Front and Center Newsletter – Vol. 2, No. 6, June 2024

When pianists learn a challenging piece of music, they often will learn the music for each hand separately and then, when the left and right hands have control of their parts, put the two together training to perform the piece as it is meant to be done. The structure of this process is found in the Marine Corps when we consider, for example, that each Marine should know himself and seek self-improvement, should achieve and maintain technical and tactical proficiency, but also, and this is the leadership principle we are examining this month, “Train your Marines and Sailors as a Team.” Each Marine must work independently to be as proficient as possible, but must also train with others as a team to perform a mission as it is meant to be done. Here the particular strengths and weaknesses of individuals must be recognized and coordinated into an efficient and effective unit, and thus here we see the importance of the leadership principle of knowing your people and seeking their welfare. As we have seen in our January issue, this principle of knowing your people is described in part this way: “ ‘Know your people’ – or team – is among the most important leadership principles. The core value focuses on fostering relationships between team members and developing an identity.”

People who teach in classrooms or seminars understand from experience that each group of students or participants has its own dynamic “personality,” and it is part of the job of an instructor to read that personality and guide the group in harmony with it. Of course, how this is done is itself guided and constrained by the purpose for which the group exists. Moreover, a group of people who gather to learn a topic or to study a professional practice has a very different purpose from one that exists to train for and to conduct combat missions since, clearly, both the actions and their consequences are of a different magnitude. This difference may seem foreign to people who have never been in combat, and perhaps even more foreign to people who did not serve in the military. Yet it is integral to the mission of the Al Gray Marine Leadership Forum at Carolina Museum of the Marine to make the important lessons of Marine Corps leadership available to all Americans for personal growth and for effective operation of organizations regardless of mission.

The idea of training Marines and Sailors as a team is a broad one, so we should give a rather full account of the description as we find it. “There are many opportunities for individual growth and advancement in the Marine Corps.” However, not everything in the military should be about personal achievement, even if it’s crucial in many other ways. Marines, especially as leaders, must be able to function as a single unit. Therefore, the better they are at communicating and establishing relationships with team members, the better they will be at their job. For this reason, Marines spend much of their training finding methods to improve teamwork and organization within a unit. The crisper and tighter the unit, the more likely the group is to have success as a team. Teams in the military not only rely on each other for the success of a mission but also for their own personal welfare. Accordingly, Marines should always train as a team, including during circumstances where fellow sailors join from the U.S. Navy. Often, teamwork involves finding the strengths and weaknesses of each service member and combining those talents to function as one team. For this reason, it’s imperative that each member of a team understand their role and purpose within the unit.”

There are several things at work here. As important as individual growth is, Marines must be able to function as a single unit, and in order to achieve this, each Marine must understand his role and purpose within it, and the roles and purposes of other members of the unit. Thus it is important to the effective functioning of a unit that each member can do his job well, understanding how this is done in concert with others. It is most valuable for the consistently effective function of a unit that its members understand and trust one another. Read more…  

Recent issues of both the Marine Corps Times and the Navy Times contain an article titled “The Man who made Belleau Wood – and the Marine Corps – Immortal.”[i] The article discusses Chicago Tribune reporter Floyd Gibbons who was one of 36 reporters approved by the military to report on WWI. At the start, we read the opening line form Gibbons’ dispatch on the battle. “I am up at the front and entering Belleau Wood with the U.S. Marines.” Although a non-combatant, Gibbons didn’t like reporting from the rear, preferring instead to be at the front where possible.

By early June 1918, more than 2,000 German soldiers and 30 machine guns occupied Belleau Wood. Marines on whom Gibbons reported attacked German positions on June 6. “As the Marines advanced, the enemy fire ‘was more than flesh and blood could stand’.” So wrote Col Albertus Caitlin in With the Help of God and a Few Marines. Col Caitlin, later BGen Caitlin, was a Medal of Honor recipient who was wounded, shot in the chest by a sniper, on June 6, 1918 while leading Marines in battle at Belleau Wood. Gibbons fared a bit worse, being struck by bullets in his left arm, left should blade, and left eye. Gibbons was left to lie where he’d been shot for three hours until he could be evacuated after dark. He later said that during those hours, he would pinch himself with his right hand to ensure he was still alive.

The military news censor incorrectly thought Gibbons was dead and decided to honor his sacrifice by allowing his last dispatch to be published as written. This, one might think, was serendipity, because up to that time correspondents wee not allowed to name the troops they were with or where they were. The Washington Post reported that since the censor allowed Gibbons’ dispatch to be published with the sentence naming Belleau Wood and the U.S. Marines, the privilege of naming names was extended to all correspondents. “For three days, reports of Marines in action at Belleau Wood went uncensored, and the American public, hungry for news of the war, were regaled with stories of the Devil Dogs as they fought in close-quarters combat with fixed bayonets,” and under machine gun fire. 4,000 Marines were wounded and another 1,000 killed, which was an attrition rate of 55%, according to historian George Clark in Devil Dogs: Fighting Marines of WWI, who goes on to say that that Marine losses at Belleau Wood exceeded losses in all of the Corps’ previous history.

Gibbons, who lived 21 more years after the battle, gave credit for victory to the 9,500 men of the 4th Marine Brigade, even though soldiers of the Army’s 2nd Division of the American Expeditionary Forces fought alongside the Marines. George Clark observed about this, “The Germans were good, the Marines were better.”

[i] The article may be found here:  https://www.navytimes.com/off-duty/military-culture/2024/04/24/the-man-who-made-belleau-wood-and-the-marine-corps-immortal/

Title: Brigadier General Charles Henry Lauchheimer, USMC Caption: As he appeared as a midshipman at the US Naval Academy, Annapolis Maryland, class of 1881. He was born in Maryland and received his commission in the Marine Corps. He died on 14 January 1920 at the Naval hospital, Washington DC. Description: Catalog #: NH 67346

Copyright Owner: Naval History and Heritage Command