Commentary: This is a speech that I think has profound thoughts applicable to not only military life but civilian life as well. While General Krulak remarks that the military is about people, the same is true about companies and business. It is all about people. Industry, business, and companies serve people. Industry would not exist if humans were not present. Companies exist as vehicles to redistribute wealth based on productive work. Through productive work in companies, cash is put into human pockets in order to give levity and dignity to human life. As General Krulak points out we need to rise above the mundane and be eagles.
General Charles Krulak
October 7, 1993
Abstract: General Krulak, Former Commandant of the Marine Corps, spoke to the Naval Academy Leadership Forum regarding the principles of integrity, moral courage, responsibility, accountability, and loyalty. During his discussion he shares personal viewpoints and experiences that molded him into the officer he had become. He concludes his speech with a call to become eagles and soar above the mundane distractions of everyday life.
General Krulak: Let me tell you how honored I am to be here this morning. One, to talk to the leader’s forum but equally as important is to talk to the first and second class of the United States Naval Academy and those from other service academies who are sitting up in the audience here of the brigade. What I would like to do this morning is to spend a little bit of time reflecting on two events that probably had the very most to do with making me the officer I am today. And whether that is good or bad you will judge as we go on through this morning’s discussion.
These two events impacted on some fundamental traits of leadership that I think we all need to fully understand and traits I would like to discuss this morning. In order to do this, though, I am going to have to, refer back in time, back in history a little bit, so that you can kind of get in my head, get inside of my body, and understand why they were so significant.
In the early spring of 1966, the 324th Bravo North Vietnamese Army Division was pulled South from its position along the border between North Vietnam and China. As I am sure you all know North Vietnam and China are ancient enemies. This division was pulled South, through North Vietnam and positioned along the demilitarized zone that separated South Vietnam from the North. The 324th Bravo North Vietnamese Army division was the same crack division that had spearheaded the assault against the French at Dien Bien Phu. They had now been pulled South and were poised to lead the first direct invasion of South Vietnam by the North. Their mission was to attack and seize Quay City.
In order to blunt that attack the United States Marine Corps supported by Army, Navy, and Air Force put together an 11 battalion size operation to defeat the enemy in zone. The operation was code named ‘Hastings’. With that as a little history, let me take you back in time.
0630 in the morning, June 3, 1966, First Lieutenant Chuck Krulak Commanding Officer Gulf Company Second Battalion First Marines, had just been landed with his company by helicopters in a small valley surrounded by jungle covered mountains about 2000 meters South of the Demilitarized Zone.
This valley was really nothing more than rice patties, about six football fields in length. I’ll put it in measurements that Admiral Lynch will understand, six football fields in length, two football fields in width. Down the Eastern side was a stream bed, a dried out stream bed, that offered both cover and concealment. No sooner than when we hit the deck, helicopters pull out, we were immediately taken under heavy small arms, automatic weapons, and mortar fire.
Fortunately, the vast majority of my company managed to move off to the side, get into this dried streambed, and we were pretty much safe. But one platoon, found itself landed a little bit further to the West. They could not move. They were pinned down by both the indirect fire weapons and direct fire weapons. And one squad within that platoon found itself directly in the line-of-fire of an enemy 50 caliber machine gun. And within a matter of seconds, I had two marines killed and two more seriously wounded.
It became very obvious to me, as I sat there and watched that this machine gun was going to kill every man in that squad. It was going to shift to the next squad. It would kill all of them. And it would end up killing every Marine in that platoon. There was no question about that.
I got on my radio and talking to my First Platoon Commander, a Second Lieutenant by the name of Oliver North. And told LT North to move his platoon up that tree line, up that creek bed, get on the flank of that gun and the tree line that the gun was in and to be prepared to assault when I gave him the signal. At the same time I had my other platoon putting down a base of fire into this tree line hoping to keep that machine gun somewhat silent.
As I was doing this my radio operator grabbed me by the sleeve and pointed out into the rice patty and he said, “Look at Lance Corporal Grable”.
And I looked out into that rice patty. And a young Lance Corporal squad leader a black Marine from Crump, Tennessee had gotten to his feet. He had locked his rifle into his hip and like something I swear to God right out of a John Wayne movie. This Marine started running back and forth firing his weapon. And for every 20 or 30 yards he ran laterally, he probably went two or three forward.
You could see the enemy machine gun pick right up off the squad and start tracking Grable. You could literally see the bullets kicking up behind him. Tracking him; tracking him; until they hit him. Picked him up like he was a dish rag, threw him through the air backwards.
In the amount of time that, that took, Ollie North move up on the flank, gave me the word he was ready to go, and I popped the green star cluster that signified for him to begin the assault. And as I did that my radio operator grabbed me again and this time he did not say anything. He just pointed out into that rice patty. And this young black Marine had gotten back up to his feet, this time no fancy stuff. Put his weapon into his shoulder, got a good sight picture, a good trigger squeeze. And he walked down the line-of-fire of that enemy 50 caliber machine gun.
About 5 minutes later, I got up to that now silenced, enemy machine gun. There were nine dead North Vietnamese soldiers surrounding it. And as God as my witness, draped over the barrel of the gun itself was Lance Corporal Grable. When we turned him over he had 5 entry holes in him. But you could not, see where they came out because he had no back left. Six months later I stood in the parking lot of the Naval Annex Headquarters Marine Corp. And Lance Corporal Grable’s widow was awarded the Navy Cross medal our nation’s second highest military decoration. And with her was a little baby boy that Lance Corporal Grable had only seen in a Polaroid picture.
So what, So what! What’s that got to do with the leader’s forum? What’s that got to do with the class of 1994 or the class of 1993 at the United States Naval Academy? A great story but that happened a long time ago. And it does not have anything to do with us.
Wrong! Wrong! It’s got to everything to do with you all. It’s got everything to do with me. Everything!
Too often, we forget, that the reality of our existence as a service is found in the willingness of our Lance Corporal Grable’s to walk down the line-of-fire of a 50 caliber machine gun, or in our, the willingness of our Seamen Smiths to go into a flooded compartment in order to stem the rushing water that is coming in as a result of a collision with a mine.
One of the things that worries me about service academies, and I say this as a proud a graduate of this great institution called the Naval Academy, is that we have slowly moved away from a focus on people to a focus on things.
Let me tell you that the profession of arms is not about things. It is about people. If your heart is set on flying an FA-18, leading a platoon of MA-1A tanks, sailing on nuclear submarines or aegis cruisers, then you are in the wrong business. Cause you ought to be focused on people.
If you are not willing to buy in that concept, that people is what the services are all about. Then you need to get out just as soon as you can.
And you say to yourself, holy mackerel, who is this little guy telling me to do that.
I am telling you, you have to think that way for one very good reason because it is people not things that you are going to lead into harms way.
It is people not things that you are going to lead into the valley of the shadow of death. It is the deeds of men and women who have sacrificed for us that have literally made us what we are today.
And when we fail to live up to the standards set for this profession of ours then we fail the Lance Corporal Grable’s and the Seamen Smith’s who have gone before us.
And believe me if you don’t know it, know it now, you are in the profession and it is called the profession of arms. It is as much a profession as the medical or the legal profession. There is one big difference though. We do not have malpractice insurance.
When we fail to serve our clients which are, in fact, the citizens of this great nation of ours, when we fail to serve our clients there is no outside agency that is going to pay the bill. The payment comes directly from the reservoir of faith that our countrymen have in us. A reservoir filled by the sacrifice and the blood of the Lance Corporal Grable’s and the Seamen Smith’s that have gone before us.
Now for those of you that are in the service I’ll tell you right now that we are entering critical times, times that are going to demand stout hearts, keen minds, and the purest of motives. For the Naval Service, times when incidence such as Tail hook have caused our professionalism to be questioned like it has never been questioned before.
At the highest levels, these are times when Congress is asking the services why they need to look like they do. Why do we need a twelve carrier Navy? Why do we need a Marine Corps? Why do we need four air forces? All of these questions flying around at the highest levels.
But to you all here today, the most important thing for you to understand is that these are the times when those fundamentals dear to this profession of arms of ours are rapidly being taken off the shoulders of people like myself and Admiral Lynch and are being placed around your shoulders, your shoulders, as the people who are going to lead, lead us into 21st century.
Let me say that again, these are the times when those fundamentals that are so dear to the Profession of Arms that are being taken away from me, I am an old man, and they are being given to you, they are being entrusted to you, and you are going to lead this nation into the 21st century. And for the next the couple of minutes I just want to talk to you about some these fundamentals that must become so dear to you.
Integrity and moral courage, integrity and moral courage, these fundamentals go hand in hand. Those officers who demonstrate these fundamental traits are the ones the nation will count on in the most difficult times.
All of our services have enjoyed their greatest success when their officer corps has been unafraid to demonstrate the full measure of these two traits.
Integrity that is the most precious possession you own. If it were not that I was afraid that the needles would be dirty, I would ask you to follow me this weekend out to a tattoo parlor and get the term integrity tattooed somewhere on your body. For me it would obviously have to be a little tattoo. For some of you it would be bigger.
But I am afraid of the needles. So what I would like to ask you to do is I would like you to tattoo the term integrity across soul, across your soul.
Your integrity prevents you, prevents you from lying, from cheating, from stealing, from being something less than a true professional. If you ever loose your sense of integrity then you are no good to your service, you are no good to your nation, and you are no good to yourself. You must be ever watchful because your integrity can be lost bit by bit without you even knowing it.
I will tell, though, the men and women that you will lead will know it immediately. Your word is your bond. Your actions must be above reproach. What is so terrible about incidences such as Tailhook is that it calls into question the integrity not only of certain individuals but of our entire officer corps.
Tied closely to integrity is the concept and fundamental trait of moral courage. This is in many ways a difficult trait to really understand. Moral courage in my opinion means the willingness to put your heart and soul into doing the right things vice doing things right. Let me say that again; the willingness and courage to do the right thing instead of worrying about doing things right. There is a very, very big difference between the two.
People in this audience, as well as officers around our services know what I mean. There are officers that are far more interested in looking good than being good, that are interested in show over substance.
Officers who are not willing to stick their necks out for fear that their necks are going to get chopped and their heads will fall, officers who are not willing to be steeple shakers because they believe that steeple shaking is not conducive to promotion.
There is no room for officers like that in our brotherhood. No room for officers like that in our profession. We need officers who have the moral courage to speak out when they see something wrong no matter what the risk. And it is here that the idea loyalty comes into play. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who view loyalty as some kind of blind following of their boss or of a concept. This is not loyalty. I am sure you understand that. Loyalty is the willingness of an officer to tell the emperor that he is not wearing any clothes. That is what loyalty is.
Loyalty is assuring that your boss is protected from making a lousy decision. Additionally, and equally important I might add, loyalty is getting behind your boss once he has weighed your input and the input of other people and has made his decision. Then you get behind him. So long as the decision is a legal one and does not call into question your integrity. If it does then my fellow officers, and you all are officers, you must make a hard decision. If you have understood what I mentioned and talked about in so far about integrity is concerned that decision becomes a lot easier.
Let me talk about another fundamental. It is called accountability and responsibility. I do not mean to insult you or insult your professional knowledge. But as you know we are all responsible and accountable for everything that we do and fail to do, everything that our commands do and fail to do. We are responsible for that and accountable for it. This fundamental has been the bedrock of the services since their inception. But I will tell you from a personal viewpoint this concept has become very fuzzy over the last couple of years.
I am going to give you two incidents that will support in my opinion in that and then I will give you a personal experience, the second experience that I told you I would share with you.
First incident, the Beirut bombing, a terrible, terrible, disaster took place that many apologist blame on a series of external errors. The commitment of forces to begin with, the rules of engagement that failed to change when the political climate changed, the cumbersome and poorly defined chain of command. Yet the bottom line remains a marine commander of a unit in a hostile environment, contrary to his training, his common sense, his tactical ability, did not disperse his troops, but gathered them into a single location where they were vulnerable to their enemies. A terrible tragedy took place and what happened to our principle of accountability? Nothing, nothing, no courts martial. No reliefs, nothing.
On Thursday 01Oct1992 at approximately 2345 the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga launched two Sea Sparrow missiles that slammed into the bridge of a Turkish destroyer. Killing the Captain and four others on the bridge and wounding fifteen. A board of inquiry was held. Approximately two months later the results of that investigation were made public.
The investigating panel of three admirals found that quote deeply rooted problems and structured deficiencies in major training areas contributed to the disastrous launching. And as you all know no one in CDC told the petty officer manning in the target acquisition console that he was participating in an exercise. There was no routine checklist for fire control safety onboard that ship counter to regulations.
The unannounced anti-ship missile exercise was just that, unannounced. Contrary to regulation the ships CO was not informed, the ships XO was not informed. Throughout the incident the investigating panel found that there was little or no, quote, following of standard Navy training procedures. In December, five officers and three enlisted men received either, punitive letters of reprimand, letters of admonition, or letters of non-punitive letters of instruction.
No courts martial. The captain of the ship was not relieved. Rather he took part in a regularly scheduled change of command approximately a week before he went in front of an Admiral for Captain’s mast. Accountability?
In an interview with the ships captain he said, “It was an accident. I am in this because I am the CO and not much more. It’s too bad.”
Let me tell you members of all the services that if our nation ever perceives that we are reluctant to be accountable for our performance then we are going to be in serious, serious trouble. There can be no excuses given to the citizens of this great nation of ours if we foul up. We must be accountable.
Let me bring this home from a personal standpoint. I was a young Captain on my way back to Vietnam for my second tour of duty. My wife drives me up to Norton Airforce base to get on a Flying Tiger Airlines plane and go to Dnang. Wife drops me off and kisses me goodbye. She is not a happy camper I can tell you. She drives back down to San Diego. I walk into the hangar where they got all the individuals that are going on that bird. And I am standing there looking around and I see this little PFC. Not little, a young PFC.
And his is carrying a workout bag and it says, “San Diego, The City In Motion.”
Well I am from San Diego! So I of course sidle over to him and start talking to him. His eyes are a little big cause he is kind of worried. And I asked him he is in fact from San Diego. Yes he is. He tells me his name is PFC Cameron. We have a good dialogue. He in fact lived about three blocks from me.
He was a communicator. Word comes get on the plane. We get on the plane. We are flying over the ocean. I see Cameron maybe two or three times during the flight. I am going up to make a head call. He is going up to make a head call. I am going up to get a drink of water. What have ya! Catch his eye. He looks at me I look at him. We go on back to our seats. The plane lands in Dnang. If you have seen the movie ‘Good Morning Vietnam’, Robins Williams gets off the plane in Dnang and it’s hot, dusty, and noisy. That’s the way it really was.
Got off the that plane and this big burly Master Sergeant says, “Ok everybody going to the First Marine Division and going to stay here in Dnang stand here or all you poor guys going up to the third Marine Division go over and stand behind there, a 130’s going to pick you up to take you up there.”
I trot on over because I am going up the Third Marine Division. Here comes ole Cameron with his bag. His eyes are, I mean to tell you, are this big. I said I better get a hold of this kid. And I get over there and said you know, “Its going be alright. Don’t worry; we are going to take of this.”
We get on the plane. Go up to Dong Ha. We separate.
I am given stewardship of Lima Company, Third Battalion, Third Marines. I go out to the company. I meet my First Sergeant monstrous guy, six Foot Six, 240 pounds. He takes me around the company area. He says here is where we are dug in, here is what it looks like. Two days later the same big First Sergeant comes walking up. He is like a mother hen. He’s got a bunch of chickees behind him, seven or eight new guys, coming into the company. You guessed it, number one in line, this time all you can see is his eyes, PFC Cameron.
I say to myself, “Self for some reason this guy keeps on entering into your life. So I had better, better latch a hold of him.”
And I did. I said to the First Sergeant, “I want Cameron to be my radio operator.”
And for the next nine months this young Marine PFC and I became so close, a closeness that can only come from times of stress and times of danger. And we shared everything. I mean we shared not just our food. We shared letters. We shared dreams and hopes. And he became over that period of time like a son to me.
At the end of the ninth month, I was called to my battalion commander’s hootch and he said that we were going up on Mutters Ridge. And I want your company to go up and form blocking position because we are going to have the rest of the battalion plus another battalion sweep down Mutters Ridge hopefully driving the enemy into you.
I said fine. Mutters Ridge was not a great place to go I will tell you. I mean you will go up there and you always got into a fight so I mean my heart was not exactly doing flips of joy. But I said we are going up there and do it.
Being a recent graduate of the Marine Corps Amphibious Warfare School and having my act together of course I got all my artillery positions prepped, fires planned, had on air on strip alert, I felt good. Put my company in formation. Two up and one back, my command group in the middle and we startup a finger on this ridge line. And we got about a third of the way up, when we started taking sniper fire. Over, over our heads you could kind of hear the bullets whizin’ by. Got on the hook started callin’ in the artillery. Felt very comfortable. All of a sudden a loud crack, same kind of crack you get when you are out on the rifle range and you are pulling butts and you know the bullet just went over your head.
I kind of ducked to the side because it went right by my ear. I turn around and Cameron was hard down. I mean hard down. And I bent down and ripped open his flack jacket and he had taken a round right through the chest. I mean he was breathing and you all I am sure heard the term sucking chest wound. That is what he had. I mean every breath he’d take you would hear this terrible wheezing sound. And instead of breathing through his mouth he was breathing through his chest. And the blood was coming up and it was bubbling. And I went holy mackerel. I dropped down to my knees. I whipped out my pressure bandage. And I put it on the kid’s chest. And I said hang in there. Hang in there you are going to be alright. And you could see him start to gray, and his eyes start to flutter back and he is going into shock. And I sat down and I pulled him onto my chest. Right up against me and I had his head in my left hand and that pressure bandage is on. And I was just praying and saying you know hang in there. You are going to make it. We are going to get you out of here.
All of a sudden I was hit on the side of my head so hard that I fell to my side and Cameron was dumped onto the ground. And standing above me was that big First Sergeant I had talked to you about. He had his helmet in his hand and he had just beat me across the side of my head.
He said, “What in the hell do you think you are doing. You got a company in contact up there that’s who you are responsible for. What are you doing with this Marine? Get your butt up that hill and fight that company.”
Man! I want to tell you that I went up that hill so fast it was not funny. Got up to the top of the hill. Some unknown reason we had no casualties except for Cameron. I will never forget the feeling I had as we went around and put my men into their defensive positions. And I went back to where my CP (Command Post)) was and the First Sergeant was there.
He says, “Skipper I am sorry I hit you.”
I said, “Don’t be sorry First Sergeant you were exactly right. You did exactly what you should have done. My responsibility was to fight the company. I was accountable for those people. You were exactly right.”
Then he said, “He did not make it.”
I said, “What you mean he did not make it?”
He said, “Cameron he did not make it.”
As he said that he had tears running down his cheeks. This big First Sergeant had tears running down his cheeks. I will tell you that three hour period drove into my soul that concept of responsibility and accountability.
I see my time is running out. I want have some time for questions and answers. So let me bring this home if you will allow me. Let take you back into that rice patty. Let me take you back to the rice patty. Let me remind you that Lance Corporal Grable is laying there hit for the first time.
Question that has been in my mind ever since that happened and reoccurs and enters my mind often is why did he not just lay there. He has been hit by a 50 caliber round. I am telling you he had to be in intense pain and he is laying there. Why didn’t he just stay there? He has a wife. He has children. He had a wound that would get him home. He was on his way home. All he had to do is lay there. But he did not. Why not? He got up and performed an act that he had to know was going to kill him. Why did he do it? In my opinion he did it because flowing through his veins and tattooed across his soul were many of the principles we talked about today; integrity, moral courage, loyalty to his people, responsibility, and accountability.
Now I’ll tell you that he probably did not have them packaged neatly in some list in his mind. I will tell you they were there, they were there, they were there. And if they were there for people like Lance Corporal Grable then they damn well better be there in us. They better be there in us.
For every class that goes through The Basic School, I talk to them about some of the things we just talked about. And I end up by asking them to be something that they probably never thought of being. And that is to be what I call a knight in shining armor in a day and age when people are not interested in knight in shining armor. I asked them to be Joan of Arc in a day when people are not interest in Joan of Arc’s. I ask them to take a page out of the Bible and soar upon the wings of eagles. To be eagles. To not walk around down in the dirt of every day life but to soar above it.
And I get crazy over this and they all they kind of think I am crazy anyhow. They say geeze its General Krulak again giving his eagle talk. One day about a week ago some kid came up to me, some Lieutenant, and he slipped a piece of paper in my hand and I read it. And I said I am going up to the Naval Academy and I am going to read this one little poem that he wrote. Think about this.
There is a great battle that rages inside me,
One side is a soaring eagle,
Everything the eagle stands for is good,
And true,
And Beautiful,
And it soars above the clouds,
Even though it dips down into the valleys,
It lays its eggs on the mountain tops,
The other side of me is the howling wolf,
And that raging howling wolf represents the worst that is in me,
He eats upon my down falls,
He justifies himself by his presence in the pack,
Who wins this great raging battle,
The one I feed,
The one I feed.
Be Eagles. You are about to be great leaders in your services. Be eagles and only feed the eagle. Thank you very much. - General Charles Krulak
