“The few. The proud. The Marines.” What does that mean? “Few” means rare. Pride is “the recognition of the fact that you are your own highest value…”
- Ayn Rand, For The New Intellectual, (PB) 130-31.
The Marines are legendary. “Send in the Marines”. “First to Fight”. Marines know what to do, and do it with elegance and superb skill.
Here are quotes about the Marines from those who, with one exception, are not Marines:
“There are only two kinds of people that understand Marines: Marines and the enemy. Everyone else has a second-hand opinion.”
- Gen. William Thornson, U.S. Army
“The safest place in Korea was right behind a platoon of Marines. Lord, how they could fight!”
- MGen. Frank E. Lowe, USA; Korea, 26 January 1952
“Why in hell can’t the Army do it if the Marines can. They are the same kind of men; why can’t they be like Marines.”
- Gen. John J. “Black Jack” Pershing, USA; 12 February 1918
“I have just returned from visiting the Marines at the front, and there is not a finer fighting organization in the world!”
- General of the Armies Douglas MacArthur; Korea, 21 September 1950
“We have two companies of Marines running rampant all over the northern half of this island, and three Army regiments pinned down in the southwestern corner, doing nothing. What the hell is going on?”
- Gen. John W. Vessey Jr., USA, Chairman of the the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the assault on Grenada, 1983
“The raising of that flag on Suribachi means a Marine Corps for the next five hundred years.”
- James Forrestal, Secretary of the Navy; 23 February 1945
“The Marine Corps has just been called by the New York Times, ‘The elite of this country.’ I think it is the elite of the world.”
- Admiral William Halsey, U.S. Navy
“The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!”
- Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, 1945
“I am convinced that there is no smarter, handier, or more adaptable body of troops in the world.”
- Prime Minister of Britain, Sir Winston Churchhill
“Do not attack the First Marine Division. Leave the yellowlegs alone. Strike the American Army.”
Orders given to Communist troops in the Korean War; shortly afterward, the Marines were ordered to not wear their khaki leggings.
“The bended knee is not a tradition of our Corps.”
- General Alexander A. Vandergrift, USMC
to the Senate Naval Affairs Committee, 5 May 1946
