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2019 Mazzara Jennifer 16731 This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ Shared experience organizational culture and ethos at the United States Marine Corps’ Basic School 1924- 1941 Mazzara, Jennifer Leigh Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Non Commercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you receive permission from the author. Your fair dealings and other rights are in no way affected by the above. Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact [email protected] providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 25. Sep. 2021 KING’S COLLEGE LONDON FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE AND PUBLIC POLICY Dissertation Shared Experience: Organizational Culture and Ethos at the United States Marine Corps’ Basic School 1924-1941 By Jennifer L. Mazzara Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy April 2019 Abstract A significant gap exists in historical study of the United States Marine Corps, centered on the conduct and curriculum of its “Basic Officers’ Course.” There is no extant history of basic officer education in the Marine Corps. The current official history is broad, lacks detail, and focuses primarily on the last thirty years. A “History of The Basic School” was written in 1945, covering the early decades in slightly more detail. It is, unfortunately, almost entirely devoid of citations and does not approach the subject in a scholarly way. Other existing publications about the history of the Marine Corps Schools fail to make a detailed survey of the content of basic officer instruction courses, though there are a handful of detailed works on field officer education. Finally, no previous project has attempted to place the instruction of Marine officers within the broader political, social, and demographic environment of the United States in the interwar period. This paper will help fill that gap. The history of the Marine Corps, like any other long-lived and large institution, has been written from a variety of perspectives, many times over. Before the American Civil War, Marine Corps history was so closely tied to that of the Navy that a unified maritime history tradition was sufficient for both institutions. Then, beginning in 1875, every generation of Marines has produced their own single-volume “History” of the Marine Corps, distinguishing the Corps’ identity from that of the Navy. Accompanying most of these are specialized monographs which consider more narrowly the conduct, composition, missions, and personalities. Only in more narrowly focused scholarly works are disputes or controversies really worked out in detail. To date, none of those inquiries attempted to explain the influence that education had on the unit cohesion or individual camaraderie which were evidenced during the Second World War. Single- mindedness in both tactical and operational environments were a hallmark of USMC operations in the Pacific Theatre, yet no analysis has been made of the one educational experience the vast majority of those combat commanders had in common. The purpose of this paper is not to settle a dispute, but rather to explain the nature of education for junior officers during a specific time period. Between 1920 and 1940 the true “professional” schools consisted of: the US Army War College, the US Army Command and Staff School, the US Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, the US Naval War College, the Marine Corps Field Officers’ Course, the Marine Corps Company Officers’ Course, and the Marine Corps Basic Officers’ Course. This last named, the particular subject of this paper, was the only professional school being conducted at the “basic” level. It was the single point of entry for commissioned officers into the Marine Corps during the interwar period, and its operations were consistent during that same interval. List of Abbreviations and Acronyms TBS – The Basic School SOA – School of Application MCS – Marine Corps Schools USMC – United States Marine Corps HQMC – Headquarters, Marine Corps CMC – Commandant of the Marine Corps USN – United States Navy USA – United States Army USNI – United States Naval Institute NWC – Naval War College AWC – Army War College CGSS – Command and General Staff School USNA – United States Naval Academy USMC – United States Military Academy ROTC – Reserve Officers Training Corps NROTC – Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps PME – Professional Military Education ABF – Advanced Base Force AEF – American Expeditionary Force NCO – Non-commissioned Officer CO – Commanding Officer FMF – Fleet Marine Force MOS – Military Occupational Specialty BAR – Browning Automatic Rifle POW – Prisoner of War KIA – Killed in Action MIA – Missing in Action 2ndLt – Second Lieutenant, Marine Corps 1stLt – First Lieutenant, Marine Corps Capt – Captain, Marine Corps Maj – Major, Marine Corps LtCol – Lieutenant Colonel, Marine Corps Col – Colonel, Marine Corps BGen – Brigadier General, Marine Corps MGen – Major General, Marine Corps LtGen – Lieutenant General, Marine Corps Gen – General, Marine Corps 2LT – Second Lieutenant, U.S. Army 1LT – First Lieutenant, U.S. Army CAPT – Captain, U.S. Army MAJ – Major, U.S. Army LCOL – Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Army COL – Colonel, U.S. Army BGEN – Brigadier General, U.S. Army MGEN – Major General, U.S. Army LTGEN – Lieutenant General, U.S. Army GEN – General, U.S. Army ENS – Ensign, Navy LTJG – Lieutenant Junior Grade, Navy LT – Lieutenant, Navy LCDR – Lieutenant Commander, Navy CDR – Commander, Navy CAPT – Captain, Navy RADM – Rear Admiral, Navy VADM – Vice Admiral, Navy ADM – Admiral, Navy \Introduction At five minutes until ten o’clock on a Wednesday morning, the passageways of Heywood Hall are silent. The somber faces of past commanders, Medal of Honor recipients, and other notable Marines hung on the concrete walls regard one another impassively. Somewhere near the quarterdeck, Colonel Commandant Charles Heywood himself occupies a wall. Heywood’s hall is the only building on the campus not named after a Lieutenant of Marines. At 1000 exactly, two hundred fifty Second Lieutenants come piling out of Classroom 1, headed north toward the barracks buildings. They have managed to stay awake for all 90 minutes of “Marine Corps Air Ground Task Force Operations II.” At the same time, 250 more Second Lieutenants leave Classroom 3’s map problem on “Patrolling” and head south, dispersing toward small group discussion rooms and the mess hall. Caught in the middle, a group of visiting members of the Class of 1969 recall how they, too, once sat in classrooms in this same corner of Camp Barrett. They sagely observe how much has changed, and yet stayed the same. At 1010, the halls are silent again. This is “The Basic School,” a unique institution among military schools and one which holds a central place in the Marine Corps’ system of training and education. Every year, the United States Marine Corps educates about one thousand newly- commissioned Second Lieutenants at its Basic Officers Course. Each class of 200-250 students, organized as a company with a Major in command, completes a six month course, at the end of 2 which each participant is considered qualified to serve in the Fleet Marine Force as a rifle platoon commander. Many go on to do exactly that, or one of a host of other things. The Basic School (TBS) is unique among the military schools operated by the United States Armed Forces. It is the only post-commissioning school categorically required for all officers of a given service to attend before joining an operational unit. There are no substitutions for TBS. The Marine Corps does not differentiate among the various sources of commissions for officers: United States Naval Academy graduates, four-year Naval Reserve Officer Training Course graduates, and “other” university graduates who attend a 10-week Officer Candidates’ School are all mixed together at TBS and no group receives individual or specialized treatment. The uniqueness of TBS comes from two primary features: its structure, and what it allegedly provides to its graduates. It is the only “basic” level post-commissioning school in the United States which imparts a “generalist” education, rather than one directed at a particular military operational specialty or community of experts. Lawyers, pilots, comptrollers, and infantry officers all attend the same course. To date, no academic study of what they actually do or teach has been completed. Without that groundwork, it would be difficult or impossible to analyze the second primary feature. There is today a strongly held belief among Marine officers that the school contributes something fundamental to the identity of a Marine officer, and thus to the Corps itself, and without TBS unity of purpose among Marine officers might cease to exist. I suggest that the commonality among officers created by attending the Basic School is equivalent to the bond enlisted Marines share having passed through the recruit depots at Parris Island or San Diego. Colonel George M. Van Sant, a graduate of Parris Island in 1945 and TBS in 1951, gave the two institutions equal billing in his memoir: “the lessons of Parris Island and Basic School [were] deeply emblazoned on my soul.”1 By beginning with a study of the “what” of ——————————— 1.
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