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State of FORCECOM September 2012

Greetings Marines,
I hope you have all had a great month, I know my report is late but it
is better late than never.
I would like the following units to the corps
The 126th Stormriders from the 1st Brigade
The 340th Time Keepers from the 3rd Brigade
The 805th Einerjar from the 6th Brigade
The 809th Arctic Wolves from the 6th Brigade
I would also like to take this moment to thank MGN Tom Webster for his
service to the corps as the 6th Brigade OIC as he decided to step down
for personal reasons, Tom I wish you all the best in your future
endeavours.
I have had marines send me emails asking me about old awards. For
example the 20th Anniversary Ribbon this ribbon was issued from August
2003 to August 2004 which was the corps 20th Anniversary asking for it
just before IC 2012 which is on the eve of the 30th anniversary does
not make sense. Even if you can prove that you were a marine during
2003 and 2004 what has taken you 9 years to ask for the award?
Here is what the SFMC Policy is on awards
It is found on page 38 of the 2010 SFMC Policy Manual
7.01 SFMC Awards Nomination Policy
Award nominations must be made no more than six (6) months after the
event leading to the
nomination. The only exceptions to this policy are nominations for
Honor and Valor awards which
are, by necessity, made for actions over the course of the preceding
year. Any nominations
for awards older than six (6) months (except for Valor and Honor Award
nominations), will be
summarily denied based on this policy.
While I am talking about awards when you put someone in for an award
write down what they did to deserve the award, the more information
you write the better
Here is what the manual says about submitting for awards
Award nominations must include as much specific information as
possible (i.e., dates, times,
names of individuals, specific actions of the individuals and any
other information which may be
necessary to show that the basic criteria for that award has been
met). Award nominations will
be considered, but may be denied if requisite information is omitted
from the nomination. It is
the responsibility of the nominator to include all necessary
information for proper consideration
of the award; the Issuing Authority will not be required to conduct
any additional investigation
or send out requests for additional information, but is strongly
encouraged to do so if the award
nomination is unclear or subject to misinterpretation as to whether
the award is justified or not.
We realize it may not be possible to include everything that would
apply to an award nomination,
but any additional information that may be helpful and which can be
easily obtained should be
included to help the Issuing Authority understand the events
surrounding the nomination.

As necessary and wherever possible, supporting statements from
witnesses, victims, etc… and
other readily available information should be included with the award
nomination. This does
not mean you need to include statements from others for all awards
(i.e., Initial Entry Training
Ribbon, Great Barrier Award, etc…), but some awards (Gold and Silver
Nebula, Wounded Lion,
etc…) are of a type that this outside information greatly aids the
decision making process and
gives a much clearer view of what went on and how events transpired
leading to the award
nomination. The more information and details you can provide, the
stronger the nomination and
the better the chance that it will be awarded.
Sometimes awards can be denied and here is what the manual has to say
about that as well
In the event that an award is denied, for whatever reason, the person
may not be resubmitted for
that award based on that particular action/event for reconsideration.
This is why it is necessary
to include everything that may be pertinent to the award being
submitted for consideration.
The decision of the Issuing Authority may be appealed, in accordance
with the SFMC Appeal
Policy found in Section 2 of this manual if you feel the denial was in error.
I would like to ask all the marines that currently hold or have been
in charge of a unit and if your unit had a unit logo if they can
please send it to me at forcecom at sfi-sfmc.org as we are trying to
create a webpage with all the unit logos so that we can honour all the
units that exist in the corps and those that have left us as well
Well that is all for this report
Until next time
Be safe out there
John Kiwi Kane
Master Gunnery Sergeant, SFMC
Commanding Officer, Forces Command
STARFLEET Marine Corps
forcecom at sfi-sfmc.org]]>