Marines don't give medals for morale, they give medals for exceptional service.
My son made sargeant within two years of enlisting in the Marine Corp. He went on to become an ambassador's aide when he developed diabetes and was given a medical discharge. He was devastated as he had planned to make the corp his career.
I respectfully disagree as far as the "national service" medals go- they are given to every servicemember for service during periods of conflict and some are specific to areas of conflict. It seems that over my last 23 years (the 19th of January was my 23rd anniversary of raising my hand and heading off to Basic Training) there has been a significant increase in the amount of service-wide medals for almost every mission. I lost count of the medals I received for just stepping into the Balkans in 1996- the awards that matter to me are those that "I" earned myself.
I can say that I have only worked about eight years of "joint service" so I have only limited experience with Marines, thus I don't know how difficult it is to be recognized for exceptional service. I noticed that Marines do have much fewer medals on their chests than the rest of the services, which must lend credence to your statement.
I hope you didn't take my comments the wrong way. I was trying to say that it seems strange that an NCO wouldn't have at least one achievement award or commendation medal- but, remember that I'm Army.
Thank you very much. Couldn't have been said better. For those of you who think that these awards that this Marine recieved are given to just anyone....think again. The Presidential Unit Citation is not given to just anyone. People think before you comment on the death of this Marine. FYI this Marine is a very close friend of my family, he lived with us for years as we were growing up and I have always considered him a brother. He was killed and was forced to leave behind his beautiful daughter who isn't even a year yet. Why don't you people who have nothing good to say, keep your comments to yourselves. Respect the family and dear friends who lost this outstanding person, great father and friend and very brave soul alone. Keeps your comments to yourself.