American Rhetoric: Movie Speech

"The Pacific" S1.E1 (2010)

RLt Col. Lewis 'Chesty' Puller Delivers Day One Briefing to Non-Commissioned Officers

The uniform that you wear, and the globe-and-anchor emblem that you have earned, will make the difference between the freedom of the world and its enslavement.

December 7th was quite a day, in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

On the same day, December 8th, on the other side of the international dateline, in places called Guam, Wake, the Malay Peninsula, Hong Kong, the Philippine islands, we were also attacked by the army, air force, and navy of the Empire of Japan. The Japanese are in the process of taking half of the world. And they mean to keep it -- with death from the air, land, and sea.

But here is what the Japs are not expecting: The United States Marine Corps.

Now, never mind Europe -- the Nazis, Mussolini, Hitler, is not gonna be our job. Well, not until they can't whip him without us.

The Pacific will be our theater of war. The Marines will do battle with the Japs on tiny specks of turf that we have never heard of. You, noncommissioned officers, you are the sinew and the muscle of the corps. The orders come from the brass and you get it done.

And whenever this war is over, when we have swept upon the main islands of Japan and destroyed every scrap of that empire, the strategy will have been that of others. The victory will have been won by you -- you, the NCOs., with the chevrons on your sleeves, and the instincts in your guts, and the blood on your boots.

Those of you who are lucky enough to get home for Christmas -- hold your loved ones dearly; and join them in prayers for peace on earth and goodwill toward all men.

And then report back here ready to sail across God's vast ocean, where we will meet our enemy and kill them all.

Merry Christmas.

Happy 1942.