{"id":19267,"date":"2017-05-27T18:47:13","date_gmt":"2017-05-27T18:47:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/uncategorized\/2017\/05\/27\/ammo-techs-honored-at-annual-event\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T20:47:42","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T20:47:42","slug":"ammo-techs-honored-at-annual-event","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2017\/05\/27\/ammo-techs-honored-at-annual-event\/","title":{"rendered":"Ammo Techs honored at annual event"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A small crowd of Marines and family members gathered recently to recognize four of their own in a vital job that touches every Marine but gets scant attention. The Marine Corps Association and Foundation guest speaker, Brig.\u00a0Gen. Jason Q. Bohm, let the Marines of the ammunition technician\u00a0community know how crucial they are. The commanding general of Training Command at Headquarters Marine\u00a0Corps rattled off all the work that ammo techs do in his remarks at\u00a0the Woodbridge, Virginia, event. “Our ammo techs need to know how to do it all,” Bohm said.\u00a0“You must become the experts in the procurement, the receipt,\u00a0the storage, the issuing, the handling, the shipping and the\u00a0salvage and renovation of ammunition,” Bohm said.As he spoke to the crowd of 155 people, a fraction of a small job field that contains less than\u00a01,400 enlisted Marines, Bohm called their job the “essence”\u00a0of the Marine Air Ground Task Force.\u00a0Connecting that work to one of the Marines’ core ethos of “Every Marine a Rifleman,” he recited the Rifleman’s Creed, learned\u00a0in boot camp, and ended by repeating the phrase, “without my rifle, I am useless.” “Let’s let that sink in for a moment … ,” he said. “Does anybody see what the missing ingredient is?” “Ammo!” shouted a few. “Because without the ammo, the rifleman and the rifle are useless,”\u00a0Bohm said. But a voice from the crowd shouted out, “Fix bayonets,” a reference to attaching bayonets to the ends of rifles for use as extended blades in close combat or when ammunition runs out.“Fix bayonets,” Bohm replied with a smirk. “That works too\u00a0my friend but I’d rather have the ammo.” The awards are named in honor of Gunnery Sgt. Edwin W. Johnson, Jr., an\u00a0ammo tech who died Sept. 8, 2009, in the Ganjgal Valley, Afghanistan, with two other Marines and a Navy corpsman while fighting off\u00a0insurgents as Afghan allies retreated. The awardees included:<\/p>\n\n\n\n