MacsLady
CSI Level Two
pre-warning: I got it in my head to do actual research on Mac's military background, so this contains excited military geeky-ness :lol:
ok, I don't know if any of you remember when i got a the bug to look up all of Mac's medals from when we got to see them in 'Blacklist'. Suffice to say i was very impressed with the implications of the operations he had to have been involved in. Recently, i've started to think more and more that he *had* to have been in SpecOps of some sort. But i wanted more than just a hunch based on vague intimations. But I'm in the Army, and know very little about Marine and Navy SpecOp insignia and training.
Then i was at Uni to talk to an advisor, and there happened to be a bunch of fliers advertising Air Force Pararescuers (bad.ass. SpecOps!!!). Listed as part of their training was (of course) Airborne school, and diver. That grabbed my attention. I remembered Mac having a diver badge on his uniform.
So, off i scurried to the internet and a solid research direction to go on. And am I ever excited about what our gorgeous Marine was probably involved in!!!
For a bit of a refresher -
My research got a little tricky, because current Marines can apparantly have the silver badge that Mac is wearing or a gold one that is slightly different which is for Combat Divers. But this latter badge didn't exist until 2006, and a specific Combatant Diver school wasn't instituted until the mid-90's. Prior to that, there were Marine combat divers, but it was much more of a 3-part training system, utilizing both Marine and Navy diver and swim schools. And there wasn't a different badge to differentiate between regular salvage-type divers and combat divers. Plus, because the current system is so different, knowing what the badge meant in the 1980's was becoming more and more just guesswork.
Then i remembered he had Naval Parachutist wings. I think i 'SQUEEEE'd' :lol: That meant he hadn't just gone to basic airborne school, but also completed additional qualifying jumps. I was convinced that scuba badge had 'combat' written all over it, and not just a basic diver certification.
Then i had a second breakthrough. I found out that to be a combat diver, one has to be a recon infantryman, and THEN i found *this* in regards to said recon infantrymen -
" In addition to basic infantry skills, he is responsible for highly refined scouting and patrolling skills. He must possess advanced proficiency in scout swimming, small boat operations, close combat skills, airborne, surface and sub-surface insertion and extraction techniques, assault climbing, demolitions, forward observer procedures for supporting arms, initial terminal guidance operations for heliborne assaults, airborne insertion operations, and various waterborne operations.
He specializes in communications, photography, threat weapons and equipment recognition, and various types of point, area, and related necessary overlap of ground amphibious reconnaissance operations. Marines assigned to assault teams possess advanced skills in assault weaponry, breaching demolitions, close quarter battle skills and raid techniques. Selected reconnaissance men are further trained as static line and free-fall parachutists and combatant divers."
At this point i *did* SQUEEEEEEEEE!!!! :guffaw:
Our boy was an infantry officer, who was not only a said badass recon infantry officer, but a super badass SpecOp parachutist, combat diver recon infantry officer! :evil: It also explains why he never really talks about what he did in the Marines, and his discomfort when his father mentioned his silver star. I'd be willing to bet just about anything that he got it for getting his team out of a really bad mission-gone-wrong situation better than could have possibly been hoped for, but lost member(s) of his team, and being Mac, blamed himself and didn't think he should have gotten the award.
So there you go, more proof of Mac's awesomeness!
*SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEE* Wow, this is impressive!
The stuff you found out is really interesting. I think the situation you described sounds very likely, given the medals he has and the info you found out. It also fits with the fact that he's never really talked about his time in the Marines (except about Beirut, and that only once to Stella). Given that he was a lieutenant then, and a major by the time he visited his father in the Blacklist flashback, which is about 1991 I think, that's quite a long period of time - 7/8 years - where we don't know what he was doing in the Marines. But if he was a Major by 1991, that's pretty fast moving up the ranks from Lt to Major. Makes me wonder if whatever he did to get the Silver Star also got him a promotion to Major, and perhaps one of the reasons he left was also that he felt he didn't deserve the promotion either.
It's weird that you should bring this up now, because listening to Matterhorn and also a book I read a while ago that was about winners of the Silver Star, Navy Cross, and Medal of Honour, it definitely seems that in order to be awarded the Silver Star you have to do something pretty damn awesome and that it can often involve something along the lines of the situation you described, ie getting out of a mission-gone-badly-wrong scenario. So that had me thinking what had Mac done to get his Silver Star. Then you posted this! It's like you're reading my mind.
I always thought it was interesting how Mac has a lot of his Marine stuff on his office walls, but he's hardly ever talked about what he actually did in the Marines, which made me think he's proud to have served, but uneasy talking about what he actually did in the Marines, and that would definitely fit with the scenario you suggest.
Sam, thanks for the lovely pics!:drool:
