The Ethical
Marine Warrior
Achieving a higher standard
by Jack E. Hoban
With the publication of
Field Manual 3– 24,
Counterinsurgency
(COIN), the U.S. military is addressing the need for broader
and more formal tactics and strategies
to address irregular threats. At the
grassroots level, new methodologies are
being developed to prepare individual
Marines to perform COIN operations.
The new training must:
• Have at its core a strong ethics element (the ethical warrior).
• Cover a wide range of martial and
combative skills.
• Include a powerful cross-cultural
conflict resolution element.
• Be a truly sustainable program
rather than just a training package.
• Be thoroughly field tested.
In his article, “The Ethical Warrior
of the 21st Century” (MCG, Feb07),
>A former Marine captain, Mr.
Hoban is a subject matter expert for
MCMAP.
LtCol Joseph C. Shusko, USMC(Ret)
described such a program. It is the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program
(MCMAP). MCMAP is an ethics-based combatives program consisting
of three main elements: character (
ethical warrior training), mental (military
skills and mindset training), and physical (martial combatives and combat
conditioning). Notably, the ethical
warrior training is considered to be the
core of the program.
A Question of Values
The combatives and cross-cultural
aspects of the new program are outside
the scope of this article and, for the
An ethical foundation strengthens our capability in combat. We are not just warriors; we are
United States Marine warriors. (Photo by LCpl Christopher Zahn.)
most part, were well covered in the
Shusko article. But, as stated, the core
of MCMAP is the ethical warrior
training. This focus has led to a need
for a clarification of the intangibles
that make up the warrior ethic. Even
the Marine Corps’ core values of
honor, courage, and commitment required a hard look. After all, don’t our
enemies display courage and commitment too? Yes, they do. And there is
“honor among thieves.” So what
makes us different?
We had to go all the way back to our
1776 values for the clue. The foundation of ethical warriorship is that “all
men are created equal.” This often
quoted, but largely unexamined,
phrase pertains to the intrinsic value of
life (the life value), not to any relative
value, such as culture, ethnicity, religion, or behavior. Insurgents operate as
if all men are not created equal. They
don’t respect the lives of those they
consider nonobservant of their fanatic
cultural, political, and/or religious values. And they will kill anyone—even
innocent women and children—to
reach their goals.
We are not just warriors, we are
United States Marine warriors, and our
core values of honor, courage, and
commitment reflect our uniqueness as
Americans. Our warrior ethics have respect for human equality as the premise—just as it is stated in our
philosophically enabling document,
the Declaration of Independence. Our
warrior ethics charge us to act differently than insurgents—more respectful
of all life—killing only to protect lives
and when absolutely necessary. The
ethical warrior shows respect for the
value of life, regardless of the relative
