{"id":8327,"date":"2014-08-28T19:54:10","date_gmt":"2014-08-28T19:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mca-marines.org\/shop\/product\/once-a-marine-pb-0940328313\/"},"modified":"2025-11-07T12:14:37","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T17:14:37","slug":"once-a-marine-pb-0940328313","status":"publish","type":"product","link":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/product\/once-a-marine-pb-0940328313\/","title":{"rendered":"Once A Marine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>SOFTCOVER EDITION<\/p>\n<p><b>Memoirs of General A. A. Vandegrift, the 18th Commandant of the United States Marine Corps<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Long awaited and well worth it. This exceptional Marine, whose career covered almost 40 years of adventure, tells his story with a quiet competence that only makes it more effective. If you&#8217;re looking for buried skeletons or sensational disclosures, however, you&#8217;ll be disappointed. If, instead, you&#8217;re looking for the logic lying behind some of the decisions of great and lasting significance for the Corps, you&#8217;ll be satisfied and fascinated.<\/p>\n<p>His story begins in post-bellum Charlottesville, VA, moves to the School of Application at Paris (one &#8220;r&#8221;) Island, then follows the young officer to Haiti, Mexico and Nicaragua. His approach is not one of retelling bandit-chasing tales. Instead, you discover the many &#8220;whys&#8221; behind the many Marine expeditions of that era. The early China years, too, rate a special treatment, with an insight seldom encountered in standard Marine fare. The pre-war days at Headquarters are almost unbelievable, particularly in this day of continuing crises, both real and imagined.<\/p>\n<p>The story then moves to Guadalcanal. This portion &#8211; and the treatment of the General&#8217;s Commandancy &#8211; occupy the major and by far most significant sections of the book.<\/p>\n<p>The memoirs of a famous man are always interesting. They are even more so when they contain the little key which can open a whole series of enigmas. Example: Few Marines who fought at The &#8216;Canal have ever had a kind word for Admiral Fletcher. What would the senior commander ashore have to say about the Admiral? You&#8217;re right. No Marine has ever had a kind word &#8211; but he receives more gallant treatment than you might expect.<\/p>\n<p>Some other topics and\/or personalities covered:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Richmond Kelly Turner and FTP-167.<\/li>\n<li>Holland Smith and &#8220;The Saipan Affair&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>Naval gunfire at Iwo<\/li>\n<li>The battle plan ashore at Okinawa<\/li>\n<li>Post-war planning and expansion<\/li>\n<li>What to do with 50% of 82 unemployed generals<\/li>\n<li>Keller Rockey and the North China agrarian reformers<\/li>\n<li>Cates-Shepherd and the choosing of a Commandant<\/li>\n<li>The whole post-war hassle with Congress, the Army, and the &#8220;Bended Knee&#8221; speech<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Inter-service rivalries infuriated the General. It made little difference to him whether the Army conducted amphibious operations in winning the war. The Marines had written the book; it was there for all to use. That some in the Army couldn&#8217;t &#8211; or wouldn&#8217;t &#8211; accept such an approach without suspecting some hidden Marine motive was, for the General, the ultimate in frustration. An eye-opening conversation with Chief of Staff Gen Eisenhower is recorded almost verbatim.<\/p>\n<p>Robert Asprey has done an exceptional job. His writing is clear and concise, and as the story teller he is at his best.<\/p>\n<p>This book is not only for old timers. It&#8217;s for every man who wears the Marine green. A truly wonderful book.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SOFTCOVER EDITION Memoirs of General A. A. Vandegrift, the 18th Commandant of the United States Marine Corps Long awaited and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":435050,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"product_cat":[3566],"product_tag":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-8327","1":"product","2":"type-product","3":"status-publish","4":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"product_cat-biographies","7":"pa_brand-38-marinecorpsassociation","8":"pa_discountable-83-1","9":"pa_google_category-88-mediabooks","10":"pa_google_category_id-e8-784","11":"pa_last_import_date-e7-2020-02-05000000","13":"first","14":"onbackorder","15":"taxable","16":"shipping-taxable","17":"purchasable","18":"product-type-simple"},"bundle_layout":"","bundled_by":[],"bundled_items":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product\/8327"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/product"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8327"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"product_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_cat?post=8327"},{"taxonomy":"product_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marineshop.ecomitize.com\/shop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_tag?post=8327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}