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General: Deploy or risk promotion chances

CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. — Marines who have not gone to war should be concerned when promotion time comes around, a top Corps official said.

“I guarantee you ... if you have a six- to seven-year war and you don’t get to the war zone, you needn’t wonder what’s going to happen when it’s time for promotion,” said Lt. Gen. Ronald Coleman, deputy commandant for manpower and reserve affairs in Quantico, Va.

Coleman spoke at a Marine Corps Association meeting here Wednesday, where he told an audience of mainly retired and active-duty Marines that leathernecks who haven’t deployed to a combat zone need to find a way to get to the fight.

“If I’m on the promotion board, I’m going to make a note of that,” he said.

While some Marines have served three, four and, in some cases, five tours in Iraq, 40,000 still have not deployed, Coleman said. Some of those Marines are in the pipeline, including those making the transition from boot camp to infantry battalions.

In January, Commandant Gen. James Conway announced his plans to rearrange assignments so that every Marine is given the chance to go to war. At the time of his announcement, titled “Every Marine Into the Fight,” some 66,000 Marines — a third of the force — had not deployed.