The Mayaguez Incident
Look and find our names upon The Wall,
Hargrove, Hall and Marshall were our names.
We were three men that were left behind,
three Marines still owed honorable graves.
Marines took back the hijacked Mayaguez
and recovered all her crewmen safe and well
But while our mission accomplished its objective
The Ninth Marines were ferried into hell.
The helicopters took us to the island,
Koh Tang, in the Southern China sea
The Khmer Rouge were dug in on the island
prepared for an assault from air or sea.
They say it was a failure of Intelligence-
The crew of The Mayaguez was moved before
The 2nd battalion forces first were landed
Upon that hostile beach, that deadly shore
Lieutenant Col. Randall Austin was commanding
Our perimeter was shrinking by the hour
Our landing force had taken heavy losses
Some died upon the beach, more drowned offshore.
It happened in perimeter reduction
we three men were forgotten in our hole.
When Helicopters flew the rest to safety
We were left behind on the atoll.
Some say we died that day, some say after
Reports are we were tortured and then killed.
Some claim we were forgotten by our nation.
But our names are on The Wall- you never will.
Look and find our names upon The Wall,
Hargrove, Hall and Marshall were our names.
We were three men that were left behind,
three Marines still owed honorable graves.
On May 15,1975, two weeks after the last Americans fled Saigon, the men of the fourth
and Ninth Marines were ordered to retake the U.S.S. Mayaguez and rescue her crew. The
ship had been seized by elements of the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia. It was mistakenly
believed that the crew were being held hostage on Koh Tang Island, Cambodia. While
the 4th Marines Delta Company successfully boarded and retook the Mayaguez, the ninth
Marines were landing on the beach at Koh Tang. Officially, the second battalion of the
Ninth Marine Regiment lost 18 dead,41 wounded and three MIA. In addition 7 of 8
assault helicopters that took part in the original assault were destroyed.
This last battle of the Vietnam War era was a tragedy of errors. The Marines were sent to
rescue crewmen who were no longer on the Island. The crew was rescued elsewhere. The
Khmer Rouge troops on the Island were expecting an attack by the Viet Cong as the
island was the subject of a territorial dispute. The marines were sent in, based on faulty
intelligence, against a force whose strength and dispositions had been badly
underestimated by our leaders. The fire fight on the Island was so fierce that the dead
had to be left where they had fallen.
Lance Corporal John N. Hargrove, PFC Gary L Hall and Danny G. Marshall’s names
appear on panel 1W lines 130-131 of the Vietnam memorial in Washington D.C. They
are the last combat fatalities of the Vietnam conflict. Not all heroes are buried in
Arlington Cemetery
poem by John F. McCullagh
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Related quotes
The Devil Dogs
Through grain fields with bayonets fixed,
from Belleau Woods the Germans came.
The sixth Marines in shallow pits
unleashed a deadly metal rain.
The French collapsed upon the left
Their flank exposed by craven fear
The Marines held fast when urged to flee:
'Retreat? , Hell we just got here.'
By June the sixth, it fell to them
to take a Hill to save the French.
A German company with machine guns
waited for them well entrenched.
With tactics from another war
Audacious yes, but not too clever
'Come on, you bastards' Dan Daly roared,
'Do you really want to live forever'
With casualties high, so many dead
The Marine Corps held the hill by night.
Counter attacks were fended off
some times with fists and K bar knife.
Now the cannon of both sides
rained steel where the combatants stood:
A once beautiful preserve of princes
was turned into a shattered wood.
Through mustard gas and cannon fire
The Marines advanced into the Wood.
Silenced machine guns and cut bared wire
Till the enemy fled, this time for good.
Before the flag at Iwo flew,
Before the Canal's jungle squalor
Marines were nicknamed 'Devil Dogs'
by the Germans who admired valor.
poem by John F. McCullagh
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Marines are very good at fighting... And if Gen. Franks wants fighters on the ground and he puts Marines in, he'll have what he wants.
quote by Peter Pace
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I learned a great many things in the Marines that helped me as a football coach. The Marines train men hard and to do things the right way, just as a football team must train.
quote by Hayden Fry
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I would not trade you a billion dollars for the kids I led to combat in Vietnam or in fact any of the Marines that I served with for a quarter of a century.
quote by Oliver North
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Tiny Mountain
The year was 1972
Tiny Mountain had a lot to do.
He volunteered to be in the Vietnam War,
He was only 17 years young,
his adventure had just begun.
He rescued 600 Marines who where Prisoner's of War,
He was a brave soul for the war took it's toll.
He shot 18 " canons on a US Battleship,
to scare the Vietnamese to give up without a quip.
The Vietnamese waved their white flags and
let his ship come to shore,
to get the rest of the Prisoner's of War.
There was a lot of tunnels underground,
Tiny Mountain didn't go, he left without a sound.
He was too big to rescue POW under there,
there was cities with stores everywhere.
Like the subway system in NYC,
it was totally different not glittery.
Now Tiny Mountain made it back,
he made it without an attack.
Thanks Tiny Mountain for rescuing our POW's,
We the people of US of A and POW's Thank you.
Written by Suzae Chevalier on August 17,2011
poem by Suzae Chevalier
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Tiny Mountain
The year was 1972
Tiny Mountain had a lot to do.
He volunteered to be in the Vietnam War,
He was only 17 years young,
his adventure had just begun.
He rescued 600 Marines who where Prisoner’s of War,
He was a brave soul for the war took it’s toll.
He shot 18 “ cannons on a US Battleship,
to scare the Vietnamese to give up without a quip.
The Vietnamese waved their white flags and
let his ship come to shore,
to get the rest of the Prisoner’s of War.
There was a lot of tunnels underground,
Tiny Mountain didn’t go, he left without a sound.
He was too big to rescue POW under there,
there was cities with stores everywhere.
Like the subway system in NYC,
it was totally different not glittery.
Now Tiny Mountain made it back,
he made it without an attack.
Thanks Tiny Mountain for rescuing our POW’s,
We the people of US of A and POW’s Thank you.
Written by Christina Sunrise on August 17,2011 at 4: 19pm.
www.purplepoems.com www.christinasunrise.com
www.puppitlady.com
poem by Suzae Chevalier
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Tiny Mountain
The year was 1972
Tiny Mountain had a lot to do.
He volunteered to be in the Vietnam War,
He was only 17 years young,
his adventure had just begun.
He rescued 600 Marines who where Prisoner’s of War,
He was a brave soul for the war took it’s toll.
He shot 18 “ canons on a US Battleship,
to scare the Vietnamese to give up without a quip.
The Vietnamese waved their white flags and
let his ship come to shore,
to get the rest of the Prisoner’s of War.
There was a lot of tunnels underground,
Tiny Mountain didn’t go, he left without a sound.
He was too big to rescue POW under there,
there was cities with stores everywhere.
Like the subway system in NYC,
it was totally different not glittery.
Now Tiny Mountain made it back,
he made it without an attack.
Thanks Tiny Mountain for rescuing our POW’s,
We the people of US of A and POW’s Thank you.
Written by Christina Sunrise on August 17,2011
www.purplepoems.com www.christinasunrise.com
poem by Christina Sunrise
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Look, many of us here are regular marines... I will die as a marine because that is my dream.
quote by Jerry Jones
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Alone iam alone in alone island
Alone iam alone in alone island
Alone mew on alone palm tree in alone island
Alone shark surrounding alone island
Alone boat far away from alone island
Alone iam dying alone in alone island
Alone iam alone in alone island
poem by Mohammed AlBalushi
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Little Island
LITTLE ISLAND
Randy Newman
In two long wars, my country bled
To save the world for everyone
As through the years, the fight we've led
Too long, we stood alone, too long alone
And when at last, the battle won
We asked for no reward
An empire gone
Two generations turned to blood and dust
Only the best were lost
Only the best
And now the years have passed
The times have changed
The foe is risen up
He stands astride the world
His dreams of conquest all fulfilled
Little island, little island
Glory lost in the mists of time
They will pay for what was done
To those of us who died so young
They will pay for what was done
Little island, little island
Little island
song performed by by Randy Newman
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Khmer Rouge Atrocities
Goddess Ganga’s Mother of Water,
the great Mekong River
flows through the Kingdom of Cambodia.
The former Kampuchea borders Thailand, Laos and Vietnam.
It was once a powerful Buddhist Khmer empire
that between the 11th and 14th century ruled
most of the Indochinese Peninsula.
On its red background, between two horizontal blue stripes,
the Khmer national flag displays a stylized image of Angkor,
the magnificent ancient temple complex,
a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
The temple ruins are located amid forests and farms
at Tonle Sap, the Great Lake.
The people of Cambodia take stately pride in Angkor,
as a lofty symbol of Khmer nationhood and identity,
In the 20th century Cambodia underwent turbulent changes
and during the Vietnam War the Americans bombed
and invaded the country.
In the 1970s the Maoist Pol Pot of the Khmer Rouge
attempted to turn Cambodia into a classless peasant society
by forcing the urban population to move from the cities
to agricultural communities.
Similarly to Mao, Pot Pol saw farmers as the base of
the working class proletariat.
The dictator persecuted teachers, lawyers, doctors
and everyone else with a university education.
Also, the anti-colonialist ideology of the Communist regime
led to the arrest and torture of those who visited another country,
or spoke foreign languages.
The Khmer Rouge had classified these people as class enemies.
Pot Pol abolished money, closed banks,
schools and hospitals and ordered to burn the books.
After all Mao, too, believed that the more books you read,
the more stupid you become.
The Khmer Rouge also tried to extirpate western medicine
and substitute it for traditional peasant medicine.
The Communist revolution in Cambodia
led not only to terrible bloodshed and suffering,
but also involved some very bizarre specificities.
Wearing eyeglasses, for example, became a dangerous thing,
because the Khmer Rouge believed
that only class-enemy intellectuals wore spectacles.
Another capital transgression was
the absence of calluses on someone’s hands.
Again, as the Khmer Rouge saw it,
only class enemies had velvety finger skins.
Unlike clerks in an office, peasants had rough skin
on their hands because they toiled hard
on the fields from sunrise to sunset.
Tuol Sleng, the Hill of Poisonous Trees,
was a high school in Phnom Penh,
which the Khmer Rouge turned into a prison of horrors.
Here thousands of men and women lost their lives
in cruel interrogations and brutal torture.
Between 1975 and 1979 the Pot Pol leadership
in Tuol Sleng, Choeung Ek and other killing fields
committed dreadful atrocities.
It is estimated that at least one million people,
perhaps even two million, died in Cambodia
in this period, due to executions, torture, starvation
and forced labour induced exhaustion.
The population of the country at that time stood at about 7 million.
The genocide perpetrated by the Communist Pot Pol regime
also targeted Christians and Buddhists, as well as ethnic minorities,
mostly of Vietnamese, Thai and Chinese origin.
poem by Paul Hartal
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Im On An Island
Im on an island
And Ive got no where to swim
Oh what a mood I am in
Im on an island
Im on an island
Since my girl left me behind
She said that Im not her kind
Im on an island
But there is no where else on earth Id rather be
Then if my long, lost little girl was here with me
Im on an island
And Ive got no where to run
Because Im the only one
Whos on the island
But there is no where else on earth Id rather be
Then if my long, lost little girl was here with me
Im on an island
And Ive got no where to run
Because Im the only one
Whos on this island
Im on an island
Im on an island
song performed by by Kinks
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Get off your butt and join the Marines!
quote by John Wayne
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Our Soldier
In a passing parade
With a stern salute
Marches a soldier
For his countries glory
In a moving band
With disciplined steps
He is always ready
For the call of duty
With commands or orders
Alerted in attention
He braves ahead
For any task or mission
In the changing wars
From Mahabharata to Rome
He stood the time
For defence or attack
In a muscular body
With knowledge and skill
He practices and trains
For the final day
In many a names
As troopers or marines
Are snipers or gunners
For a forgotten soldier
In a power self possessed
With rewards and expertise
He is charismatic
For the ultimate authority
In pain and suffering
When wounded and crippled
The soldier lives on
For the pride of his country
In victory and defeat
Love your soldier
He is a countries asset
For he is a man of honour
poem by Jayram Daya
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Those who served, and those who continue to serve in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard took an oath to uphold and protect the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic, and we can never forget the importance of their commitment to our Nation.
quote by Robin Hayes
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Chantre
Et l'unique cordeau des trompettes marines
poem by Guillaume Apollinaire
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But the Air Force was sort of a bastard child of the Army, much like the Marines with the Navy. Everything had to be done over by the Army after it had already been done by the Air Corps, a mess.
quote by Stuart Symington
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Liberty's Torch
In New York Harbor, long ago,
The prison ships rode upon the tide.
Ten thousand Patriots crammed aboard,
Starved, abandoned, and left to die.
They sacrificed sweet life you see
So we might enjoy Liberty.
When the Philadelphia ran aground,
hard by the shores of Tripoli.
We sent Marines to fire the ship
That she not fall to piracy.
Again upon Saint Mary's Heights
at Fredericksburg, a sight to see.
Ten Thousand Union casualties:
white men dying to set blacks free.
Can you recall the names of those
who did not want to live forever?
They died in France in the Great War, .
the one that would end wars forever.
From age to age, from Gen to Gen
From falling hands the torch is passed.
It is now ours to hold on high
Let not the flame of Liberty die.
Tyranny and ignorance
And the darkest superstition
Oppose the light of Liberty
and would make this Earth a prison.
We must be ever vigilant,
despite the World's derision.
For if the light of Liberty dies,
Our faults won't be forgiven.
poem by John F. McCullagh
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The Vietnam memorial is a masterpiece. The names of the dead are listed there, chronologically. Just the names.
quote by William Westmoreland
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Some people wonder all their lives if they've made a difference. The Marines don't have that problem.
quote by Ronald Reagan
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