We live in a very dangerous world today, and we may need you.
Y'all have got the eyes of the world on you, the work that you do.
Nobody else can do it.
Thank you for what you do.
Thank you for how good you are.
The US Marines and aircraft, they are now ready for a possible evacuation of Americans from the US Embassy in Libya's capital of Tripoli.
Unlike the last time in Benghazi, when they had no forces nearby, just across the Mediterranean in Italy, troops and firepower assembled ready to go if the order comes.
What we saw in Benghazi about two years ago, when there was no available military force nearby close enough to do anything.
The US Marines will be ready to go if and when the order comes.
Ukraine stands on the brink of disaster. After losing the Crimea Peninsula to Russian annexation, it now faces losing control.
The crisis response mission here in Europe is pretty important, especially now, more than ever.
We have decided to enhance the capacities of the National Parks Agency by creating a special squadron.
Climb the world with Marines trained park rangers to cause people poach and then use that money to fund terror, to fund extremism, to fund some of these civil wars that are going on, to fund some of the instability.
The United States Marine Corps is here in the region promoting security and stability, and we're not going anywhere.
The new norm, you know, is an interesting term, you know, there's not much normal about it, but you know, it's come to be something that I think everybody's grasped the hold of as being something that makes us a valuable asset to the nation.
Through our combined strength, we promote stability, security in the region, and with that comes peace and prosperity.
Going over and being altruistic, and truly altruistic in our reasons that we're there, and you know, if that's the new norm then, you know, I'm all about it, but if we need to go to combat again, maybe that's the new norm as well.
We do offer a unique and capable asset here. It gives the nation another viable option, a forward stage contingency force to rapidly respond to, you know, say an embassy reinforcement, a non-combatant evacuation operation, other types of humanitarian assistance.
It just provides commanders with another level of capability already prepositioned and located in this part of the world.
After the Special Purpose MAGTF initiates into some, so to say, operations, after that, you know, it could be very closely tied into a Mew.
Got them a camp alone.
Oh, it's all.
We're a larger force that could come in to go on and take care of whatever business we need to do.
There have been too many times throughout history where things have gone wrong throughout the world and we just haven't had the troops there to support it, so we're really trying to fix that.
I think it's pretty important. I mean, Benghazi proved that, that there needs to be someone standing by and ready to react to that can get directly into the fight.
And we're here to do that.
We've got, you know, birds to fly us, ready to go, anything would happen. You know, we're always ready.
We have an aircraft that can fly at 280 knots and flies as a helicopter or an airplane, so anything needs to go anywhere or any people that need to be placed in a certain location, we're able to do that.
The KC-130 supports the MB-22s primarily with refueling, and also if there needs to be flies to be dropped in any location, our plane is capable of air-dropping them.
It's all about being ready, being ready for anything, whether it's, you know, a natural disaster or, you know, something breaks out and we have to get called in to really show them what riflemen can do.
You know, we're ready.
We've got guys in a lot of different locations around Europe, kind of keeping true to the single MAGTF mantra.
We're throughout Romania, Spain, Italy, different parts of Africa, we even still have Marines back in Camp Lejeune, back in the USA. We're always ready.
It's really just one collection of assets that we use to accomplish whatever mission is put forth to us.
It's very well integrated, it's very streamlined, and it's very smooth transition from one unit to the next unit and one mission to the next mission.
Theater Security Cooperation is, we go in, we train the instructor cadre, we train directly with a foreign country, and we teach them how to keep the capacity of and learning how to do it themselves.
The shot of the round to the left, you push it to the right.
We're very impressed by the Marines' flexibility and they got sent to be on Special Forces MAGTF, to operate on the SCT Security Cooperation team, and be able to act as instructors and do a mission they've never done before that no one had experienced it and accomplished it.
We ended up going to eight different countries over the course of our deployment and it's really to become partners.
A bilateral training agreement is training side by side to get together on their ranges.
Bilateral training in today's Marine Corps is extremely important because we find ourselves routinely in battlefields with different nations.
We get that experience of moving, integrating, going to a foreign land, and getting out of there with all of our gear, our personnel, and as Marines and NCOs gain experience in tackling those challenges, we become better trainers, we become better learners, and we become better warfighters.
There's a need to have pre-established relationships so that when the crisis emerges, both forces are prepared to respond not just as separate units, but in a cohesive force.
I always appreciate everybody from the NATO forces to come to our land if it would be needed to support us, and especially for Marines.
By far the biggest takeaway that our unit has gotten from this training is partnership with other nations and being able to talk across languages, talk across styles, get to that common goal and for us as infantrymen it's to locate close with and destroy the enemy.
It's a great sense of satisfaction that you're contributing to not only the training of other nations and the successful evolution of what those militias are able to do, but also that you're here and you're able to support American citizens as they're spread throughout the world.
If any Marine knows standing post takes a lot of discipline to do that day in and day out, and my Marines helped this discipline for the entire seven months until the days that it really, really counted.
Our mission there was to focus externally on the Department of State location and work hand in hand with the diplomatic security, which is an element of State Department.
We were attached to JCSE as well as an IDC corpsman and four Marines from 10th Marines as well as a couple other assets that we fell in on.
Morning of July 13th, two militias, two rival militias, kicked off heavy fighting in and around the Tripoli area, specifically targeting the Tripoli International Airport, at which time all commercial traffic in and out of Tripoli ceased.
We were just caught in the crossfire of it essentially.
A lot of rockets, mortars, they had AA guns everywhere, a lot of AA fire.
Some of it was landing inside the compound, a lot of it was bursting above the compound.
Know your target and what lies beyond. We were beyond.
It got pretty violent, but we were very fortunate then to what he got hurt.
The fighting continued and continued to get worse as the time period went on until finally the determination was made around the 24th to 26th that it was time to leave.
And this is where the military assisted the State Department parting through southern Libya into Tunisia.
Obviously, AFRICOM had utmost control of the mission at all times, but Special Purpose MAGTF crisis response was our go-to.
They were our parent command and they were the ones that supplied us with all the assets to conduct that mission.
I was sleeping and they wake us up. One of our sergeant comes in and tells us they guys, we just got past word, we were evacuating in two days.
At this time we didn't really believe it because it had been going on for so long.
Special Purpose MAGTF crisis response was totally in control of this mission at that point and they were able to coordinate with a lot of other different agencies.
They had the Air Force providing us with F-16s, C-17 and a couple C-130s for extract as well as the Navy providing us ISR coverage out of Signela, Italy.
And then Special Purpose MAGTF CR, their own organic V-22s were airborne with elements from FOX-22 as well as a crisis response medical team, which was also airborne throughout this entire operation.
All those assets stayed airborne with us through the duration of leaving Libya and pushing into Tunisia until the extract was complete.
At which time we extracted via Air Force C-17 and C-130s back to Italy where the LCE element of crisis response was there to gain both the Marines and the American citizens that we had evacuated.
Two days prior to us actually leaving the embassy, there wasn't any of our land's corpals ever had a thought that within the next day they'd drive in an up-armored suburban from Libya to Tunisia and it would take 18 hours and it just amazed me.
It really was something to be remarked in history books in the Marine Corps.
We as Marines and sailors, we have a lot of austerity in our lives, a lot of preparation for the dirty business of war that we do.
As a chaplain, part of my job is to help these Marines and sailors develop character and to experience the culture that they're serving in.
That it's not just a forward deployed site from which we conduct combat operations, but that we truly care about their children, we truly care about them and we want to leave a legacy of goodwill behind.
And then by the end of the deployment, there's real sincere relationships there and I think it, I know it's changed me and I know it changes Marines and sailors for the better.
You know, I'm actually doing something productive and I'm helping these kids, you know, be happy and it's just a lot better than doing nothing.
I know we're not here just to train the military, we're here to help too as well, you know.
What's your favorite part about this?
This right here.
The Marine Corps is calling it a new norm and what has been asked is above and beyond the average bill of description that goes to their respective MOSs.
Basically we've been fighting above our weight class and I'm very proud of them.
It's interesting to see this concept developed and now it's went from, you know, kind of ad hoc units to reserve Marines to now you have infantry battalions covering down on this mission to now you actually have a defined area for each element of a magtap and how the Marine Corps is going to continue to expand and operate within the host nations to provide a more, a bigger capability for the nation in this area.
Go to MG!
It gives the regional commander, the O6 level commander the capability to also go to any one of those hubs and provide the C2 out of that hub for say the European theater, the African continent or something else.
The single SP magtap is something that completely highlights the strategic corporal concept.
Never before have I heard of something where a junior Marine has so much impact both down on the continent and in the command element with the responsibilities that they're expected to perform at and the level that they're expected to perform at.
So I can't say enough about what these Marines are doing out here.
The entire battalion had to re-aggregate into one central location.
I think the fact that we're all from the same battalion enables us to more effectively work together.
I know already what my S4 officer at a B-SERF is expecting from me. I know the stuff that he's going to be thinking about and I know the stuff that he might not be thinking about.
You know, that's what the new norm means. It means the Marine Corps gets to get out there and defend freedom and you tell that to Marines, they grab ahold of that mission, they get excited.
I can't begin to tell you just how proud I am of them.
This deployment represents Exhibitionary Force 21.
Four deployed operational forces engaging with coalition partners ready to respond to a crisis.
This is what the Marine Corps is about.
This is what the Marine Corps is about.
This is what the Marine Corps is about.
This is what the Marine Corps is about.
This is what the Marine Corps is about.
