The Marine Corps Way of War Quotes

“The MCWW’s maneuver warfare and its legacy has positioned the Corps and its warriors/ scholars into the future as the nation’s “Force in Readiness” worldwide. No other branch of service in the United States can make that claim. More than lip service has been paid to a transition to Boyd’s maneuver warfare and the advantages derived from this type of thought and engagement by a small amphibious fighting force.”
― Anthony Piscitelli, The Marine Corps Way of War: The Evolution of the U.S. Marine Corps from Attrition to Maneuver Warfare in the Post-Vietnam Era

“In General Gray’s mind, the Corps needed to change how it would do business in this new battlespace. The impetus behind this initiative can be found in the post-Vietnam analysis of the effectiveness of the American campaign in Southeast Asia. Couple this with the bombing of the Marine 24th Amphibious Unit, Battalion Landing Team, HQ Barracks, Beirut, Lebanon in 1983, and it was obvious that serious and immediate battlespace changes needed to be implemented. 14”
― Anthony Piscitelli, The Marine Corps Way of War: The Evolution of the U.S. Marine Corps from Attrition to Maneuver Warfare in the Post-Vietnam Era

“Military education is a major part of this evolution into a MCWW. No new doctrine could have taken hold without the presence of militarily educated warriors. In fact, it has become standard practice for all United States Marines to become thinkers and readers. 11 Required readings encompass the entire Corps, from general officers down to newly minted privates leaving the recruit depots of Parris Island and Camp Pendelton in San Diego. Not only is reading now a fundamental aspect of being a Marine, it is also a socialization process within the Corps itself, for these readings lead to formal and informal discussion groups focusing on various aspects of military history, doctrine, strategy, and tactics. In part, this educational process grew out of the Reformers’ ad hoc meetings for the MCWW development in order get its center of gravity embedded within the Marine Corps. 12”
― Anthony Piscitelli, The Marine Corps Way of War: The Evolution of the U.S. Marine Corps from Attrition to Maneuver Warfare in the Post-Vietnam Era

“General Gray, the 29th Commandant of the Marine Corps, characterized this evolutionary development this way: You have to understand Maneuver Warfare is really a thought process.... So it was much more of an impact and it is probably not even a good name but that’s what we gave it. The point is, it was all about empowering people and letting people do what they think they had to do, letting people make mistakes and so on, so they learn, and that was one of the big leadership parts of the maneuver thought process. The empowerment of people, and the idea of decentralization, in other words, maybe decentralizing operations so the intent is to understand two echelons up, and two echelons down, that type of thing. So that thought process is very, very important. I think that we in essence turned the Marine Corp loose. So the Marine Corp really did it. I just let them do it. 7”
― Anthony Piscitelli, The Marine Corps Way of War: The Evolution of the U.S. Marine Corps from Attrition to Maneuver Warfare in the Post-Vietnam Era

“It also incorporated the military philosophy of Col. John R. Boyd (USAF, ret.) and the reliance on the Marine Corps’ own former strategies and tactics found in its “Small Wars” DNA. 5 American history and its foreign relations helped to forge the Marine Corps into a military institution that has the unique characteristic of being the only waterborne fighting force in the American military experience. This can be seen in the very DNA of the Marine Corps from its inception and its concomitant history. In foreign actions, both bellicose and humanitarian, from the American Revolution to its present participation in the Global War on Terror, the Marine Corps has transformed itself into a force-in-readiness capable of employing maneuver-type tactics, casting aside the attritional defensive-offensive way of war.”
― Anthony Piscitelli, The Marine Corps Way of War: The Evolution of the U.S. Marine Corps from Attrition to Maneuver Warfare in the Post-Vietnam Era

“Historian Citino’s description is found in his outstanding study titled, aptly enough, The German Way of War: The Germans called it Bewegungskrieg—the war of movement on the operational level.... [I] t meant the maneuver of large units to strike an enemy a sharp, even annihilating blow as rapidly as possible. It could be a surprise assault on an unprotected flank or, better yet, both flanks—or even better than that, his rear. Such a vigorous operational posture implied certain other characteristics ... an army with an extremely high level of battlefield aggression, an officer corps that tended to launch attacks no matter what the odds, and a flexible system of command. 1”
― Anthony Piscitelli, The Marine Corps Way of War: The Evolution of the U.S. Marine Corps from Attrition to Maneuver Warfare in the Post-Vietnam Era