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PHOTO: Jack Hoban/RGI
On February 28th, 2010, this author published an article on the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program. The article came to the attention of Jack Hoban, a Subject Matter Expert, Consultant, and Instructor with MCMAP. This author was contacted by Mr. Hoban’s company, Resolution Group International, who facilitated an interview with him. Mr. Hoban graciously shared his thoughts on the Warrior Ethos and MCMAP. This author would like to thank Mr. Hoban for generously sharing his time and instruction.
In 1996, the United States Marine Corps convened a Close Quarter Combat Review Board that would later prove to be an inflection point in its history. Under normal circumstances, this board is convened periodically to review the Marine Corps training manual on Close Quarter Combat, more commonly known to the civilian world as hand-to-hand fighting.
This particular board was very different from its predecessors. Its mission was to review the Close Quarter Combat Manual in light of the new form of warfare that the Marines faced in the coming years - counterinsurgency and asymmetric warfare.
Since its inception, the United States Marine Corps has been called upon to perform the most difficult missions - from shooting at the enemy from the swaying masts of tall ships, to the brutal amphibious assaults on Iwo Jima, Okinawa and countless Japanese strongholds in World War II. Today, the Marines are fighting wars where there are no front and rear areas, and the distinctions are blurred between insurgents and civilians.
Faced with this new form of warfare, the Marines called upon Dr. Robert Humphrey, a respected academic, whose warrior credentials were indelibly forged as a Marine rifle platoon leader on Iwo Jima. It was his vision, along with others, which led to the belief that success in this new battlespace lay in building ethical Marines who could win the hearts and minds of the local populace.
Dr. Humphrey became ill at this critical time and the Marines, with Humphrey’s blessing, invited a former Marine Captain, Jack Hoban, who had trained in traditional Japanese martial arts with Dr. Masaaki Hatsumi. Sadly, Dr. Humphrey soon passed away, leaving Jack Hoban to carry on and enact his vision of the ethical warrior.
Jack Hoban and Dr. Humphrey defined ethics as "moral values in action": the compass that points true north for a warrior and guides his or her every action. Lack of ethics made for wrong decisions, and wrong decisions, coupled with moral ambiguity, often led to the kind of behavior that created more enemies.
Satsujinken, Katsujinken (The sword that takes life must also be the sword that gives life) - Yagyu Shinkage Ryu Maxim
Jack Hoban's training in traditional martial arts had inculcated him with a warrior ethos. This ethos is core to many traditional arts. It was as if the developers of these martial arts realized that imparting their teachings without the proper ethical grounding could lead to disaster. The ethical lessons are ubiquitous in martial arts philosophy, and are central to the teachings of many famous warriors like Miyamoto Musashi and Yagyu Munenori. Simply put, teaching martial skills without ethical training is akin to providing people with loaded guns without the knowledge of when, where, and why the guns should be used.
PHOTO: Jack Hoban/RGI
Practitioners of traditional martial arts come upon their ethos through a form of guided enlightenment - constant training, unquestioning obedience, little discussion, and lessons by example. Often, years of discipline and rigorous training pass before the martial artist has the epiphany that he or she had been learning a code of ethics and putting it into action.
Hoban's biggest challenge was twofold - to persuade the Marines and their superiors that ethical training was central to addressing their new challenges, and that martial arts, as opposed to a Powerpoint slideshow, was the best vehicle to convey this lesson. He also had lacked the luxury of time - the Marines had to have their epiphanies before they shipped out.
Gallant fellows these soldiers - they always go for the thickest place in the fence.
- Admiral de Robeck, while watching the landings at Gallipoli, 1915
Knowing that this ethical training had to be foundational to the Corps, certain Marines, along with Hoban, began by re-examining the Holy of Holies - the Marine Corps Core Values of Honor, Courage, and Commitment."This is where the trouble began," recalls Hoban. "Couldn't it be said that the enemy has these values too? Weren’t they also courageous and committed – at least many of them – and didn’t they have a code of “honor” that contrasted sharply with ours? So what made us different?"
When examined with an objective eye, it became evident that these values, despite their seemingly solid definitions, were in fact relative to a deeper concept. This revealed a critical question that needed to be asked - what was the absolute truth that underpinned these values?
"Without a universal, superseding value as a foundation, honor could easily turn into conceit, courage into martyrdom, and commitment into fanaticism." Hoban found that without a solid, nonnegotiable value underpinning the Corps Values, they would not only remain relative, but they would also cease to be the key differentiator that sets the Marines apart from all others, especially the enemy.
So what was the absolute, universal value that everyone could agree upon? It turns out that the answer was enshrined in the second sentence of the Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Life was the universal value. The Marine protects his or her life, and the lives of all others. With this, the Marines had identified the ethical anchor, the non-negotiable truth that underpinned the Core Values - the protection of all life. Being a moral absolute, this protection extended to the enemy - if they chose to stop taking life. Protecting life did not preclude the taking of life - so long as the killing was done to protect others.
One can imagine how this first resonated with the average Marine rifleman, whose job description was pretty clear - to close with and kill the enemy. The Marines who had committed themselves to the Ethical Warrior concept had a monumental task ahead of them. Not only did they need to convince the other Marines, they had to convince certain old-school Marine commanders, of the paramount and foundational importance of the universal life value.
So how were attitudes to be changed?
First, was the redefinition of the warrior from being a killer to a protector who only killed as a consequence of protecting others. Most humans, with the possible exception of those with sociopathic tendencies, are protectors by nature - and will be even more so with the right training and support.
The second was the recognition that protectors were the most to be feared in nature. A grizzly bear protecting its food source would only fight to a point, but a mother bear protecting her cubs would fight to the death. Thus, protectors are naturally more fearsome.
The third idea was to depart from the traditional, but often unacknowledged practice of dehumanizing the enemy. Various terms and epithets, from "gooks" to "hajjis" have been, and are being, used to take away the enemy's human face - in theory making them easier to kill without compunction. The answer lay in changing how the enemy was viewed: "They" kill people over beliefs. Killing people over beliefs is morally reprehensible. "We" kill only to protect life.
This was the morally unambiguous differentiator that would set the United States Marine apart from all others. Would this make the Marines soft? Hoban argues that "treating people with respect is not going to make you less capable of doing what needs to be done."
These realizations, and the simple but powerful idea that a single Marine, acting unethically, could negatively change the moral standing of the United States in the world, led to a refreshed acceptance of the importance of ethics in the makeup of a Marine warrior.
The next challenge was to find the most effective way to teach the principle of the universal life value and transform the Marine mindset from that of a killer to that of a protector.
In 2000, the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program was established, with then Lt. Col. (now Colonel) George Bristol as its director. At the onset of the program, ethics was a component of the training, but the focus, naturally, was on techniques and developing a combat mindset. Gradually, however, the powers that be, including Bristol and his replacement, Lt. Col. Kevin Nally (now a Brigadier General select) realized that very lethal techniques must be taught with adequate assurance that the Marines would be absolutely clear on when they should be used. It was this thought process that led to the introduction of warrior ethics as the fundamental perspective of MCMAP. The current Director of MCMAP, Lt. Col. Joe Shusko (ret.) takes it to the next level: Ethics and character were to comprise the core component and not a side item, and MCMAP was to be its delivery vehicle. Still, the question remained, especially with the short time frames, how to deliver the ethical lessons effectively?
Studies have shown that experiential learning leads to mastery - doing and experiencing lessons work better than simply listening or reading. Experienced martial artists and sensei understand this. Jack Hoban and others in the Marines understood this. But the diversity of the Marines, American learning styles, and the short timeframes did not allow the luxury of teaching by guided enlightenment.
Today, Hoban teaches the Marines ethics lessons in the context of martial arts training. He introduces each lesson by demonstrating and teaching techniques that are good metaphors for the specific lesson being imparted. Having found that people are more receptive and open to ideas after some physical exertion, he reinforces the physical lessons with short lectures that are peppered with stories, examples, vivid imagery, and anecdotes called “tie-ins,” as they “tie" the physical to the moral.
At a recent Bujinkan Taijutsu seminar in suburban Chicago, Hoban used the same teaching techniques in a roomful of martial artists, a number of whom were ex-military and first responders. The students would watch each technique with rapt attention, as Hoban emphasized the ethical lesson inherent in that technique. The students would practice the technique, absorbing the lesson through their movement.
Periodically, Hoban would halt the activity, gather everyone around, and reinforce and elaborate on the lesson.
Combining the eastern principle of teaching ethics and martial arts as one with modern American teaching styles has been successful, but it is an ongoing journey. Martial artists have a saying that learning martial arts is like drinking from a river - the water is best closer to the source. At the Marine base in Quantico, Virginia, Hoban regularly teaches Marine MCMAP instructors, passing on the lessons from 30 years of martial arts training. By passing on the legacies of Dr. Robert Humphrey and Masaaki Hatsumi Sensei, he is doing his part to ensure that the Marines drink as close to the source as possible.
This Memorial Day, we commemorate those who have fallen in service of our country, while protecting the lives of others. As we reflect on those who made the supreme sacrifice, we now realize that they did so while fulfilling the supreme mission of protecting life.
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