Marine Corps historically balks at promoting generals of color
WASHINGTON » All things being equal, Col. Anthony Henderson has the military background that the Marine Corps says it prizes in a general: multiple combat tours, leadership experience and the respect of those he commanded and most who commanded him.
Yet three times he has been passed over for brigadier general, a prominent one- star rank that would put Henderson on the path to the top tier of Marine Corps leadership. Last year, the Navy secretary, Richard V. Spencer, even added a handwritten recommendation to Henderson’s candidacy: “Eminently qualified Marine we need now as BG,” he wrote.
But never in its history has the Marine Corps had anyone other than a white man in its most senior leadership posts. Henderson is Black.
“Tony Henderson has done everything you could do in the Marines except get a hand salute from Jesus Christ himself,” said Milton D. Whitfield Sr., a former Marine gunnery sergeant who served for 21 years.
Proud and fierce in their identity, the Marines have a singular race problem that critics say is rooted in decades of resistance to change. As the nation reels this summer from protests challenging centuries- long perceptions of race, the Marines — who have long cultivated a reputation as the United States’ strongest fighting force — remain an institution where a handful of white men rule more than 185,000 white, African- American, Hispanic and Asian men and women.
“It took an act of Congress last year to get them to integrate by gender at the platoon level,” said Rep. Anthony G. Brown, D- Md., a former Army helicopter pilot. “And now they continue to hold onto that 1950s vision of who Marines are.”
Current and former Marine Corps officials point to Henderson’s personality as an explanation for why he has been passed over, including what they call his tendency to speak his mind — traits that have not disqualified white Marine colonels.
Since the Marines first admitted African-American troops in 1942, the last military service to do so, only 25 have obtained the rank of general in any form. Not one has made it to the top four- star rank, an honor the Marines have bestowed on 72 white men. Six African- Americans reached lieutenant general, or three stars.
The rest have received one or two stars, the majority in areas such as logistics, aviation and transport, areas from which the Marine Corps does not choose its senior leadership.
Out of 82 Marine generals overall today, there are six African- American brigadier generals and one African- American major general.
Charles F. Bolden Jr., who would go on to command two Space Shuttle missions before becoming the first African- American to lead NASA, received only two stars in the Marines.
To make it to four stars, a candidate needs combat postings in his background. ( The pronoun “his” is apt because no woman has made it to four stars in the Marines, either.) Such a leader would have commanded troops in Iraq or Afghanistan, bearing responsibility for the lives of Marines who shed blood in poppy fields, mountain ranges and desolate desert villages.
The Marine Corps makes exceptions to this only- combat- arms rule when it gives four stars to aviators, including James F. Amos, in 2008, and Gary L. Thomas, in 2018. But they are white men.
It is difficult for those outside the armed services to understand the prestige that comes with becoming a four- star general or admiral.
Four- star officers sit on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, oversee an entire branch of the armed services or serve as top officers of a regional command around the world — Centcom, for example, which supervises all U. S. military operations in the Middle East. The commanders directly advise the defense secretary and the president.
For one week beginning Wednesday, the service’s promotion board will meet to consider its next group of generals. For the
fourth time, Henderson s is being deliberated. If he does not make it — the results will not be announced for months — his acquaintances say he is likely to leave the Marines.
Henderson declined to be interviewed for this article.
Officially, the Marine Corps says it cares deeply about diversity.
“Only as a unified force, free from discrimination, racial inequality and prejudice, can we fully demonstrate our core values, and serve as the elite war- fighting organization America requires and expects us to be,” Gen. David H. Berger, the Marine Corps commandant, wrote June 4 in a message to service members, in the wake of the protests that ignited after George Floyd died in the custody of the Minneapolis police.
Since the protests, senior Defense Department officials have begun an internal examination into how to increase the percentage of minority service members in its predominantly white officer corps. One of the steps Defense Secretary Mark Esper has announced is to remove the photographs of officer candidates from promotion board hearings.
Overall, the military has long promoted itself as one of the most diverse institutions in the country. About 43% of the 1.3 million men and women on active duty are people of color. But of the 42 most senior commanders in the military — those with four- star ranks in the Army, Navy, Air
Force, Marines and Coast Guard — only two are Black: Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr., the Air Force chief of staff, and Gen. Michael X. Garrett, who leads the Army Forces Command.
Gen. Paul M. Nakasone, whose father is a secondgeneration Japanese American, leads the U. S. Cyber Command.
There is only one woman in the group: Gen. Maryanne Miller, the chief of the Air Force’s Air Mobility Command, who is white.
The Marines have the worst diversity representation in their top ranks. In 2013, the branch released a photo of its six four- star generals, all gathered in desert camouflage at the commandant’s home at the Marine Barracks in Washington: John F. Kelly, Jim Mattis, Joseph F. Dunford Jr., James F. Amos, John R. Allen and John M. Paxton. The men are smiling as they hold their white Marine Corps coffee mugs.
All six have garnered respect across the political spectrum. But to Black Marines, the photo evokes a place where they do not belong.
“Look, I’m a dedicated Marine,” said Whitfield, the former gunnery sergeant. “But that photo makes me feel like they’re saying, ‘ None of you all are good enough to get to the high levels of authority or leadership.’ And I’m ashamed.”