SERVICE BEYOND THE SEAS ADVANCED BASES, EXPEDITIONS, AND LANDING OPERATIONS - Section III
SERVICE BEYOND THE SEAS
ADVANCED BASES, EXPEDITIONS, AND LANDING OPERATIONS
1899-1923
SECTION THREE:
EXISTENTIAL CHALLENGES
Ten years after the Spanish American War, the Marine Corps remained in a state of transformation, moving from their role as shipboard enforcers and navy yard watchmen to becoming a landing force capable of supporting Navy fleet operations. Proof of concept exercises at Nantucket, Culebra, and Subic Bay were dress rehearsals for the nascent Advanced Base Force, then yet to be fully formed due to operational exigencies. Expeditionary units of the Marine Corps had fought in the Boxer Rebellion, fought in the Philippines, secured the independence of Panama from Colombia, and supported the Army in Cuban pacification. But for Marines of this era, it was Theodore Roosevelt’s Executive Order 969 which remains the most remembered event of the year 1908. Framed by many as yet another existential threats to abolish the Corps, it showed that Marine leadership fully embraced the Advanced Base and Expeditionary missions, before dissembling by President Roosevelt and Army Major General Leonard Wood forced Marines to lobby Congress and fight the executive order.
By 1908, Roosevelt’s “Great White Fleet” was circumnavigating the globe, testing planners’ theories on moving the battle fleet from the Atlantic to the Pacific rapidly, and stretching then-current limits of technology and the logistics capabilities of the U.S. Navy. Sotto voce, it was a massive evolution in response to increased tensions with Japan, which had been exacerbated by American nativist sentiments in the San Francisco School Board controversy, and the success of the Imperial Japanese Navy over the Imperial Russian Navy at Tsushima. Roosevelt based many of his decisions on the development of the U.S. fleet while regarding Japanese capabilities, asking the General Board and Naval War College for the plans that would eventually evolve into PLAN ORANGE.
The Marines at Subic Bay continued their proof-of-concept fortifications on Macmany Point and Grande Island, showcasing the advance base force mission. Major John A. Lejeune took command of the Philippine Brigade upon the departure of Lieutenant Colonel James E. Mahoney, and Captain Hiram I. Bearss assigned Lieutenant Pete Ellis to a detail on Grande Island at the mouth of Subic Bay. Ellis’ mission was “emplacing naval guns sited seaward, as well as laying protective minefields, mounting searchlights, and positioning of the equipment to protect the strategic harbor.”[1] This was Ellis’ second stint in the Philippines and may have been his first real introduction to the planned defense of island bases.
In Washington, Major General Commandant Elliot sought better facilities stateside to house and train Marines in the advanced base mission. At League Island, he sought to garrison two battalions of Marines “at the ready”. The ability of these units to rapidly deploy would be buttressed by the establishment of permanent quartermaster manufacturing and warehousing facilities in downtown Philadelphia. Given the space, and real estate, constraints of the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Elliot proposed purchasing property on Long Island where units could drill and conduct field exercises. Meanwhile, in Cuba, the 1st Provisional Marine Regiment continued in its expeditionary role, reporting to the Army of Cuban Pacification and maintaining peace in the countryside for a second year.
Given the repeated requirements being made of the Marine Corps to rapidly assemble and deploy expeditionary battalions, and commitment to the Advanced Base Force mission, Commandant Elliot requested a dedicated naval transport to serve alongside the long-suffering USS DIXIE and USS PANTHER. Transporting Marines for “service beyond the seas” on the decks of battleships proved to be a less-than-optimal means of transport expeditionary units. Lieutenant Colonel Eli K. Cole made note of this when he and his expeditionary regiment sailed to Panama in June of 1908.
“The trip has, in my opinion, demonstrated the undesirability of using battle ships for transports, not only on account of the cost, but of the discomforts to the men and difficulties in handling stores and the desirability of having transports on hand always ready to move expeditions of this sort at a moment’s notice.”
Cole and his unit deployed to Panama to join the permanently based Marine unit already there, to ensure free and fair elections in the young republic.
In July, Commandant Elliot reported there were 2,022 Marines, out of a service total of 9,100, aboard the ships of the Navy, providing security, manning the secondary guns, and policing discipline among the sailors. Despite the three-fold increase in the size of the Corps, largely due to the new Advanced Base and Expeditionary missions, most Marine leaders believed the role as shipboard guards to be at the traditional core of their mission, and pinned their anticipation of a continued Marine Corps future on maintaining their presence aboard ship. This stubborn stance on the role of the Corps, a case of tradition trumping evolution, led to further political and intra-service conflict in the wake of President Theodore Roosevelt’s Executive Order 969.
Naval reformers, emboldened by Roosevelt’s love of the Navy and his selective love of progressivism, redoubled their efforts to remove Marines from the shipboard role of policeman and enforcer, with the stated aim of establishing nine regiments ashore for expeditions overseas. The reformer’s interests ranged from the abolition of the silos created within the Navy Department by a bureau system[2] that controlled appropriations within the Navy, the organization and promotions of the officer corps, how the next war at sea would be fought, and what ships the Navy was buying. Remaining aligned with the General Board, the reformers drew the ire of Roosevelt’s many opponents in Congress for public disputes with whichever one of Roosevelt’s Navy Secretaries was at the desk. As much as Fullam and his reformer cohort were consistent antagonists to the traditional Marine Corps mission, others were sharpening their knives too.
The Army, led by the Army General Staff, and Major General Leonard Wood, recently Governor of Moro Province in the Philippines, was experiencing a transformation of its own, having expanding rapidly for the war with Spain and occupation duty in the new territories. Pacification in the Philippines and Cuba meant the Army needed troops; were the Marine Corps to be dissolved, 9,000 well trained officers and men, many experienced in living overseas, might be made available. Leonard Wood’s advantage in steering this course lay in his close friendship and access to Roosevelt, who’d been his subordinate in the 1st American Cavalry during the war with Spain.
President Roosevelt, who’d run on a platform of reform, personally objected to the Marine practice of running to the Secretary of the Navy, or Congress, for inside, preferential treatment, every time their silo was threatened. Strangely, he didn’t seem to have any issue with the reformers within the Navy turning to him for assistance under similar conditions. Roosevelt judged the Marines and their lobby as an infernal nuisance. As a former Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Roosevelt had experience resolving internal Corps disputes, ranging from the argument over whether sutlers should continue selling their wares on post — versus the establishment of a post exchange system[3] — and the preferential assignment of Marine Barracks commands.[4]
On the Navy side, Lieutenant Commander William Freeman Fullam had been arguing for removal of Marines from the ships of the Navy since 1890.[5] Through Lieutenant Commander William Sims, Roosevelt’s Naval Aide, Fullam had the ear of the President. Over the summer of 1908 the naval reformers mobilized a political effort within the Navy, and its controlling bureaus, to reassign Marines from ships to shore stations, without notifying Major General Commandant George F. Elliot; Elliot was not kept in the loop, because in the past, anytime the naval reform movement acted to remove Marines from ships, the Commandant and members of his staff successfully lobbied the Secretary of the Navy to forgo the action. As Elliot learned of this new movement, he asked the Secretary if he could appeal directly to Roosevelt. Secretary of the Navy Victor H. Metcalf informed Elliot that he had already ordered the Marines’ removal from USS NEW HAMPSHIRE, MONTANA, NORTH CAROLINA, IDAHO, and MISSISSIPPI, roughly 800 Marines, but did allow Elliot to meet with Roosevelt.
Understanding that the Marines viewed removal from shipboard service as an existential threat, even if Elliot didn’t, Roosevelt tasked Elliot with developing a schedule of assignments for when the Corps was removed ashore. Elliot turned to his staff, including Lieutenant Colonel Eli K. Cole, Lieutenant Colonel James Mahoney, and Major Charles J. Long, all experienced in the Advanced Base Force mission, to draft what became Executive Order 969.[6]
In accordance with the power vested in me by section 1619, Revised Statutes of the United States, the following duties are assigned to the United States Marine Corps:
(1) To garrison the different navy yards and naval stations, both within and beyond the continental limits of the United States.
(2) To furnish the first line of the mobile defense of naval bases and naval stations beyond the continental limits of the United States.
(3) To man such naval defenses, and to aid in manning, if necessary, such other defenses, as may be erected for the defense of naval bases and naval stations beyond the continental limits of the United States.
(4) To garrison the Isthmian Canal Zone, Panama.
(5) To furnish such garrisons and expeditionary forces for duties beyond the seas as may be necessary in time of peace.
Theodore Roosevelt
THE WHITE HOUSE, November 12, 1908,
(No. 969)
In crafting the framework of the order, Elliot and members of his staff accepted removal of Marines from shipboard security duties, accepted the advanced base and expeditionary missions, and accepted the force in readiness expeditionary mission. Aside from the published terms, Elliot’s staff recommended the service form nine garrisoned regiments to avoid the ad hoc confusion of drawing Marines from numerous Navy Yards to form emergency battalions.
In EO969, Marine leaders wrote their own prescription and expressed their belief in the future of the Advanced Base Force and shipborne expeditionary unit missions. They accepted a mission that the Navy didn’t have the manpower to perform itself, and that the Army was either incapable or unwilling to execute. From a doctrinal development perspective, it showed where Marine leadership thought the future of the Marine Corps lay.
However, Roosevelt inadvertently provided the Marines with an escape route from the controversy. Shortly after the announcement was made, news accounts revealed that Roosevelt and Major General Leonard Wood, fresh from service in the Philippines, had been in discussions about abolishing the Marine Corps, turning the well trained and experienced Marines over to the Army to fill gaps in the Infantry.
If published doctrine is any indicator of the direction a service has taken on a subject, the Army’s Transport Service Regulations of 1908 show that it was not following a parallel course to the Navy and Marine Corps in terms of landing operations. The Army delegated the transport of troops and material by water to the Quartermaster’s Department, and their manual shows that the Army was primarily interested in transporting troops in an orderly and hygienic fashion, not contributing to naval operations. Unlike Dion Williams concepts for the advanced base mission, or the Navy’s landing manuals, the role of embarked troops, according to the Quartermaster, was largely that of passengers.[7]
However, the way the Army War College wrote their policy on mobile and coastal artillery units in 1915 showed that they may have believed in the advanced base mission in support the Navy in the national defense. The terminology the Army uses calls for “mobile troops” and “coast artillery troops” with the assignment to furnish harbor defenses and provide a “strong fortified base” from which the fleet could operate.[8] This wording is very similar to that used by the General Board and the Marine Corps dating back to the Advance Base Force’s inception. Whether this later policy reflected Leonard Wood’s calculations when he advised President Roosevelt on the Army absorbing the Marines in the wake of Executive Order 969 isn’t clear, but it does reflect a greater acknowledgement that the concept of building advanced bases to support naval operations was viable and accepted.
One of Roosevelt’s greatest gripes about the Marines was their predilection towards self-advocacy. As naval reformers exulted over the first tranche of Marines being removed, the Marine officer corps attempted to mobilize politically. However, Elliot forbade any lobbying efforts made by his officers, most of whom viewed the change in their primary mission as a death-knell. Army leadership had been interested in absorbing the Marines for several years, to man coastal batteries, which would allow the Army to expand its Infantry footprint in turn. Leonard Wood lobbied the president, leveraging executive powers over the Marine Corps which allowed him to move the Marines for service with the Army whenever he wished. Wood broached the subject with several Marines, who passed the interest on to Commandant Elliot. Feeling betrayed, Elliot blew up; when challenged by the press on this state of affairs, Roosevelt replied that he fully supported his mentor and friend, Wood, and that he believed the Corps should be absorbed into the Army.
As Congress convened hearings on Roosevelt’s action, Navy leadership reiterated that they only wanted the Marines removed from shipboard service, not the Navy Department itself; its previous experience with the Army in executing any advanced base or expeditionary missions had become mired in failed communications and mismatched expectations in regard to roles and responsibilities.
With Roosevelt’s betrayal in the open, Commandant Elliot reversed himself and allowed his officers to engage in lobbying Congress. In what was becoming tradition, the Marines turned to friends in Congress to ensure their survival in the final month of 1908.
The House Naval Affairs Committee held hearings on the status of Marines serving aboard ships of the line in December of 1908. Before completing the annual naval appropriations bill, they convened subcommittee hearings on the matter, led by Representative Thomas Butler, father of Captain Smedley Butler. In January of 1909, Marine officers and several senior Navy officers provided testimony on how removing Marine security guards might affect Navy operations. Most Navy officers advocated for their removal but expressed a need to keep the Marines available, in garrison, for overseas expeditions. While these hearings largely favored the Marines, an amendment requiring the reinstatement of Marine guards was not attached to the overall appropriations bill, which then headed to the Senate. The Senate Naval Affairs Committee, under noted Roosevelt opponent Senator Eugene Hale (R-ME), moved to reinstate the Marine guards — more a vote against Roosevelt, than support of the shipboard enforcer role. The lame duck president and his allies elected not to fight the bill when it returned to the House, but Roosevelt, always gracious in defeat, crafted another directive allowing ships’ captains to decide whether Marines would man secondary batteries aboard ship. Giving this option to captains who wanted Marines removed from ship the freedom to neuter one Marine argument for their retention. When William Howard Taft was sworn in, Marines got the nod to return to the fleet and Roosevelt’s parting shot was rescinded.[9]
EO 969 had the effect of galvanizing the Marines’ political resolve and reinforced the Navy General Board’s belief in keeping Marines at hand for what they presumed to be inevitable, advanced base operations, and expeditionary deployments. Even William Fullam, as evidenced by his Congressional testimony, believed having Marines at the ready:
“If I were king here to-morrow, I would preserve the Marine Corps in its present numbers, and if necessary increase it, in order to use it in a civilized way… as a splendidly organized, mobile force, to serve with the navy and in connection with the Navy by garrisoning and holding all our Colonial possessions, and in providing for this contingency of seizing and holding naval bases.”
The Army continued to regard the Marines as a threat to their newly designated Coast Artillery branch and viewed the Marines’ often existential lobbying efforts merely as an attempt to create a second land army. When Roosevelt left office in March of 1909; and William Howard Taft was sworn in, Taft gave the nod to Marines returning to the fleet. The matter receded behind operational concerns; in total the 2,677 Marines had been withdrawn from thirteen capital ships during the fall of 1908 and ordered returned on March 3, 1909.[10]
CHANGE OF COMMAND
While the Navy found the base at Guantanamo excellent for its purposes in the Caribbean, it had difficulty securing appropriations for its development. As a forward base for Marines in the region, it proved itself as a support base for the Provisional Brigade of Marines attached to the Army of Cuban Pacification. When the Marines were released by the Army command on January 23, after two and a half years’ service, they returned to garrison duty at the Cuban base. In the Philippines, Olongopo has been selected as the primary Navy base in the region, as it was thought more defensible than Manila. But like appropriations for Guantanamo development, replacements for Marines rotating to the Philippines could not keep up with operational requirements. A Marine battalion remained stationed at Panama.
Commandant Elliot repeated his request a ship dedicated to servicing the Corps, à la DIXIE or PANTHER. Nothing showed this shortage as much as when expeditionary deployments continued, and Colonel James E. Mahoney led 32 officers and 709 Marines aboard USS PRAIRIE at League Island in December of 1909. Due to ship-scheduling needs, this regiment transferred to USS DIXIE three days later, which then sailed for Cristobal, Panama, arriving on the 12th. Upon arrival, the unit cross decked to USS BUFFALO, and set sail for Corinto, Nicaragua, arriving on December 20th, 1909. Lieutenant Eli K. Cole led a regiment of Marines aboard USS PRAIRIE on December 11, 1909, bound for Panama, where they linked up with another Marine regiment to form a brigade under the command of Colonel William P. Biddle.[11]
When Assistant Secretary of the Navy Beekman Winthrop ordered Commandant Elliot take charge of the care and custody of advanced base ordnance and materiel, and instruct all hands in its use, he helped cement the permanent establishment of the Advanced Base Force School. When the Advanced Base School was established at New London on July 13, 1910, Elliot reported:
“The course at this school will embrace both practical and theoretical instruction in advanced base work, the erection of temporary fortifications, laying of mines, etc., and it is hoped that excellent results will be obtained. [12]
Elliot continued to lobby for dedicated shipping support for the advanced base and expeditionary Marine units; if not USS DIXIE or PANTHER, perhaps USS COLUMBIA or MINNEAPOLIS could have been dedicated to Marine missions.
When Secretary of the Navy George v. L. Meyer chose William Biddle to replaced George Elliott as Commandant of the Marine Corps, he did so despite others having seniority and the lobbying of Colonel Littleton “Tony” Waller.[13]Disparaged as “Sitting Bull” by Waller and his acolytes, he was not regarded a “field Marine” or warrior, despite having commanded the Marine guard aboard OLYMPIA at Manila Bay, and led the regiment against the Boxers at Peking in 1900.[14] Biddle was not a graduate of the Naval Academy but made himself a fixture in DC society, having married well. Biddle appears to have understood the General Board’s belief in the advanced base mission; Biddle led the movement at Subic Bay to establish the advanced base defenses at Grande Island and McManny Point.
First deployed in December of 1909, Colonel Mahoney’s expeditionary regiment remained aboard ship, off the coast of Nicaragua until the 15th of March, when they sailed back to Panama. Dispatched from Philadelphia because of heightened diplomatic tensions, Mahoney’s Marines stayed in Central American waters until the 14th of April and returned to League Island. Lieutenant Eli K. Cole’s regiment of Marines, which had travelled from Philadelphia to Panama aboard USS PRAIRIE in December 1909, became part of a brigade in the Canal Zone under the command of Colonel Biddle. Cole’s unit remained in Panama until the middle of April, returning to the U.S. aboard PRAIRIE with Mahoney’s regiment.
After years of debate the General Board of the Navy has “decided” that Pearl Harbor should be the center of naval operations for the Pacific fleet and that Olongopo should be a supply base, repair yard and coaling station for the Philippines. Secretary of the Navy George von Lengerke Meyer recommended that the facility at Cavite, on Manila Bay, be shut down, with all assets shifted to Subic Bay. Meyer also recommended that Port Royal in South Carolina, and the temporary advanced base established at Culebra, be closed.
In December, sick and suffering from the chaos of investigations and personnel disputes at headquarters, Commandant George Elliot retired after 37 years of service; while Commandant Heywood made the initial ante on the Advanced Base Force in 1900, Elliot shares responsibility for investing in the mission. As he prepared to leave, he attempted to consolidate the bulk of Marine training at the Philadelphia Navy Yard. In concurrence with Secretary Myer, he recommended moving officer training from Port Royal to League Island.[15] He also announces the intent to move the Advanced Base School to League Island. During his watch, Advanced Base Force Marines conducted exercises at Nantucket, at Subic Bay, and at Culebra, and continued to support a harried deployment schedule, supporting Navy and Army operations in the Philippines and Cuba, as well as U.S. obligations in Central America and China. His opening the Advanced Base School at New London, showed a sincere effort to support the mission; but he’s probably most remembered for semi-successfully navigating the crisis created by President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 969.
To introduce a measure of clarity in the dispute between the Army and the Navy over responsibility for the advanced base mission, the General Board of the Navy defined the classes of advanced bases into those of a permanent nature, and those that were temporary, which helps to frame the discussion of bases and fortifications under consideration in the Philippines in 1906. The state of permanence involved in the definition determined the sophistication of fortifications and infrastructure that might be deployed in support of the fleet. Pearl Harbor, and the defenses the Army was building around it, had been designated the permanent advanced base in the Pacific. Guam and Olongopo, with no permanent hardened defenses fell into the temporary classification; any bases established by the Marines and Navy in any anticipated conflict would necessarily be temporary, until the Army arrived and built permanent fortifications. This definition of terms would be reinforced by treaty agreements made with Japan regarding hardening bases in the Pacific during the Washington Conference a decade later, but helped clarify roles and responsibilities for the Navy and Marine Corps, as well as the Army and Coast Artillery, in 1910.
Planning for a war in the Pacific predicted that an expansionist and aggressive Japanese state might neutralize American forces in the western Pacific to consolidate its hold on territory already taken on mainland China. As the estimation of what would motivate a Japanese attack — only five years before revolving about heightened political tensions created by racist nativism in California — the economic threat caused by the American “Open Door” policy came to the forefront. The General Board pushed planners to further develop PLAN ORANGE, and determine how a fight across the expanse of the Pacific might be waged.[16] The continued support of the advanced base mission spotlighted the need to support fleet logistics operations to accomplish this plan.
One of the junior Marine officers involved in the Grande Island advanced base exercises, Pete Ellis, returned stateside from a tour in the Philippines, where he’d emplaced guns for the defense of Subic Bay. Disillusioned with service overseas, he sought a transfer to the nascent aviation detachment of the advanced base outfit. Commandant Biddle had better ideas and instead sent Ellis to the Naval War College as a student. At Newport, he quickly proved his abilities as a staff officer and was kept on as an instructor. His presence gave planners an officer experienced in the advanced base mission; when they were contemplating the composition of a “prefabricated naval base able to service the entire fleet at a raw harbor”[17] he must have understood the level of planning they required. To the benefit of the Marine Corps, his time at the Naval War College granted him his a formal introduction to intelligence and operational planning.
Another Marine at the Naval War College, Major Robert “Hal” Dunlap, delivered two lectures during the 1911-1912 academic year. “The Naval Advanced Base” and “The Temporary Naval Advanced Base, General Considerations” presented students with the purposes and composition of advanced bases, drawing on the Marines’ experience in exercises, then existing defenses on Guam, and intelligence garnered from the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. An artillery Marine, Dunlap brought his technical knowledge to the lecture hall, making clear the differences between field artillery and naval guns emplaced ashore.[18]
Operational developments for the Marines in 1911 included two months of fleet exercises and landing exercises at Culebra, and a month at Cape Cod Bay. To counter the overwhelming operations tempo subsuming the service, Commandant Biddle turned to consolidation and closed the barracks at the Navy training stations at San Francisco and Newport, and at the naval stations at New Orleans and Pensacola. Moving the deployable Marines from these stations to League Island provided men for the Advanced Base School and expeditions. Additionally, aboard the navy yards, he separated Marines into the barracks units — mostly non-deployable men — and numbered companies prepared for deployment, composed of 100 men and two officers each. He hoped this move would result in greater unit cohesion, and sufficient coverage of all posts in the yards. However, the revolution in Mexico heightened tensions for American interests in the capital and oil-rich regions on the eastern coast, which put the Navy and Marines on alert.
The Mexican election of 1910 was contested when the victor, Porfirio Díaz, dictator-president since 1876, threw his competitor, Francisco Madero, in prison. Madero escaped from rather lax custody to Texas, where he declared the Mexican Revolution. The resulting uprising quickly caused Díaz to resign and flee to Spain in April 1911. The unrest in Mexico caused U.S. Secretary of the Navy Meyer to order the muster of an Expeditionary Force for Cuba. Then Lieutenant Frederic Wise recounted:
“That winter all the Marines were taken off the ships at Guantanamo, sent ashore, and with the addition of a lot of other Marines from the United States, a Marine Brigade was organized. Washington was expecting trouble with Mexico.”[19]
Col L.W.T. Waller began forming the expeditionary brigade at Philadelphia, boarding USS PRAIRIE on March 8th, 1911; his subordinates, Colonel George Barnett and Colonel Franklin J. Moses commanded the 1st Regiment, composed of 31 officers and 731 enlisted, and the 2nd Regt. with 31 officers and 685 men. Moses’ men boarded DIXIE at Philly and Norfolk on March 13, 1911. Maj Geo. C. Thorpe, the Atlantic Fleet Marine Officer, collected another 22 officers and 666 men, taken from the ships of the Atlantic Fleet. When Thorpe’s Marines landed at Guantanamo, they were turned over to LtCol Ben H. Fuller as the 3rd Regiment of the Brigade. When the situation in Mexico resolved itself in June of 1911, all hands returned to the navy yards and ships from whence they came. This expedition gave the Marines practice in embarking and landing units the size of a brigade; thirteen years prior, the service had to resort to extraordinary lengths to muster a single battalion of six companies of Marines.
The concentration of younger officers at Guantanamo in 1911 had longer term consequences for the professional development of the officers of the Corps. Repeated intra-service attacks by officers of the Navy and Army, demanding either the dismissal, dissolution or absorption of the Marine Corps, led to the formation of a professional organization, the Marine Corps Association, in the fall of 1911. Jack Shulimson ably documented the reform movement within the Marine officer corps during the 1880s and 1890s, and their lobbying efforts for legislation to improve the promotions process for officers. In 1911 Marine officers looked beyond personal concerns, seeking increased agency for the Marine Corps. The threat posed by Roosevelt’s Executive Order 969 put the existence of an independent service still tied to the Navy at risk. Taking a page from the United States Naval Institute, formed at Annapolis in 1873, the Association intended to “disseminate knowledge of the military art and science among its members, and to provide for their professional advancement”. When the brigade returned stateside, the association faded from view, but a seed had been planted.
BECOMING A TRAINING ORGANIZATION
The introduction of naval guns, artillery, machine guns, telephones, generators, phones, naval mines, and searchlights to units in the fleet meant the skill sets of individual Marine became more technical. Commandant Biddle and his staff determined that Marines should undergo a formalized course of training upon induction to ensure basic competencies before advanced training was introduced. To meet the goals of the General Board and the Department of the Navy, the Marine Corps opened the Advanced Base School at New London in 1910 and moved it to Philadelphia the following year. The Advance Base Battalion formed at Philadelphia on 11 August, and it became the cadre of the Advance Base School on 11 September, tasked with training Marines and preparing itself for deployment.[20]
“There has been established by the marine corps, at the naval station at New London, Conn., a school known as the "Advanced Base School," and the officers assigned there are doubtlessly receiving an amount of instruction in a little known curse which will be of inestimable value to them. However, up to the present time, in so far as the writer is aware, the instruction is purely theoretical. To be of lasting benefit and value to these officers and to the marine corps, this theoretical instruction must be supplemented by the practical work which would be performed by an advance base force in the seizure of a designated spot.”
– Major Henry C. Davis ‘Advanced Base Training’ Proceedings Magazine, March 1911
Commandant Biddle and the Navy moved the equipment set aside for the ABF to Philadelphia, where the cadre could maintain it, and more importantly, drill with it. Lieutenant Frederic Wise, stationed at League Island, wrote:
“Hours every day in the Yard we had to haul those three-inch guns around. We had to build a portable railroad. We had to dig pits. We had to build gun-platforms. We had to mount the guns. And then, when we had it all done, we had to tear the whole business down and do it all over again.”[21]
Previously, with no permanent curator of the advanced base equipment—owned by the Navy, utilized by the Marines—its condition was deficient each time it was broken out. This meant, as with all appropriations matters, it became Commandant Biddle’s responsibility to lobby for updated and serviceable equipment to outfit the ABF.
Prior to the war with Spain, new Marines would be assigned to a Marine Barracks at a navy yard, preferably for a year, before being assigned shipboard duty. Marines would be trained individually, or in small groups, by local non-commissioned officers, in the ways of the Corps. As American society explored new concepts in education, management, and “efficiency”, it became evident that this form of ad hoc training lacked efficiency of scale, and the quality of training depended on too many variables; material covered, length of training, sophistication of training methods, and practical applications were all dependent on the local command. Additionally, when emergencies arose, and Marines were required overseas post haste, training was curtailed as barracks emptied out for deployment. Frank Keeler joined the Marine Corps in April of 1898 at the Charlestown Marine Barracks, as war fever gripped the nation. He received a week’s training in Boston, before being transferred to the Portsmouth Navy Yard, where he stood guard duty for two weeks before being selected to join the battalion forming in Brooklyn for the Spanish emergency. Three short weeks after being sworn in, Private Frank Keeler was aboard USS PANTHER headed to war.[22]
Commandant Biddle initiated the establishment of training companies — recruit depots — at Puget Sound, Mare Island, and two at League Island, Philadelphia, where Marines would receive consistent basic indoctrination in the ways of the Corps. Removing the basic training function from the barracks at the navy yards resulted in better-trained Marines, and an increased level of professionalism in their trainers. Various deployments exposed units lacking in training, such as when Colonel Charles Doyen assembled a regiment at San Diego for exercises. A third of the unit were new enlistees, who had not completed the full measure of available training — the regiment did not meet expectations during the exercises. Commandant Biddle was also responsible for the designation of permanent expeditionary companies at the various barracks, composed of two officers and 100 enlisted each, that would train together, working under the same officers and noncoms, developing unit familiarity and cohesion , separate from the yard guard force.
Commandant Biddle also directed the creation of a sea service school to train Marines prior to forming the guards aboard newly built warships.[23] Prior to the Executive Order 969 controversy, Commandant Elliot had attempted to train Marines this way but ran into roadblocks put up by naval reformers intent on removing Marines from shipboard duty. These steps all contributed to an increased professionalism in trainers and trainees, and gave Marines better training before joining an expeditionary or advanced base outfit.
INTRODUCTION TO DOCTRINE
Major Dion William, USMC, then serving with the Office of Naval Intelligence, delivered a lecture on at the Naval War College in 1912, titled “The Naval Advanced Base”. The lecture is important in that it documents the status of the Advanced Base Force in that year, reviewed its history, and laid out concerns regarding its implementation. In his address, Williams directed his focus towards what he saw as a strategically neglected area located between the physical development of the fleet, and the infrastructure of permanent naval bases; Williams draws the audience’s attention towards the need for temporary advanced bases supporting the battle fleet during a naval war.[24]
Williams’ exposition borrows greatly on the popular concepts of sea power and naval history of the era; not surprising as Mahan’s teachings remained omnipresent in American military and political circles, and Williams was a Naval Academy grad, class of 1891. He uses the example of the Guantanamo landing to define the concept of the Advanced Base and develops the definitions important to naval leaders of the day, separating permanent, from temporary bases, in support of fleet operations. This definition figured in the contention between the Army and Navy in how the Philippines might be defended, and where to place the great American garrison in 1907.
Williams ties the evolution of the New Navy to the creation of the General Board of the Navy, and to war planning efforts made at the Naval War College under the board’s guidance. Japanese victories over the Russian fleets invoke the threat that he sees emanating from the Japanese navy and he raises the specter of the loss of Cavite and Olongopo. In revealing this prophecy he displays the need for the fleet to be able to secure bases from where the U.S. could strike back at Japan. He states,
“the lot of establishing and defending the advanced base selected would fall to an Expeditionary force carried in transports along with the fleet.”
Williams establishes the need for exercises to develop the skills required to keep the advanced base effective in a naval war, and warns of the consequences if the “expeditionary force is poorly trained in its duties, or ignorant of the details of the work required of it…” His recommendations are a plea to allow the Marines to shed their previous mission and adopt one in support of developing naval strategic planning.
At Newport, Dion Williams addressed a select audience, one that already understood the threat Japan posed in the western Pacific. While he probably wasn’t disclosing any operational intelligence or classified planning in his lecture, it is stamped THIS PAPER IS CONFIDENTIAL on its cover. His arguments largely mimic those made in PLAN ORANGE, created by naval planners at ONI and NWC for a war with Japan in the wake of the San Francisco School Board Crisis of 1906. Under ORANGE, planners anticipated the fall of U.S. defenses in Philippines, and that the Navy and Marine Corps would require 90 days to return. This makes sense, given that the Navy wasn’t intending to fully fortify any naval base in the islands.
Any return to the Philippines after a Japanese attack in order to maintain the Open Door to China, would require the sea services to secure an advanced base at some point on the great common between Hawai’i and the western Pacific. The fleet’s march across the Pacific would require the protection of an Advanced Base Force Brigade. This unit would be required to periodically “rapidly dismount their guns ashore (sic) lift their mines, and with defenses and supplies embark in their transports and accompany the battle fleet to the new base…” In ORANGE, and the mission of the advanced base force, the foundations of the island hopping campaign of the Pacific War are visible. Once the fleet had engaged, and defeated, the Japanese fleet, “the command of the sea would be ours, and the; next step would be to move our land forces across the Pacific to regain the Philippines.” Williams is purposefully hazy on the particulars — would the advanced base be on Guam, or closer to Manila? — but he is confident that these steps would be required before Army involvement.
He then shifts the audience’s attention closer to home; he supposes a European power has designs in the Caribbean, or South America. With the declaration of war, Williams imagines the Navy would play its part and destroy any trespassing fleet; an invading European army ashore would be cut off from its logistics train. With the enemy isolated this way, a major land campaign might not be required, and the diplomats could go back to work. This gambit recalls the true state of the Spanish Army in 1898, lacking supplies, while the Amada was bottled up at Santiago de Cuba.
Williams makes his case to the war college audience as the commandant did annually to the Secretary of the Navy; success of the Advanced Base Force would depend upon sufficient appropriations for equipage and training. Equipping the ABF would require increased outlays and investments. Without this support, the advanced base outfit would find itself isolated when the fleet is off in pursuit of the enemy. To accomplish its mission, the ABF would need to accomplish the following:
“Mines must be laid across the entrances, guns must be mounted, magazines constructed, earthworks erected and then concealed,, search-lights and their power plants established to cover the entrances from the sea and the probable landing place of an enemy’s raiding force, wireless stations put up to keep in touch with the Battle Fleet that operates from the base, and the whole must be knit and tied together by a system of communications embracing wagon roads, trails, telegraph and telephone lines, cable lines across bays and rivers, flag and semaphore signal systems by day and electric and other light signals by night.”
Buttressing these fixed defenses, Williams makes the case for a mobile regiment of infantry and artillery, to defend the defenders, and amplifies the point that the Marines that execute this mission must not be the Marines embarked on the ships of the Navy as security guard detachments.
Williams recounts the efforts of the Marines to develop the mission ever since the landing at Guantanamo, and the hurdles the service experienced in the dozen intervening years. Lagging appropriations, antiquated weapons and gear, and the lack of a well-equipped campus upon which Marines could practice the tasks required by the mission had been the refrain of the entire Marine Corps for decades, conditions that were only exacerbated given the spotlight on the advanced base mission. Williams anticipated future criticism of the force and acknowledged that the fundamental change it was engaged in was an arduous row to hoe.
Williams continues his lecture by offering the audience an estimate of the situation and presents a table of organization specific to the advanced base mission. He makes his case for permanently assigned units, without mentioning that the bulk of the Marine Corps’ experience with expeditionary forces had been ad hoc units prior to the War of 1898. To accommodate large permanent garrisons, Williams states the Marines would need established permanent stations on the east and west coasts; at the time, the best facilities to house the regiments of the brigade were located at League Island (Philadelphia), Mare Island (north of San Francisco), and Honolulu. Guantanamo would remain a good location for basing and training the force, given the harbor’s waters, and expanses of terrain to conduct exercises.
Williams describes the artillery the advanced base force has been forced to make do with — cast off deck guns taken from the decks of pre-Spanish War cruisers. He makes the case for the purchase of modern naval rifles — the same ones arming Navy cruisers at that date — infantry machine guns, and modern field artillery pieces. Force engineers would require “portable derricks with donkey boilers and engines” — mobile cranes — and trucks, and portable rail set-ups to haul the gun platforms and mounts for the naval guns. He highlighted the need for range-finding apparatus for the naval rifles (which was missing during exercises in the Philippines in earlier years) and weatherproof magazines for the guns firing bagged charges. Naval mines, produced by the Army, in numbers large enough to span a two-mile wide strait, and the boats capable of handling said mines would be essential to the Marines’ mission. He itemized the requisite communications equipment to communicate in all available mediums, and a wish-list of tools and equipment wanted. Searchlights, generators, cables, tents, three months’ provisions, and a field hospital, as well as everything listed would require dedicated shipping, and the Marines of the unit should travel as complete units, not doled out to travel on the various ships of a squadron.
Dion Williams delved into nautical architecture discussing the requirements for dedicated shipping for the advanced base mission and made recommendations on how other naval vessels may be employed in the defense of the base. Minelayers, submarines, and destroyers would multiply the defense’s coverage, and he envisioned the use of ships’ electricians in helping Marines with the construction of electrical infrastructure ashore.
Finally, Williams reiterates the necessity of theoretical instruction, drills, and exercises the outfit would require in every aspect of establishing the advanced base; to establish the capabilities desired, large scale exercises, using battalion sized forces, needed to be conducted using the real estate available at Guantanamo, Culebra, near San Diego, in Hawai’i, Guam, and the Philippines.
Williams’ lecture is interesting on many levels. It displays the level of understanding within the Marine Corps of a mission they’d only adopted a decade prior. It also show his understanding of the Navy, and why the mission was of importance. His address ably recognizes the Marine Corps’ new role within strategic fleet operations. It identifies the Japanese as the near-peer competitor in the western Pacific and displays the sophistication of plans that strategists at Office of Naval Intelligence, Naval War College, and the General Board had developed regarding the anticipated recovery of the Philippine Territory. Williams highlights where the Marine Corps had been challenged in adopting the mission, and asked for assistance in securing new ships, equipment, and real estate. His lecture is important because it documents the history of the ABF, its status in 1912, and plans envisioned for its utilization in support of naval operations. Its place in the greater development of Marine Corps amphibious doctrine is evident.
Williams had as much experience with landing operations as any Marine. He led the USS BALTIMORE’s guard ashore two days after the Battle of Manila Bay to secure the naval station at Cavite and authored what may be the first volume on landing operations reconnaissance in the United States. He served in the Philippines during the insurrection and had multiple tours serving as a Fleet Marine Officer, reporting to naval squadron commanders, messing with Navy officers, and planning landing parties. His 1912 lecture provides us a snapshot in the development of American amphibious doctrine development, and offers a model for the discussion of the role of the Marine Corps.
“Objections have been advance that the service above outlined for the Marines would preclude them from possible participation with the Army in the strictly military land operations that follow the conquest of the sea; but, far from it, the service thus performed by these Marine brigades in defending the advanced bases for the Navy would make them the best seasoned troops under the flag; and their duty in the first phase of the campaign, - the strictly naval phase – completed, they would be ready to join an Army of invasion, welcome additions to such a fighting force, ready to profit by their varied experiences in the opening actions of the war.”
As Williams made his presentation to the staff and students at the NWC, Captain Earl “Pete” Ellis, USMC, was completing his studies there, and preparing to fill the billet of Marine instructor on staff, replacing Major Charles Dunlap, USMC.
In the fall, Commandant Biddle reported to the Secretary of the Navy on the Advanced Base School, and how it was determining best methods and equipment to accomplish the mission. The school had the mandate to form the doctrine it was teaching in
“Theoretical study by officers of such military and naval subjects as pertain to the selection, occupation, and attack and defense of advanced base positions…”
The inventory of collected advanced base material and equipment showed that it was worn out or obsolescent, and that purchases of both ordnance and equipment required further study. With plans for two regiments of 1,300 to form the Advanced Base Brigade — one fixed, one mobile — Biddle identified the one naval transport available, USS PRAIRIE, as deficient, capable of transporting only 750-800 men at a time.
When the 1912 insurrection in eastern Cuba posed a threat to American commercial interests the Secretary of the Navy ordered Commandant Biddle to form and deploy an expeditionary brigade of Marines to protect American mining and rail interests in eastern Cuba. The 1st Provisional Regiment consisted of Marines assigned to the Advanced Base School, and sailed from League Island in May aboard USS PRAIRIE. A second regiment formed and sailed for Cuba split between the decks of USSs GEORGIA, MINNESOTA, MISSISSIPPI, MISSOURI, NEBRASKA, NEW JERSEY, OHIO, RHODE ISLAND, and USS WASHINGTON; the two regiments formed the First Provisional Brigade serving in Cuba during June and July; most of the 2,000 Marines remained at Guantanamo, with small detachments located in towns and villages of the east. One skirmish with Cubans occurred, with no deaths. By August the Brigade cased its colors, and all hands returned to their assigned duty stations.
After months of factional fighting, Nicaragua devolved into a full-blown revolution in July of 1912. Under what could be called “Special Operations in Central American Waters”, the Department of the Navy dispatched warships to the Nicaraguan coast to protect American interests; a regiment of Marines from League Island sailed for Nicaragua aboard USS PRAIRIE in August, under Colonel Joseph H. Pendleton, USMC. Pendleton’s unit was joined by a second regiment in September led by Colonel Franklin J. Moses. Landing parties composed of Bluejackets and Marines secured railroads and American owned facilities ashore and a battalion of Marines under Major Smedley Butler redeployed from the Panama Canal Zone to Nicaragua, aboard the collier USS JUSTIN. Rear Admiral William H.H. Southerland commanded all U.S. forces ashore in Nicaragua, totaling 2350 men.[25] The Americans engaged Nicaraguan at Chichigalpa, Masaya and Leon on October 4th and 6th; U.S. forces suffered seven killed and thirteen wounded, and the revolutionist leaders surrendered to Southerland.[26]
In the Pacific, the Pacific Fleet used Honolulu as a base for three months of exercises from November of 1911 through March of 1912. Following that, the fleet spent three months in Olongopo, before returning home by way of China and Japan. These exercises highlighted the need for “properly designed and equipped transports for the use of the Navy.”
Commandant Biddle sought to consolidate recruit training at two locations from four, at Norfolk on the east coast, and Mare Island on the west. The continued accelerated operations tempo has resulted in some recruits having their training cut short by half, a less-than-optimal situation. Marines trained for sea duty at Annapolis likewise had their training cut short, for expeditionary service. The permanent companies established at the Navy yards were successfully employed on expeditionary deployments; reflecting the change Commandant Biddle’s report to the Secretary of the Navy minimized the importance of having Marines performing security functions aboard the Navy Yards. To support constant operations he sought ways to reduce the Marines’ obligations as gate guards and patrolling sentries in the yards.
[1] Dirk Anthony Ballendorf and Merrill L. Bartlett. Pete Ellis: An Amphibious Warfare Prophet, 1880-1923. Naval Institute Press, Annapolis. 1997. p.44
[2] The eight bureaus within the department were: Yards and Docks; Equipment; Navigation (personnel and operations); Ordnance; Construction and Repair; Steam Engineering; Supplies and Accounts; and Medicine and Surgery.
[3] Shulimson. Mission. pp. 156-162
[4] In 1897 Roosevelt had to referee a dispute between Lieutenant Colonel Robert Huntington and Major Percival Pope over who would command the Marine Barracks at New York, Boston, and Mare Island. Pope won the popularity contest, which must have made the deployment to Guantanamo a year later awkward, with Pope (BnXO) reporting to Huntington (BnCO).
[5] William F. Fullam. “The System of Naval Training and Discipline Required to Promote Efficiency and Attract Americans”. Proceedings. October 1890.
[6] Jack Shulimson and Graham A. Cosmas. “Teddy Roosevelt and the Corps’ Sea-Going Mission”. The Colonel Robert D. Heinl, Jr. 1982 Memorial Award in Marine Corps History. Marine Corps Gazette. History and Museums Division, Headquarters, U.S. Marine Corps, Washington, DC. 1982.
[7] “United States Army Transport Service Regulations, 1908.” The Secretary of War. 1908.
[8] “The Coordination of the Mobile and Coast Artillery Units of the Army in the National Defense.” Army War College, Washington. 1915.
[9] Millett and Shulimson. Commandants. p.159
[10] Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Naval Academy and Marine Corps, Committee on Naval Affairs, House of Representatives, on The Status of the U.S. Marine Corps, 1909. Washington, Government Printing Office 1909.
[11] The breakdown in the size of the Marines in 1909; ashore in the U.S., 219 officers, 4,021 enlisted; ashore in foreign stations, 66 officers, 2,681 enlisted; aboard ship, 49 officers, 2,498 enlisted.
[12] Commandant’s Report. 1910.
[13] “the Butcher of Samar” 1902-1903.
[14] Waller served as one of Biddle’s battalion commanders in China.
[15] Port Royal would soon be known as Paris Island, then Parris Island, as it is known today.
[16] Miller. Plan Orange.
[17] Miller WPO p.148.
[18] Leo J. Daugherty III. Pioneers of Amphibious Warfare, 1898-1945 Profiles of Fourteen American Military Strategists. McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Jefferson. 2009. Kindle edition.
[19] Frederic Wise. A Marine Tells It To You. J.H. Sears & Company, Inc. New York. 1929. p.112.
[20] John H. Johnstone. A Brief History of the First Marines. Historical Division, Quantico. 1968.
[21] Frederic Wise. A Marine Tells It To You. J.H. Sears & Company, Inc. New York. 1929. p.119.
[22] Marine Corps Museum, Quantico, VA. The Journal of Frank Keeler 1898. Marine Corps Letters Series, Number One. Carolyn A. Tyson, ed. 1967.
[23] Total 330/9454, authorized 333/9521.
[24] Since leading a detachment of Marines ashore at Cavite, in the wake of Dewey’s victory at Manila Bay, Williams had attended and instructed at NWC, had been Fleet Marine Officer for the Atlantic, then U.S. Fleet, and authored a major work on pre-landing reconnaissance.
[25] From Secretary of the Navy Annual Report, 1912. “Special Operations in Central American Waters” July 29, 1912 Nicaraguan waters. ANNAPOLIS to Corinto, landing Bluejackets. TACOMA to Bluefields Aug-Oct ’12 50 Bluejackets ashore. Aug 15 ’12 350 Marines from Panama aboard collier JUSTIN to Managua. August 10 tensions rise, DENVER responds. August 21 regiment of Marines dispatched aboard CALIFORNIA, GLACIER, PROMETHEUS, and SATURN, followed by COLORADO and CLEVELAND. CLEVELAND (last) arrives 14SEP12, total in country 2350. Fighting on October 4, USN 4 KIA 5 WIA USMC 5 WIA. October 3 KIA 3 WIA.
[26] Harry Allanson Ellsworth. One Hundred Eighty Landings of United States Marines – The Official US Marine Corps History of Landings from 1800 to 1934. Marine Corps History Division, Washington. 1934.
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