter and the V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor face the budget axe.

Even without sequestration, the half-trillion in cuts over 10 years already imposed by last year's Budget Control Act are "going to have an impact on the amount of things we're able to buy," Gen. Amos said. "Right now we've not adjusted the top numbers, the program of record, [for] what we plan on buying on V-22s and JSFs. [But] over time, especially if sequestration hits, we're going to have to take a look at the total numbers."

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My Comment: He is preparing the Marines for sequestration.