MY THOUGHTS, WHAT IS A LEADER? A Marine Corps leader has nearly unlimited power and can accomplish anything if he can muster the courage and inspiration of others. Being a good leader requires more than just the ability to weald power, and while the skills to lead can be taught, it also requires several intrinsic skills that are easy to recognize but nearly impossible to define. A leader is easy to spot by the good men he surrounds himself with; he is always prepared to take responsibility when things go wrong, and to recommend someone else for accolades when the mission is a success.

I have always beleived in God, the Lord Jesus and that we only truly have one thing that is ours, one thing that can not be taken away and one thing that will be used by others to sum up your life and judge you as a human being. That one thing is your word, or as the Marine Corps likes to call it, your integrity.
There are three things that I have always done that have served me well, and which I have incorporated into my philosophy on life.
First I always try to be honest often brutally so. This has cost me many friends but, I sleep well at night and the few friends I do have, are life long not fair weather.
I never say anything behind someones back that I will not say to their face and I try not to associate with those that do. On the rare occasion where I make a mistake and say something I regret, I always go to the person and tell them what I have said. I have found that people always find out if you talk about them, and it is better that they hear it from you than letting it get confused through the grape vine.
Lastly I always attack a problem straight on and as soon as possible. Maybe it is the Scotsman blood in me, hell maybe Im just a nut but, if I have something to say to you I say it, and I do not care who you are or if it will hurt your feelings. On the surface this may seem insane and, yes, this technique has gotten me in fights but if you do not believe in an issue enough to fight about it, then you really didnt believe in it at all did you? However, more times than not, I have found that once all parties know all sides of an issue they find there really is no disagreement at all.
This philosophy has served me well in life and it served me well in the Corps.......

Marine (ma-rene) n : A mean, violent, nasty, green amphibious monster. Born in combat, raised in tradition, and feared throughout the world. Marines are impervious to pain and feed on fear. For over 200 years Marines have consistently, and at a moments notice delivered hell, death and destruction to the enemy. Ever ready and Always faithful the Marine Corps has never failed to live up to its motto,Semper Fidelis.

I joined the Marine Corps on 10 November 1976. 10 November just happens to be the Marine Corps Birthday but, I did not know that at the time. I went to boot camp in July of 1977 and graduated as the 3rd squad leader and meritorious PFC from platoon 3084. This is my boot camp graduation picture 1977

You have never really partied until you attend a Marine Corps ball!

During my tour I had the misfortune of being in Beirut Lebanon in 1983. I lived at a wonderful little garden spot known as "Rock Base", on the edge of the Beirut International Airport and about 500 meters from the 24th MAU headquarters building that was destroyed by terrorists at 0622 on 23 October 1983.

A Beer in Beirut! While at Rock Base I worked on aircraft during the day and worked for MSgt Obed L. Gandy in the evening bartending in the beer tent.

We ate our hot meals at the 24th MAU headquarters building. This picture was taken on the way to breakfast. Shortly after this was taken we went to condition RED and I had to return to my tent for my flack jacket and helmet. While I was in my tent, two incoming rounds hit close to where had been walking on killing one Marine and wounding another. As the old axiom goes "There but by the grace of God." This was one of several epiphany moments for me. I saved a piece of shrapnel from that attack; I wore it on my dog tag chain from that day on for good luck, to this day I still keep it close

The one that nearly had my name on it

Another Picture of Rock Base, notice the sandbags around the bottom of the tents? We put them there after we started to take sniper fire through the tents at night. We also took allot of incoming mortar rounds, which we were told were intended for the Lebanese training camp that was located about 200 meters behind our position. We dug, by hand, a huge bunker that was shoulder deep and intended to hold everyone in the compound. A few days after we completed it, it promptly collapsed. It was a good thing no one was in it at the time.

After passing water survival training, being hoisted out of the water by a CH-46 helicopter, surviving the dunker, qualifying with the aerial .50 and firing several hundred rounds at sea dye markers and floating pallets, the flight surgeon would not sign off on my flight physical because, at the time, I had to wear a steel reinforced knee brace on my left knee from the surgery I had earlier in my career. So I never finished my qualifications, I never drew flight pay and I never got my aerial gunner wings. The squadron did however, allow me to hang on the end of an aerial .50 caliber machine gun for two missions over Beirut in 1983, I never fired a round in anger. After a couple of months It starts to get pretty boaring on the ship and soon the bordom drives you to do strange things just for fun. For example, one day my whole work center just up and shaved our heads! And here is a picture of me in my flight deck cranal. It is a sort of helment you have to wear anytime you are up on the flight deck during flight operations. Notice my goggles which I painted one day out of total bordom.....

24th MAU Headquarters, 23 October 1983. I was a young sergeant when the BLT building was bombed and I also had the misfortune of being assigned to the working party sent to retrieve the bodies of our fallen brothers and to secure the only remaining landing zone "TLZ Brown". The night after the attack, I along with three grunts off of one of the other ships stood watch on the roof of the hanger at LZ Brown. I had a pair of night vision goggles, a radio and my M16, and the grunts manned an M60 machine gun. We were positioned on the rear corner of the roof of the hanger, high above the intersection of the road that ran from the destroyed BLT building to LZ Brown. We were supposed to stand watch in shifts but when I bolted awake the next morning, I found we had all fallen asleep. As I stood on the roof of the hanger early that morning I actually watched two tanks battle it out at the foot of the mountains near a section of Beirut that the Marine Corps refered to as Hooterville. I know the word is badly overused but, surreal is the only word that can explain the events of those few days. The above picture is a picture I took of the BLT Headquarters building just a few days before it was leveled by a bomb blast.

I Did not take this picture but it cleary shows the horror of the day.

HAZE GRAY AND UNDER WAY ! In The Corps I traveled from the Dominican Republic to the Artic Circle. From California to Saudi Arabia and all points in between. Most of the time we traveled by ship. I was lucky because I never seem to get sea sick, many others were not so lucky.

Fun In The Dominican Republic. Just prior to the landing seen here in this picture, about a dozen small Dominican children came running up the mountain to see our helicopter. The CH-53E produces a rotor wash winds that can exceed 300 mph! I yelled and tried to wave them away but, they only smiled and waved back. It was sad and I hope none of them got badly hurt but, I could not stop laughing as the rotor wash hit them and knocked them ass over tea kettle back down the mountain.

Once in country, we realized that we did not bring enough crew members to do the mission. Since I was the senior non-aircrew member and even though I had never had one day of flight training, I got to fly as a crew chief for a wild man named Major Larry Cook. To make matters even worse, the Major's microphone stopped working on his helmet so we cannibalized mine. For the whole day I flew, illegally at 14,000 feet with no oxygen, wearing a helmet with which I could hear but could not answer! God it was fun and it damn sure was an adventure! If you look real close you can see the other aircraft down there.

I went to cold weather training several times in Volk Field Wisconsin. This is preparation for going on what is called a NATO cruise where you go to Norway, England and north eastern Europe. At cold weather training you sleep in the snow, learn how to snow shoe and ski, and pull an sled through the snow like a sled dog. I loved every moment of it!

Crossing the Artic Circle. If you look real close you can see it.

AND AS A GUNNY I GOT TO GO ON ANOTHER FUN ADVENTURE CALLED ...........................................

DESERT STORM

Actually the Gulf War was two separate adventures. The first was Desert Shield where we waited, and prepared and waited some more. The second part of the adventure was Desert Storm with an aggressive air campaign and a short ground war. We moved around more than the local nomads and lived in several lovely places like Jubail air field. The smoke from the oil well fires literally changed the weather patterns and this desert country got over 3 inches of rain the first few days we were there. The powdery sand turned into a sticky knee deep mud, and walking through it was nearly impossible. The smoke had oil soot mixed with it and the rain left black spots on everything as it dried including the nice white shirts of the Congressmen who came to visit us so they could get their faces on TV but, did they did not stay around long.

The rain ended but, the war hadn't started yet so there wasn't much to do but fix and fly aircraft, play volley ball, run and work on a tan like you had to work that.

Then we moved to Ras Al Gahr, here we spent allot of time in gas masks and at MOPP Level 4. MOPP Level 4 is where you wear a thick charcoal lined Chemical/Biohazard suit, rubber boots and gloves and your gas mask with hood. No skin is exposed and as you might imagine it gets pretty damn hot, especially in the desert. The Doc gave us treats like nerve agent pills, antibiotics and anthrax shots and we actually got ammunition for our weapons. We slept with our gas masks and MOPP gear at the ready because every night at around 3 AM we would be roused from our sleep by a loud siren. We would quickly don all our gear and rush to the bunkers and set there until the Scud missiles passed overhead and the all clear was given, this could last anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours.

Me and Top Stillwell at Ras Al Gahr. Top was a great guy and once had a bit part in the movie "An Officer and a Gentleman." We were really hurting for a good barber as you might guess by looking at my haircut.

This picture was taken the day we moved from Ras Al Gahr to Lonesome Dove. We had taken our tents down but a small crew of us had to stay back to fix a broken aircraft. That night I had to sleep in a bunker. The 3 am scud alarm had become such a habit that, that night when the siren went off I woke up confused about where to run to, its funny now, it was not funny then. To this day when the fire department siren goes off the hair on the back of my neck stands up.

Then we moved to the best spot of all, a wonderful little spot the Marine Corps designated "TLZ Lonesome Dove". Before the Marine Corps got around to giving it an official name we called it "Bedrock" because it looked like something from the Flintstones....

We were smack dab in the middle of no where, living in the middle of a damn desert 5 miles from the Kuwait boarder. You could look out over the desert for miles in all directions and see nothing but sand, camels and smoke. We lived in tents, and all of them except for the maintenance tents, sat in deep holes in the ground that had been gouged out by bulldozers. The wind blew constantly and the blowing sand made your hands and face raw. Some days the sand storms were so bad we would not go outside our tent. At night, during the air war, the ground would shake from the thousands of tons of bombs our B52s were dropping on the Iraqis. From our position the evening sky would light up like day light and we were surrounded by a constant thundering followed by concussions that sucked the air from your lungs.

We were not allowed to drink while in Saudi but, the day the war ended somehow booze showed up from no where and flowed like water. This photo is Johnny Russ and me at Lonesome Dove the night we got booze!

In March of 1991, I was part of a two aircraft detachment that flew to Kuwait and lived in tents at the Kuwait International Airport for four days. There are no words to explain the amount of damage that Iraq inflicted on not only the country of Kuwait but, more importantly, our environment.

As we flew into Kuwait we could see several dozen fires burning and huge oil slicks where the oil had been allowed to pour into the Persian Gulf. As far as the eye could see there was nothing but smoke, fire and oil the clogged the coast, killed the fish, and coated the local wildlife.

From where our tents were pitched at the Kuwait Airport, we could see 23 oil wells burning, much of the ground was covered with thick sticky oil, and most of the time the sky was pitch black. Believe it or not this picture and the previous one were both take around lunch time of the second day.

When it was all said and done we did allot of really neat things, lived through and saw allot of disturbing things and participated in allot of really stupid things like the day we had to fly boxes of endangered oil covered ducks to their new home.......but that's another story.