thedrifter
06-23-07, 05:35 PM
5th Marines bids farewell to one tough boss
Nicholson hands over decorated regiment
By Gidget Fuentes - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday Jun 23, 2007 16:37:02 EDT
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/xml/news/2007/06/marine_5thcommandchange_070623/MT_changecom_800_070622_287.jpg
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. — An insurgent 122mm rocket struck Camp Fallujah, fatally wounding his communications officer and shooting shrapnel into his body just hours after taking command of Regimental Combat Team 1, but Col. Larry D. Nicholson wasn’t going to be stopped.
Just three months after the Sept. 14, 2004, attack, Nicholson, with a new set of combat gear and surgical scars still healing, boarded an airplane and returned to Iraq, much to the surprise of his fellow commanders. Nicholson, a native of Canada and graduate of The Citadel, was intent on holding up his end of the bargain to finish that combat tour, one way or another.
“I really wanted to get back,” he said.
Nicholson took command of 5th Marines and last year deployed to Iraq leading Regimental Combat Team 5 in a yearlong combat tour in Iraq’s western Anbar province. The year saw many successes in rebuilding Iraq security forces and a renewed stability in Fallujah, once an insurgent stronghold.
On June 21, Nicholson handed over command of 5th Marines — “The Fighting Fifth” — to Col. Patrick Malay, a seasoned infantry and reconnaissance officer who led his men with 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines, through often harrowing deadly battles on Fallujah’s streets in late 2004.
Fifth Marines, one of two infantry regiments at Camp Pendleton, is the Corps’ most decorated unit, and among its recent combat awards are six Navy Cross medals — awarded to Marines with 3/5 who fought in Iraq. Its four infantry battalions —1/5, 2/5, 3/5 and 2/4 — have seen multiple Iraq combat tours but are on different operational rotations, including to Japan in the Unit Deployment Program and to ship-going Marine expeditionary units, which some have sent forces into combat in Iraq.
Nicholson, who was stationed in Brussels before he first landed in Iraq, now heads east to Quantico, Va., to command The Basic School and to be promoted to the rank of brigadier general.
Whether talking to Marines or large crowds, he speaks off the cuff, without notes, recounting with a heartfelt emotion the personal and poignant stories of his warrior Marines in great detail. At a recent ceremony awarding the Navy Cross medal to the family of a fallen 3/5 Marine Cpl. Jason S. Clairday, killed in Fallujah in 2004, he rattled off the names of five other “Darkhorse” battalion men who also earned the Navy Cross in Iraq. Each time, his words burst with the pride of a father praising his son’s courage, skill, bravery and awe-inspiring acts under fire.
Nicholson is of a breed of officer who’s a grunt at heart, a popular leader and a Marine’s Marine, a stout, optimistic officer with the call-sign Grizzly. He’s one of them, too: a battle-hardened, combat-wounded, fighting Marine.
“He’s a tough bastard,” Malay said in a recent interview from the Army Command and Staff College in Carlisle, Pa.
Malay remembers that fateful day in Iraq. Before he was evacuated, he said, Nicholson promised them, “I’ll be back.”
“He was a mess. He was bleeding all over the place,” he recalled. Marines in the room quickly put pressure bandages on Nicholson’s wounds, which included shrapnel that struck his shoulder and upper arm.
So it was a shock of sorts when Malay spotted Nicholson stepping out of a Humvee on Christmas Eve 2004 at Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi.
“I walked up to him and I said, Holy ****, is that you, Larry?’ ” he recalled, laughing. “He’s a tough bastard.”
“We all have a great deal of respect for him,” he added.
Nicholson served out the tour as the operations officer for 1st Marine Division.
“It was more emotional for me I think to get back. It was pretty exciting for me,” he said. “The exciting thing for me was the elections.”
Better-than-expected voter turnout in Fallujah buoyed expectations, he said, and “we were able to pull it off without attacks, so people had a chance to vote.”
The road back
For Nicholson, that return to Iraq didn’t end his journey to regain his physical health.
He spent a month at the Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., after initial emergency surgeries at military hospitals in Iraq and Germany, and settled in Charleston, S.C., for recuperation. His wife, Debbie, nursed him through that period, changing his bandages and shuttling him to outpatient appointments and physical therapy at the VA Medical Center in Charleston.
“I worked hard to get the motion back,” he said of his arm. He endured painful skin graft surgeries in which doctors took skin from his legs for reconstruction.
Nicholson speaks of the actions and sacrifices of the men in his battalions with awe and reverence. It’s a close, personal relationship, the tight bonds of combat, the brotherhood and shared sacrifice. They, like him, have become embedded in the regiment’s combat lore, and they share history with thousands of other men before them. Combat and sacrifice become the ties that bind them, forever.
Nicholson knows well that it’s a lifelong link. The regiment and Darkhorse battalion, 3/5, have strong alumni associations with members veterans of several wars who gather at ceremonies and reunions and occasional coffee shops and restaurants to reminisce and honor their fallen members.
“Our alumni net is pretty strong here,” he said. “There’s a combat legacy here that even the young guys understand, and they get it.”
These days, Nicholson, whose own son is on his second Iraq combat tour, would like to take on a small personal mission: compiling a database of all the wounded men of 5th Marines.
During his command tour, he tracked each month the regiment’s wounded Marines, many who lived in barracks rooms near the chow hall at Camp San Mateo. But those are only ones still on the books, attached to the battalions, and he worries about other Marines trying to get healthy and their life-after-combat back on track.
It might be tough logistically or bureaucratically, but he’d like 5th Marines to put its “long arms” around those who might go forgotten while recovering or once they hang up the uniform and leave the Corps. But he’d like to know.
“Do we have the ability to see? How good are our records?” he asked.
Recent tour saw key successes
Nicholson said the presence, engagement and actions of RCT-5 units led to some significant progress in Anbar during the 2006-2007 tour in recruiting and training more Iraqi security forces.
Local sheikhs took on a bolstered role, especially in the more-rural tribal areas. The ISF took the lead in Fallujah, and “the sheikhs’ role was a catalyst for a large part of that,” Nicholson said. He spent many nights visiting and dining with local sheikhs, time and energy that paid dividends in easing local relations, assisting with community policing and recruiting local men into Iraqi security forces with the help of military training teams.
“Those things really paid off,” he said. “What we tried to achieve was win mutual respect ... When we achieve mutual respect, a lot of great things happen.”
They jumpstarted the local economy. While some Iraqis had jobs, more were needed.
“We knew that going in,” Nicholson said. “The question was: OK, how do we get them back to work?”
With cash and the help of U.S. aid agencies and Defense and State departments, more Iraqi businesses started up in the area and some businessmen who fled to Jordan returned to restart their businesses.
“We started seeing some progress of that at the end,” he said.
In Fallujah, stronger tribal ties to ISF and coalition forces made for a less-welcoming environment for insurgents and al-Qaida terrorists who had set up shop in the city. While many local residents object to U.S. presence, most don’t support al-Qaida either, Nicholson noted, adding, “I don’t think al-Qaida has any future in Fallujah.”
Nicholson said he’s proud of what the regiment accomplished in Iraq, especially in Fallujah.
“We laid the foundation for the continued growth and emergence of Iraqi forces,” he said, noting that more local men began to step up and assume security roles. “We have what I consider to be now probably the best police force in Fallujah,” he added.
Ellie
Nicholson hands over decorated regiment
By Gidget Fuentes - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday Jun 23, 2007 16:37:02 EDT
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/xml/news/2007/06/marine_5thcommandchange_070623/MT_changecom_800_070622_287.jpg
CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. — An insurgent 122mm rocket struck Camp Fallujah, fatally wounding his communications officer and shooting shrapnel into his body just hours after taking command of Regimental Combat Team 1, but Col. Larry D. Nicholson wasn’t going to be stopped.
Just three months after the Sept. 14, 2004, attack, Nicholson, with a new set of combat gear and surgical scars still healing, boarded an airplane and returned to Iraq, much to the surprise of his fellow commanders. Nicholson, a native of Canada and graduate of The Citadel, was intent on holding up his end of the bargain to finish that combat tour, one way or another.
“I really wanted to get back,” he said.
Nicholson took command of 5th Marines and last year deployed to Iraq leading Regimental Combat Team 5 in a yearlong combat tour in Iraq’s western Anbar province. The year saw many successes in rebuilding Iraq security forces and a renewed stability in Fallujah, once an insurgent stronghold.
On June 21, Nicholson handed over command of 5th Marines — “The Fighting Fifth” — to Col. Patrick Malay, a seasoned infantry and reconnaissance officer who led his men with 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines, through often harrowing deadly battles on Fallujah’s streets in late 2004.
Fifth Marines, one of two infantry regiments at Camp Pendleton, is the Corps’ most decorated unit, and among its recent combat awards are six Navy Cross medals — awarded to Marines with 3/5 who fought in Iraq. Its four infantry battalions —1/5, 2/5, 3/5 and 2/4 — have seen multiple Iraq combat tours but are on different operational rotations, including to Japan in the Unit Deployment Program and to ship-going Marine expeditionary units, which some have sent forces into combat in Iraq.
Nicholson, who was stationed in Brussels before he first landed in Iraq, now heads east to Quantico, Va., to command The Basic School and to be promoted to the rank of brigadier general.
Whether talking to Marines or large crowds, he speaks off the cuff, without notes, recounting with a heartfelt emotion the personal and poignant stories of his warrior Marines in great detail. At a recent ceremony awarding the Navy Cross medal to the family of a fallen 3/5 Marine Cpl. Jason S. Clairday, killed in Fallujah in 2004, he rattled off the names of five other “Darkhorse” battalion men who also earned the Navy Cross in Iraq. Each time, his words burst with the pride of a father praising his son’s courage, skill, bravery and awe-inspiring acts under fire.
Nicholson is of a breed of officer who’s a grunt at heart, a popular leader and a Marine’s Marine, a stout, optimistic officer with the call-sign Grizzly. He’s one of them, too: a battle-hardened, combat-wounded, fighting Marine.
“He’s a tough bastard,” Malay said in a recent interview from the Army Command and Staff College in Carlisle, Pa.
Malay remembers that fateful day in Iraq. Before he was evacuated, he said, Nicholson promised them, “I’ll be back.”
“He was a mess. He was bleeding all over the place,” he recalled. Marines in the room quickly put pressure bandages on Nicholson’s wounds, which included shrapnel that struck his shoulder and upper arm.
So it was a shock of sorts when Malay spotted Nicholson stepping out of a Humvee on Christmas Eve 2004 at Camp Blue Diamond in Ramadi.
“I walked up to him and I said, Holy ****, is that you, Larry?’ ” he recalled, laughing. “He’s a tough bastard.”
“We all have a great deal of respect for him,” he added.
Nicholson served out the tour as the operations officer for 1st Marine Division.
“It was more emotional for me I think to get back. It was pretty exciting for me,” he said. “The exciting thing for me was the elections.”
Better-than-expected voter turnout in Fallujah buoyed expectations, he said, and “we were able to pull it off without attacks, so people had a chance to vote.”
The road back
For Nicholson, that return to Iraq didn’t end his journey to regain his physical health.
He spent a month at the Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., after initial emergency surgeries at military hospitals in Iraq and Germany, and settled in Charleston, S.C., for recuperation. His wife, Debbie, nursed him through that period, changing his bandages and shuttling him to outpatient appointments and physical therapy at the VA Medical Center in Charleston.
“I worked hard to get the motion back,” he said of his arm. He endured painful skin graft surgeries in which doctors took skin from his legs for reconstruction.
Nicholson speaks of the actions and sacrifices of the men in his battalions with awe and reverence. It’s a close, personal relationship, the tight bonds of combat, the brotherhood and shared sacrifice. They, like him, have become embedded in the regiment’s combat lore, and they share history with thousands of other men before them. Combat and sacrifice become the ties that bind them, forever.
Nicholson knows well that it’s a lifelong link. The regiment and Darkhorse battalion, 3/5, have strong alumni associations with members veterans of several wars who gather at ceremonies and reunions and occasional coffee shops and restaurants to reminisce and honor their fallen members.
“Our alumni net is pretty strong here,” he said. “There’s a combat legacy here that even the young guys understand, and they get it.”
These days, Nicholson, whose own son is on his second Iraq combat tour, would like to take on a small personal mission: compiling a database of all the wounded men of 5th Marines.
During his command tour, he tracked each month the regiment’s wounded Marines, many who lived in barracks rooms near the chow hall at Camp San Mateo. But those are only ones still on the books, attached to the battalions, and he worries about other Marines trying to get healthy and their life-after-combat back on track.
It might be tough logistically or bureaucratically, but he’d like 5th Marines to put its “long arms” around those who might go forgotten while recovering or once they hang up the uniform and leave the Corps. But he’d like to know.
“Do we have the ability to see? How good are our records?” he asked.
Recent tour saw key successes
Nicholson said the presence, engagement and actions of RCT-5 units led to some significant progress in Anbar during the 2006-2007 tour in recruiting and training more Iraqi security forces.
Local sheikhs took on a bolstered role, especially in the more-rural tribal areas. The ISF took the lead in Fallujah, and “the sheikhs’ role was a catalyst for a large part of that,” Nicholson said. He spent many nights visiting and dining with local sheikhs, time and energy that paid dividends in easing local relations, assisting with community policing and recruiting local men into Iraqi security forces with the help of military training teams.
“Those things really paid off,” he said. “What we tried to achieve was win mutual respect ... When we achieve mutual respect, a lot of great things happen.”
They jumpstarted the local economy. While some Iraqis had jobs, more were needed.
“We knew that going in,” Nicholson said. “The question was: OK, how do we get them back to work?”
With cash and the help of U.S. aid agencies and Defense and State departments, more Iraqi businesses started up in the area and some businessmen who fled to Jordan returned to restart their businesses.
“We started seeing some progress of that at the end,” he said.
In Fallujah, stronger tribal ties to ISF and coalition forces made for a less-welcoming environment for insurgents and al-Qaida terrorists who had set up shop in the city. While many local residents object to U.S. presence, most don’t support al-Qaida either, Nicholson noted, adding, “I don’t think al-Qaida has any future in Fallujah.”
Nicholson said he’s proud of what the regiment accomplished in Iraq, especially in Fallujah.
“We laid the foundation for the continued growth and emergence of Iraqi forces,” he said, noting that more local men began to step up and assume security roles. “We have what I consider to be now probably the best police force in Fallujah,” he added.
Ellie