It seems I’ve always heard that the Army gets all the new stuff, while the Marines make do with hand-me-downs. When the Army had M-1s at the start of WWII, the Marines were cleaning the cosmoline off 30-year-old pieces that were, in the memorable words of a character in Leon Uris’ Battle Cry, "worthless as tits on a boar hog." Then, in the 1991 Gulf War, the Army had Abrams tanks while the Marines drove M-60s.
But it’s always been a point of pride for the Corps that they make do, and more than make up for the inadequacy of their materiel by maintaining it better and fighting harder. It’s a formula that has seemed to work.
Anyway, all that jumped to mind when I saw the above photo out of Beirut, where the Marines had returned to help evacuate U.S. civilians.
That’s a Huey, people! I doubt most of these Marines were alive when the Army ditched those.
Of course, the Marines do have a lot of cool equipment they’ve hardly gotten to use — hovercraft for
amphibious attacks, for instance. To the right you see one of those coming ashore in Lebanon. But the AP photographer didn’t make it clear in his cutline whether that was a Marine vehicle or not.
I’ve also seen folks being evacuated in an older-style amphibious vessel — an LCU. Note how much the below photograph is reminiscent of the way we picture the Normandy invasion — except that the American’s are civilians, and they’re going in the wrong direction, and the terrain looks more like when the Big Red One landed in North Africa in 1943, and this particular craft was built either in 1969 or 1970.
But other than those things, it’s a dead ringer.
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That LCU is a 1600 class and was never operated by the Marines. It’s a Naval boat, some were used by the army but the Navy used them in Vietnam on the river for patroling. The ones in the Pacific were permanently attached to Assault Craft Unit ONE, San Diego and in the Atlantic Assault Craft Unit two, Little Creek
Yeah, I think the only involvement the Marines had with this was that they were ashore assisting the evacuation. I don’t think any of them were attached to the vessel.
I knew it didn’t fit well with the subject I’d started out with; I just thought the visual contrast between the hovercraft and LCU was interesting.
After reading this, I got hooked on trying to find my dad’s LCT (I can’t remember the LCT number for the life of me). During the war they would weld an LCT to the deck of an LST for transport across the Pacific, so consequently LCT crews and LST crews would become well acquainted. I think he was on a MK 5 since I only remember him mentioning one 20mm. The “Japs” (as he called them) wouldn’t usually attack the smaller LCTs (with bombs, that is, they certainly did strafe LCTs) and would go after the larger LSTs in the flotilla instead, so the LCTs would put up fire to protect the larger ships. A Coxain (my dad’s job) and another crew member would man the 20mm during GQ. His little boat had 2 ½ kills, although the LST they traveled over with was eventually bombed and many on that crew were lost. They didn’t use tanks in the jungle, so LCTs would ferry in troops and supplies all around the Solomon Islands and New Guinea. My dad used to talk about how malaria would kill almost as many soldiers as did the Japanese, about “Washing Machine Charlie” (he could sleep through anything), and about how the Australians would try to shoot Japanese aircraft by radar at night. He’d never tie his shoes on a boat (the man could steer a boat). I remember as a kid, he’d show me how to do semaphore and Morse Code, and he’d tie all of those fancy knots. I learned all the naval terms for everything a long time before I ever joined the Navy from my dad.
After he spent 27 months in the Pacific, he was assigned to Quonset Point, Rhode Island, where his was the coxain of the craft that ferried President Truman between Quonset Point and Washington. He used to tell the story of how President Truman saved his “liberty” for months. Once, after a rainstorm, he was topside and decided to open the vent to let in some air down below deck where President Truman and all the military big wigs were seated having a meeting. When he opened the vent, water from the previous rainstorm streamed down on one of the generals sitting at the table. The general’s face turned beet red with anger, and all the big wigs and the president looked up at my dad. As my dad’s stomach turned upside down, and after they all stared at him for a long time, the big wigs all turned and looked over at President Truman. President Truman was so impressed by the general’s misfortune that he couldn’t help to crack up laughing. Once Truman started laughing, then all the big wigs started laughing too (including the general who had the water spilled on him). My dad jokingly said that that was one of his closest scrapes in WWII.
Great story, Mark!
He must have done a great job in the Pacific, to become the president’s coxswain. That’s great.
Was that Guadalcanal where he encountered “Washing Machine Charlie?” Whereever it was, great story.
When I was very small, my Dad was attached to an LST out of Charleston. One of my earliest memories — embarassing moments tend to stick with you — was when I preceded my mother up the gangway onto the vessel, walked up to a sailor (I was probably not much more than 2), and asked if he knew where I could find “Lt. j.g. Don Warthen.” He and several other men laughed, which confused me. What had I said wrong? It was years later before I realized anybody that small was expected to say, “Where’s Daddy?”
Not nearly as good as Mark’s story, of course, but that’s what landing craft make me think of. I still remember walking across a wide, flat grating under the bright Charleston sun, determined to speak in a way that I would not seem out of place. I’m sure it was hilarious to the grownups.
I also enjoyed that Mark. My father-in-law was on an LST in the Pacific; his most vivid memories at Okinawa. I guess they weren’t in the center of battle, but with tons of ammunition on board, they didn’t want to be the target of kamikazes, either.
No wonder those guys have a comradeship (is that a word?) that lasts forever. Dad still wears his LST hat wherever he goes, and has an LST license plate (Illinois) on his car.
Speaking of what little kids say, Brad, my nephew was asked at age 4 what he wanted to be when he grew up. The lady was expecting this little boy to say something like “fireman.” He responded very emphatically, “I want to be chief justice of the Supreme Court!” He’s now a naval academy grad, training to be a pilot, but with a two year leave for mathematical research at the U. of Texas. He could conceivably still make it.
A lot of people mistake that the Marines are just making do, when they are actually choosing to do so.
For example, they are coming up with their own extra armor for the Humvees, rather than contracting for Humvee upgrade kits stateside, because they don’t want the weight, and their armor is just hung on. It can be removed quickly to lighten the vehicle, and can be taken from a disabled vehicle to improvise a fortified defensive position until reinforcements arrive.