While no man in the room would willingly give his life away, every one of them would run the risk, trusting to God or luck or fate in the knowledge that each of the others would do the same. The men in these pictures were unknown to the Marines, but they were comrades—more than friends—to whom loyalty was owed. And so they would risk their lives for them. “I don’t have to tell you how dangerous the mission is,” the Admiral concluded. “The fact of the matter is, you know those dangers better than I do, but these people are Americans, and they have the right to expect us to come for them.”
