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Reading Generation Kill by Evan Write does not give this impression of the US military...
by skywal_l 5y ago
Reading Generation Kill by Evan Write does not give this impression of the US military...
- staticautomatic 5y agoHell, reading most things about the military doesn’t give this impression.
- ZeroGravitas 5y agoBit older but Catch-22 also paints a different picture.
- QuarterReptile 5y agoThis is much less applicable yet, given that the all-volunteer military, which has a higher degree of professionalism than its previous iteration as a result, didn't exist at the time.
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y agoGeneration Kill apparently covered a marine battalion (according to Wikipedia), not the navy. To my understanding the branches of the military function as independently cooperating entities rather than one large organization and therefore when criticizing systemic/institutional failures and cultures of the military, the specific branch in question is an important detail. Criticizing the navy using the marine corps in this instance is similar to criticizing the us coast guard for marine corps behavior.
- boomboomsubban 5y agoThe Marines are part of the Department of the Navy, unlike the Coast Guard which is part of the Department of Homeland Security.
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y agoIn the United States, the marines appear to be a separate force to the navy. They are listed as a branch of the United States Armed Forces, of which the coast guard is also under. (Edit: someone downthread had explained to me that the marines are a sister organization to the us navy, and are both under a department. It makes more sense to criticize the branch based on what a sister branch did.) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces
- scarmig 5y agoTechnically, they're under the Department of the Navy and a sister organization to the US Navy (also under the Department of the Navy).
- SamoyedFurFluff 5y agoAh, I understand, thanks for explaining. I would still argue that something specifically focused on flaws in the marines is probably left-field of someone who was in the US navy if they’re sister orgs. (This is not to say the flaws are inaccurate or that the navy doesn’t have issues, only that they should be leveled accurately to the organization of the military.)
- ethbr0 5y agoAfaik, the easiest way to explain it is that the Marines get their funding as a branch of the Navy, but their orders and command as their own branch.