Danger Close, Lima 3/7, 2003-2007
Danger Close, Lima 3/7, 2003-2007
The focus on Danger Close, Lima 3/7 2003-2007, is on the operational flexibility of a Marine Company – from Big War (2003 Invasion of Country) to Small Wars – which depends upon the junior leaders like Bellmont, Mejia, and hundreds of other Marines through 4 deployments and in so doing both helps the veterans to explain why their part of the war was necessary and shows how similar American companies may play a vital role in the national defense in the future. Danger Close stands for the principle of combined arms – best exemplified by a 400m danger close artillery mission during The Push, but also in hundreds of other engagements – which historians like Bickel, Mars Learning identify as the lasting historical value of a prior period of Small Wars (Haiti, Nicaragua, Dominican Republic) to a Big War through the key leaders who served in both eras. For the average Marine Grunt who served in Lima 3/7 (or the thousands of post 9/11 Small Wars), all the violence may seem senseless and unconnected to a larger purpose, especially in the darkest days of the insurgency in 2004-2006. Danger Close is a history designed to show how the company adapted the counterinsurgency doctrine (COIN) to win their war, just as a World War II Company had to adapt through cycles of training/ combat.
