U.S. Marine Sgt. Responds to Threats of Violence

I saw this first at MadMikesAmerica:

An arti­cle I wish I would never have to write — To those call­ing for a civil war, this Marine wants you to stop, and think…



By Sgt. C USMC


It’s been said that the mil­i­tary is always prepar­ing for war. That is true. We pre­pare for com­bat every day. We ran 5 miles today to the rifle range and shot nearly 200 rounds a piece at tar­gets and then ran back. How­ever, we also pray for peace. I would love one day to be com­pletely unnec­es­sary. But alas, I am a real­ist, and I know that day will never come.


The head­lines of the last week have reminded me more of glimps­ing at the S2 Daily Brief­ing Sheets while in the­ater or the Al-Jazeera than the NY Times or the Wash­ing­ton Post. Think about that for a moment, let it sink in.


Before I get into the main premise of this arti­cle — I need to make two state­ments here.


First and fore­most , when it comes to the back and forth of who did what to whom and why — I don’t give a @!$%#. It doesn’t change the action. In life we’re judged by our actions, noth­ing more, noth­ing less. One of the great­est things of the mil­i­tary is when it comes to an enemy, the pol­i­tics behind the sit­u­a­tion — don’t mat­ter in accom­plish­ing that mis­sion. For the mil­i­tary , life is sim­ple in that regard.


Sec­ondly, Regard­less of your polit­i­cal ide­ol­ogy, you’ve earned the right as US Cit­i­zens to say your piece — no mat­ter how wrong it may be. That is your right, and I will give my life to pro­tect it.


But this gov­ern­ment of ours is a democ­racy. We vote for our rep­re­sen­ta­tives, and they vote in our inter­ests. Some­times, the votes don’t go our way. That’s life, bet­ter luck next time. Exhaust your leg­isla­tive options, and then focus on gain­ing the required votes and/or seats to achieve your desired leg­isla­tive vote next elec­tion time. That’s the way things work.


But the SECOND you start com­mit­ting acts of vio­lence and van­dal­ism, then you’ve usurped that Con­sti­tu­tion. You in a way have assaulted it. And then you and I (I being every ser­vice­mem­ber who has sworn to defend said Con­sti­tu­tion) will have a MAJOR PROBLEM.


For those of you call­ing for a civil war, I implore you to stop and think about what you’re say­ing. Look around your neigh­bor­hood and your city. Now imag­ine using that ter­rain to sur­vive. Imag­ine dodg­ing semi-automatic rifle fire as you scram­ble from cover to cover, drag­ging your wounded child behind you. Imag­ine the deaf­en­ing report of a mor­tar as it strikes the ground a 150 feet in front of you, the over­pres­sure enough to shat­ter your teeth and per­fo­rate an ear drum. Try and envi­sion a Stryker rolling through neighbor’s front lawn or a F/A-18 mak­ing lazy loops over your head in Close Air Sup­port for the troops in the distance.


Now with that vision in mind, stop by your local Marine Corps base, being they will be the first mil­i­tary units you’d face in an all out ‘civil war’ . Look at them for a moment, exam­ine their ‘work envi­ron­ment’ . They’re run­ning the track, they’re climb­ing ropes, they’re grap­pelling with each other in mock hand-to-hand com­bat, and shoot­ing tar­gets while mov­ing in raid lines on a daily basis. Nearly every­one on that base, down to our ‘sec­re­taries’ has a com­bat award of one type or another, they’ve faced some of the most stress­ful sit­u­a­tions on Earth where suc­cumb­ing to the stress can get you killed, and they flourished.


Now ask your­selves and be hon­est — when is the last time you’ve run any­thing other than late to work, climbed any­thing other than a flight of stairs, grap­pelled with any­thing other than a paper jam, and shot off any­thing other than your mouth? When’s the last time you were in any sit­u­a­tion more stress­ful than a traf­fic jam?


Now I’m not blam­ing you for your career choice, not in the least. I can’t think of a sin­gle job that’s not use­ful in some way or another. I just want you to sim­ply com­pare and con­trast your work envi­ron­ment with ours and ask your­selves “Who is bet­ter suited to win this bat­tle ?” We both know the answer here, and if you doubt that answer, look at the results from Fal­lu­jah in 2004. Over 1200 of them ‘lost’ and we ‘lost only 28. That’s a ‘win-ratio’ of almost 60–1, and they’ve been fight­ing their whole lives.


Put this in another sce­nario. You and your office­mates think your local pro foot­ball team sucks , so you put together your own team of the best your com­pany has and chal­lenge them to a game. Even if your team might be good, they’re pro­fes­sion­als. This is their job. Your job is to answer phones and type on a key­board. In short, they’ve for­got­ten more than you will ever know about foot­ball. The result, will be a slaugh­ter for you, and a prac­tice for them. But at least you’ll get a chance to sit at home, ice your wounds and say ‘whew I never should’ve done that!’


Not so with com­bat. The results of com­bat are far…FAR..more per­ma­nent. There are no sec­ond chances, no time for regrets, and no do-overs. This is not Call of Duty.


Now I ‘d like to dis­perse a myth here — many of you think that US mil­i­tary would not fight civil­ians. I can’t speak for all, but in my case — the moment you declare civil war, you’re no longer civil­ians. The moment you attack the con­sti­tu­tion, you’re now ene­mies of that con­sti­tu­tion. And I swore to defend and sup­port and if nec­es­sary give my life for that Con­sti­tu­tion and uti­lize every tool, tech­nique, and weapon at my dis­posal to do so. And trust me, I’m not alone.


I hope some of you heed my words and cool the rhetoric and focus on achiev­ing your goals diplo­mat­i­cally instead of phys­i­cally. It would never want to receive a frag order to Mary­land, or North Dakota, or Texas, but it is an order I will fol­low no mat­ter how much it pains me to do so.