QUOTE

Gone to Florida to fight the Indians. Will be back when the war is over.
—Commandant Col Archibald Henderson, USMC, (5th CMC) on a note pinned to his office door, 1836

Some people live an entire lifetime and wonder if they have ever made a
difference in the world, but the Marines don’t have that problem.
—President Ronald Reagan, 1985

And once by God, I was a Marine!
—Actor Lee Marvin, circa, 1967, about serving in WW II
We’ve been looking for the enemy for several days now. We’ve finally found them. We are surrounded. That simplifies the problem of getting to these people and killing them.”
—Col Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller, Chosin Reservoir, Korea 1950
The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!  
—Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, 1945

Marines I see as two breeds, Rottweilers or Dobermans, because Marines come in two varieties, big and mean, or skinny and mean. They’re aggressive on the attack and tenacious on the defense. They’ve got really short hair and always go for the throat.
—RAdm “Jay” R. Stark, USN, 10 Nov. 1995

Marines know how to use their bayonets. Army bayonets may as well be paperweights.
—“Navy Times,” November 1994

We have two companies of Marines running rampant all over the northern half of this island, and three Army regiments pinned down in the southwestern corner, doing nothing. What the hell is going on?
—Gen. John W. Vessey Jr., USA, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the assault on Grenada, 1983

They told (us) to open the embassy, or “we’ll blow you away.” And then they looked up and saw the Marines on the roof with these really big guns, and they said in Somali, “Igaralli ahow,” which means “Excuse me, I didn’t mean it, my mistake.”
—Karen Aquilar, in the U.S. Embassy, Mogadishu, Somalia, 1991

We are going to Marine. When we can’t Marine anymore, it’s time to retire and to go sit on the porch.
—Maj Steve Shivers, MCAS, Cherry Point, N.C., 1986, on retirement

Marines are about the most peculiar breed of human beings I have ever witnessed. They treat their service as if it was some kind of cult, plastering their emblem on almost everything they own, making themselves up to look like insane fanatics with haircuts to ungentlemanly lengths, worshiping their Commandant almost as if he was a god, and making weird noises like a band of savages. They’ll fight like rabid dogs at the drop of a hat just for the sake of a little action, and are the cockiest SOBs I have ever known. Most have the foulest mouths and drink well beyond man’s normal limits, but their high spirits and sense of brotherhood set them apart and, generally speaking, of the United States Marines I’ve come in contact with, are the most professional soldiers and the finest men I have had the pleasure to meet.          
—Anonymous Canadian

They say “you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” In the Marine Corps, you can make that horse wish to hell he had.
—Sgt Fred Larson, Drill Instructor, Plt 343, San Diego, 1965
Son, when the Marine Corps wants you to have a wife, you will be issued one.
—LtGen Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller when asked by a PFC for permission to marry.
Old breed? New breed? There’s not a damn bit of difference so long as it’s the Marine breed.
—LtGen Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller
The more Marines I have around the better I like it.
—Gen Mark Clark, USA
Don’t you forget that you’re Marines- First Marines! Not all the communists in hell can overrun you!
—Col Lewis B. “Chesty” Puller, rallying his 1st Marines near Chosin Reservoir, Korea, December 1950
I’m going to fight my way out, I’m going to take all my equipment and all my wounded and as many dead as I can. If we can’t get out this way, this Division will never fight as a unit again.
—MajGen Oliver P. Smith, CG, lstMarDiv, Korea, 1950, to LtGen Ned Almond, USA, X Corps, who suggested Smith’s division escape the Chosin Reservoir by letting “every man go out on foot by himself.”

I have just returned from visiting the Marines at the front, and there is not a finer fighting organization in the world!
—General of the Army Douglas MacArthur on the outskirts of Seoul, Korea, 21 Sept. 1950

Panic sweeps my men when they are facing the American Marines.
—captured North Korean major

Since I first joined the Marines, I have advocated aggressiveness in the field and constant offensive action. Hit quickly, hit hard and keep right on hitting. Give the enemy no rest, no opportunity to consolidate his forces and hit back at you.
—LtGen H. M. “Howlin’ Mad” Smith: “Coral and Brass,” 1949

The bended knee is not a tradition of our Corps.
—LtGen A. A. Vandegrift, 18th CMC: To the Senate Naval Affairs Committee, 5 May 1946 regarding U.S. Army proposals for the abolition of the Marine Corps.

I selected an enormous Marine Corps emblem to be tattooed across my chest. It required several sittings and hurt me like the devil, but the finished product was worth the pain. I blazed triumphantly forth, a Marine from throat to waist. The emblem is still with me. Nothing on earth but skinning will remove it.
—MajGen Smedley D. Butler, recalling his time as a lieutenant in Asia.

I want you boys to hurry up and whip these Germans so we can get out to the Pacific to kick the s*** out of those purple-pissing Japanese, before the goddamned Marines get all the credit!
—LtGen George Patton, USA, 1945

We’re not accustomed to occupying defensive positions. It’s destructive to morale.
—LtGen H. M. “Howlin’ Mad” Smith, Iwo Jima, 1945, quoted to Walter Karig

If you can’t carry it, eat it or shoot it, don’t bring it.
—Marine Corps saying, source unknown

In the Army, shock troops are a small minority supported by a vast group of artisans, laborers, clerks and organizers. In the Marines there are practically nothing but shock troops.
—Combat correspondent John Lardner, 6 March 1945 report on Iwo Jima in New Yorker magazine, 17 March 1945

The Marines have landed, and the situation is well in hand.
—Richard Harding Davis, war correspondent 1935 who reportedly wrote it after the 1935 landing in Panama

Any officer can get by on his sergeants. To be a sergeant you have to know your stuff. I’d rather be an outstanding sergeant than just another officer.
—SgtMaj Daniel Daly 1873-1937

Once a Marine, always a Marine.
—MSgt Paul Woyshner, a 40-year Marine

Their fiery advance and great tenacity were well recognized by their opponents.
—LtCol Ernst Otto, Historical Section of the German Army writing about U.S. Marines in the fighting at in 1918 Belleau Wood, France

Why in the Hell can’t the Army do it if the Marines can; they are all the same kind of men, why can’t they be like Marines?
—In a letter to HQMC, dated 12 Feb. 1918, concerning a inspection of Marines by Gen John J. “Black Jack” Pershing, CinC, AEF

The deadliest weapon in the world is a Marine and his rifle!
—General John J. “Black Jack” Pershing, USA

I have only two men out of my company and 20 out of some other company. We need support, but it is almost suicide to try to get it here as we are swept by machine gun fire and a constant barrage is on us. I have no one on my left and only a few on my right. I will hold.
—Marine 2dLt Clifton B. Cates, 96th Co., 19 July 1918, 1045 a.m., from records of the U.S. 2d Division (Regular)

Come on you sons of bitches! Do you want to live forever?
—Gunnery Sergeant Dan Daly urging Marines to attack in 1918 France.

Retreat Hell! We’ve just got here!
—Attributed by MajGen Ben Fuller to Col Frederick M. “Dopey” Wise, CO 2d Bn., 5th Marines, 2dDiv, AEF in France, on being informed that the French troops were retreating and being advised to do likewise, Wise reportedly erupted with an expletive.

I would rather command a company of Marines than a brigade of volunteers.
—Remark attributed to Capt John R.F. Tattnall, Confederate States Marine Corps, in explaining why he resigned his Army commission as a colonel and his post as acting brigade commander in Nov. 1862 to resume his work as a Marine captain.