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Trooper
 
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Storied unit returning for anti-terrorism duty
1st Battalion, 9th Marines, to reactivate with 4th MEB
By C. Mark Brinkley
Times staff writer
CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. — The Marine Corps is adding an infantry battalion to help fight the war on terrorism, and they’re giving it an old name.
The fabled 1st Battalion, 9th Marines, better known as “The Walking Dead,” returns to service after nearly a decade of deactivation, reforming as the anti-terrorism battalion for the 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade (Anti-Terrorism).
“It is coming back,” said one 4th MEB Marine familiar with the plan. “They still haven’t worked out all of the details on how or when.”
Marine officials said the formation of the Corps’ anti-terrorism brigade in fall 2001, a response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, increased the operational tempo for the 2nd Marine Division but provided no additional resources.
So the division took the requirement out of its own hide, rotating battalions to the 4th MEB in much the same fashion as supplying grunts to Marine Expeditionary Units or the Unit Deployment Program rotation to Okinawa.
But the requirement left the division using nine infantry battalions to support “operations that require 10 infantry battalions,” according to an internal division memo on the change. Compounding the problem, the division also lost a maneuver element when the headquarters for 8th Marines was transferred to 4th MEB.
The Corps took the problem to Congress, which approved the funds necessary to give 4th MEB its own command element and its own battalion, to be designated as 1/9. Marine officials are still determining how to proceed with the change and how to best incorporate the new unit.
The anti-terrorism unit will have some big shoes to fill.
Activated in 1942, the original 1/9 saw some of the toughest combat in the Corps’ history: Bougainville, Iwo Jima, Khe Sahn, Operation Desert Storm and Somalia. The unit was deactivated in September 1994.
Empty threat
In Vietnam, members of 1/9 faced constant combat.
By most accounts, the unit’s nickname came from a 1966 speech in which North Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh labeled the unit “the walking dead,” promising to wipe them out as they operated in a valley near Da Nang.
The promise didn’t materialize, and the name stuck.
“Every one of us has wished for years that the unit would come back,” said Phil Sutherland, a former staff sergeant and president of the 1/9 association, who served in the battalion for 14 months in Vietnam in 1966 and 1967. “It’s passing the torch to a new generation of Marines. And from what I’ve seen, I’ll be very, very proud to pass the torch to them. Semper Fi.”
    
pain is temporary, glory is forever and chicks dig scars, SO MOVE OUT AND DRAW FIRE!!!
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Strac Trooper
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That's interesting - I didn't know they got deactivated.
Welcome to another Red Devil rehersal, only this time it's for real
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Seasoned Vet
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1/9
They will be needed. I hope they stay with the 4th MEB (or MOB as I have heard.)
Go with God, but make Him walk the point.
If you load a mudfoot down with a lot of gadgets he has to watch somebody a lot more simply equipped - say with a stone axe - will sneak up and bash his head in while he is trying to read a Vernier. - Robert Heinlein
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Strac Trooper
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As good as reactivating a batallion is...allow me to throw out another idea:
What if the Marines were to recreate/ressurect Raider Batallions? Train them to be specialized in house/house or anti Terror and let them loose in the sandbox.
Mi dos centavos
 
Fighters are our salvation, But BOMBERS alone provide us with the means of VICTORY! - Winston Churchill
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Hard Charger
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quote:
Originally posted by warpusher
As good as reactivating a batallion is...allow me to throw out another idea:
What if the Marines were to recreate/ressurect Raider Batallions? Train them to be specialized in house/house or anti Terror and let them loose in the sandbox.
Mi dos centavos
It's starting now in a small way:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/printer-friendly.asp?ARTICLE_ID=30148
"EBO isn't a strategy. It's a sales pitch." - Ralph Peters
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Stare Master
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The title of the topic brought on flashback of that horrible movie from a few years ago.[yuck]
Only two defining forces have ever offered to die for you, Jesus Christ and the American GI. One died for your soul, the other for your freedom.
"History teaches that when you become indifferent and lose the will to fight someone who has the will to fight will take over." COLONEL BULL SIMONS
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President for Life
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Trooper
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