CAMP LEJEUNE, NC - "We're entering the summer months, and you know what that means: nice weather, beach parties, cooking out. And a more than 40% increase in duels," says Gunnery Sergeant Colin Bond as he clicks to a slide that indicates a sharp rise in the incidence of duels during warmer parts of the year.
The Department of Defense has long struggled to respond to public claims that it has failed to effectively address what seems to be an epidemic of duels following the reduction of deployments as operations have wound down in Iraq and Afghanistan. Though dueling has long been explicitly punishable under Punitive Article 114 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, lawmakers and the public have called for a more active role in preventing duels instead of punishing them.
"Explain to me why you think you're never going to be in a duel, and I'll show you the statistics that tell you to think twice," says Bond to a classroom full of young Marines. "Whatever you're going to tell me, I've already heard it: 'Oh, they're only talking about duels to the death.' Well let me tell you, even a duel to first blood can end in tragedy."
Bond is talking about the tragic case of Corporals Sanchez and Forbes, two of the latest Marines whose lives were claimed by a supposedly "non-lethal" duel. The two Marines had been listening to their senior enlisted adviser, Master Gunnery Sergeant Ned Prince, talking about duels he engaged in as a young Marine, one of which resulted in a prominent facial scar that had gotten him a date to the Marine Corps Birthday Ball with supermodel Adriana Sklenarikova (later Adriana Karembeu) in 1995.
