 Cameras work fine, Captain. OK, we'll head to home. The run was made at 750 feet. I couldn't see what we needed in the afflicts. I made this forward firing cast. Should be about 10 or 15 frames down in the first run. There it is. OK, we'll need prints of these three and the rest of the run. Gentlemen, plan alpha caused for landing on Blue Beach. However, our photo interpreters have ascertained from our aerial reconnaissance Blue Beach to be heavily fortified. Therefore, we recommend Plan Bravo, the landing on Red Beach. Mission, amphibious operations. The target, a distant stretch of Sandy Beach, is brought close by reconnaissance. Months of planning have paid off. Now the final decisions must be made. Lieutenant, get a message out to the amphibious task force commander. Yes, sir. Advise him that we recommend using Plan Bravo with a landing on Red Beach. We also recommend HL at 0500. At sea, a Marine battalion landing team is poised for the assault. Men, weapons, and Navy support. All together, they form a powerful striking weapon. They've been training together for seven months. Get your team out there to go. OK, I'm going to attack. Now it's going to happen. And they're ready. The half late of dawn, the landing force moves ashore. Everybody traveling just a little faster under fire. Wave after wave hits the beach on a precise schedule. In 30 minutes, 1,200 Marines will be ashore. With the men comes mechanized support, the fast-moving Antos tank killer searching out its targets. You ought to have action for half hour and put up the black flag. Yes, sir. War games, a rehearsal, that's right. Just going through the motions, no. That's not right. Team, move out to the left and belly up to the left. Go! Month after month, the men of the Fleet Marine Force carry out these exercises. And they take it seriously, all of it. Each time, the beach is a proving ground for tactics, for machines, for men. Each time, they gain experience, better their performance. You don't wait for combat to take your training seriously. Here's an actual incident during an amphibious exercise. An enemy strong point is holding up a marine rifle company. An umpire points out the target. The company commander calls in a forward air controller. He's a marine aviator assigned to the infantry to guide air strikes against the enemy. Ordnance, 96-2, 36-1. Assisting the controller is a marine communicator, a radio specialist, and a jeep full of equipment. Ready in minutes, sir. Within minutes, he's set up and ready to go. Hello, binder. This is Bird Dog 1-4. I have one priority mission over. The request is cleared swiftly through the echelons of command. Close air support is a Marine Corps specialty. Mission number one is priority. Fortified position in target area, nine or six, three, three, one, eight. Chart number one, request bombing, rocket, and napalm attack. Aircraft already on patrol are directed to the area. Bird Dog 1-4, Bird Dog 1-4. So it's Highball 3-3, over. Guiding a flight of supersonic attack aircraft down to a small target on the ground isn't easy. It's done by one pilot talking to another in the special language of flight. One, two, three, four, eight, and six, four, eight, one, four, aircraft, over. Highball 3-3, this is Bird Dog 1-4. I have you in sight. You're cleared on target, heading three, five, zero degrees, pull out left. The wind that the target is from the east, set 12 knots, I suggest a running, heading, six, four, four. A Bird Dog 1-4, this is Highball 3-3. Your transmission's broken. Say again, please, over. It happens every so often, usually at the wrong time. Hello, Bird Dog 1-4, Highball 3-3, over. Just cut dead it out, you get it? Without guidance, the strike aircraft can't complete the mission. At the moment, everything depends on one marine's communications know-how. His response is almost instinctive, as he checks the connections, the terminals, the fuses, seeking to isolate the problem. Highball 3-3, this is Bird Dog 1-4. How do you read me now, over? I ride your Bird Dog 1-4. This is Highball 3-3. We're reading you loud and clear, over. Roger Highball 3-3, this is Bird Dog 1-4. I say again, I suggest you're bomb heading from north to south, over. Roger Bird Dog 1-4, this is Highball 3-3. We have the target in sight. We're rolling hot right now. Was training that pulled him through? Less than a year out of high school, this marine knew where to look and what to do, because he was trained in what the Marine Corps calls immediate action. The training he received in communications built one step upon another from first principles of radio on through increasingly complex theory and practice. All of it has been pointed toward rapid response to cope with the emergency as soon as it happens. One of his training covered the MRC-87 used in ground air communication, a vertical, systematic instruction that stuck with him when he needed it. Through this receiver transmitter, if any students are still in doubt as to the position of these units, please come forward. Roger, where is the receiver transmitter located? Right here, Stevenson. However, the most complex piece of equipment that will give you the most trouble in the field is the antenna coupler. But even small problems will give you more trouble in the field, such as wires, cables, small joints. Marine training made him a competent technician. His initiative and alertness did the rest. Thousands of marine specialists participate in every exercise. Their professional touch is as necessary here as it is in combat. The helicopter crew chief. OK, real good. Give me a thumbs up when it's completed. The combat engineer, the aerologist, probing for tomorrow's weather, the highly trained reconnaissance troops repelling in behind enemy lines, far afield the work of hundreds of other Marines supports the operation. Each of the 30,000 Marines sent to formal training courses each year becomes expert in his field. Marine Corps builds men, men who are highly skilled, who seek to excel in their assignment, whether it's programming a computer or maintaining the fuel system of a jet fighter. Where do they derive this standard of excellence? It's something Marines will tell you, you know from the beginning, from the first day you put on the uniform. The Marine Corps wants your best effort, no matter how specialized his assignment. Every Marine is a rifleman, first, last, and always. You didn't know what you were doing. The training is rugged, unforgiving. It may mean changing the habits of a lifetime, but these standards will set the pace for every other experience you'll have in the Corps. Men, combat is a serious business. If you go into combat and don't know what you're doing, you are going to be in serious trouble. Is that clear? Come on, Marine. There's a safety arm. When you aim in at the tank downrange at 300 yards, you squeeze the trigger and you do not jerk it. You'll always be confronted with a challenge of high performance. Teams do their part, but victory still hinges on the courage and stamina of the individual, the rifleman, himself an expert in the heart of winning and surviving in the very serious business of combat. The constant training and practice gives him that extra margin, the confidence, the alertness, the mark of the professional. And this is how the Marine Corps has always trained the young Americans who have joined its ranks. For more than 190 years, whenever Marines have gone into battle for their country, training, thorough and realistic, has prepared them to face any problem, any challenge, anywhere. Marines are experts in the complexities of modern warfare. And they are the same self-reliant men who have answered this nation's call since 1775. The Marine Corps is offering you a challenge to join the ranks of these Marines to undergo the training and building of body, mind, and spirit, the mark of a Marine.