This was a matter of a group of Marines remaining in an LVTP-7 for approximately thirty minutes while it slowly filled up with water.
The only lack of leadership was that an NCO on scene didn't tell them all to leave their gear and get out of a sinking craft.
Exactly right. The ranking marine on the track did not take the necessary action to save his men.
The gleeful tones of the two rat congresscritters commenting on this, says it all about how this cost the general his career.
Correct, why any NCO would not tell his men to get top side is beyond me. And why are they training 70 miles off the coast?
Well, to be fair, the other problem was that that LVTP (and a few others) were not seaworthy, and should not have been deployed for a training exercise.
“The only lack of leadership was that an NCO on scene didn’t tell them all to leave their gear and get out of a sinking craft.”
That sounds about right. It was certainly a CF with plenty of stupidity to go around for these marines to drown this way.
This may have been a convenient opportunity for them to get rid of the Major General. I suspect there may have been more rationale (justified or not) than just this accident.
Ya, in the PPCLI, we didn’t wait to get told much of anything, we normally acted on our own.