The Marines, Counterinsurgency, and Strategic Culture

92 Chapter 4
Marines] were extraordinary. Of course you don’t get along with everyone,
but . . . it’s being around people that appreciate the core values that you hold
dear. You know the core values in [the] Marine Corps are honor, courage,
and commitment . . . and the individuals that participate in that are, I mean,
they are heroes.” 35 The “other Marines” valued are not only contemporary
buddies, but also connections in spirit and practice to Marines who have
come before. Homage to the Corps’s heritage and heroes is ritualized in the
Marine Corps birthday celebration every year on the tenth day of November.
On this day, the commandant sends out a birthday message that reminds
troops of Marines long gone (but not forgotten!) to whom they owe a future
of honor. 36 Typical of birthday prose is Commandant Randolph Pate’s in
1956: “We must strive constantly to add luster to the glorious record of those
Marines who have gone before us. Only by so doing can we prove ourselves
worthy of our heritage. Only thus can we proudly bear the title of United
States Marines.” 37 Commandant John A. Lejeune originated the tradition
of the birthday ball (which Marines must “voluntarily” attend), as well as
Marine Corps Order 47, which lauds the history of the Corps and is read
annually. Commandant Lemuel C. Shepherd formalized the cake- cutting ritual.
38 The first piece of cake, cut with a Mameluke sword to celebrate warrior
heritage, goes to a guest of honor, the second to the oldest Marine present,
and the third (or a remainder of the second piece) to the youngest Marine
present—signifying the bond between the two generations, the passing down
of heritage. Marines take their Corps’s birthday seriously and will cobble
together a cake no matter their situation, including in combat zones. It is a
ritual performed on the same day all around the world, a reminder of heritage
and brotherhood from which they derive strength.
Rituals such as the birthday ball and cake- cutting ceremony reinforce a
primary theme running throughout Spooner’s legend collection: The Marine
Corps is a family. Retired Marine and scholar Aaron O’Connell describes
the Corps in the same terms. The Marine Corps provides “a connection
to a larger family that reaches across time and space. This is one of the
principal benefits of membership in the Marine Corps: a broad and deep
sense of kinship that encompassed all Marines, past and present, living and
dead.” 39 Its members protect each other internally and out. Even the worst
of Marines are defended from outsiders. This may mean defending physical
life or personal reputation. To save a lieutenant whom they detest, Spooner’s
fictional platoon risks life and limb: “In either case, he was down and for all
their disgust, the men of the Third Platoon had to save him. He may be the
lieutenant they most wanted to see marooned on a desert island, but he was
a Marine.” 40 The reputations of individual Marines are protected in order to
protect the reputation of the Corps as a whole. Protection of brothers, and
of the Corps, is laudable, and without question this demonstration of fierce
internal loyalty contributes to the strong bonds of brotherhood that remain
the most attractive, and reliable, feature of the Corps. In counterinsurgency