Camp Bojeador, PHILIPPINES – Two U.S. Marines with Marine Corps Installations Pacific, Marine Corps Base Camp Butler, detached from their parent commands to provide full postal operations and support for Marines with 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment, 3rd Marine Division, during Exercise Balikatan 2024.

These Marines deployed to the Philippines on April 20 where there was no current post office support for 90 days. However, with coordination from 3rd MLR, Fleet Mail Center, Yokohama, and Naval Supply, Yokosuka, MCIPAC postal was able to establish cargo lanes for sending and receiving mail shortly after sending Marines to Camp Bojeador.

“The biggest misconception with postal Marines is that some commanders and enlisted leaders think about only the unit or battalion mailroom when they think of us,” said Chief Warrant Officer Michael Atkins, postal director of MCIPAC. “They don’t realize that there’s an entire side of the postal field preparing year-round ready for deployment.”

Staff Sgt. Tylar Pruitt and Sgt. Guillermo Brambila, arrived in the Philippines on April 20, where they were assigned to work in Camp Bojeador. Along with Cpl. Noah Torralba and Lance Cpl. Hailey Holsey, both postal clerks, these four were responsible for the sending and receiving of mail for Marines in the entire exercise. While working out of Camp Bojeador for mailing operations, they frequently travel to Subic Bay, Paredes Air Station, Laoag International Airport, and Naval Base Camilo Osias.

“The process was pretty tedious, when we arrived at the location we had to identify network capabilities and facilities available for processing and storing mail,” said Pruitt, postal chief of Exercise Balikatan 2024. “When we arrived we had to hit the ground running by securing a quadcon for storage, Wi-Fi from an onsite Marine Corps Community Services, and a few other amenities to create a sustainable postal operation.”

According to Pruitt, postal operations were established within a week of their arrival to the Philippines.

Year round, postal Marines with MCIPAC maintain their equipment and deployment readiness through exercises and training. Balikatan 2024 is a prime example of a situation that postal Marines train to support.

The Marine Corps is the only branch that retains the postal military occupational specialty. For other branches, postal operations are a secondary assigned duty and not a primary specialization. Whenever other branches need to provide postal support, they must train their personnel ahead of time. Due to this, the Marine Corps holds the fastest postal capability among all the military branches.

The Marine Corps maintains a force of around 450 postal Marines who are ready to support deployments for all Marine Expeditionary Force units across the world. These capabilities also make postal Marines heavily relied on in a joint environment. Because the Marine Corps retains their dedicated personnel, senior postal officers and staff noncommissioned officers can be readily sent in joint operations.

In the case of Balikatan, MCIPAC Postal coordinated with the Fleet Mail Center, Yokohama, and Naval Supply, Yokosuka, to establish cargo lanes for sending and receiving mail to 3rd MLR’s locations.

Some of the equipment that was brought to Balikatan 2024 included postage meters, scales, scanners, and a computer. This equipment is maintained year round by MCIPAC postal for deployments and exercises.

“When I was deployed to support Operation Enduring Freedom, we had seen Marines who had been outside the wire for 30 to 45 days,” said Atkins. “Some of these Marines were in firefights two, three, four times a day and sleeping in skirmisher trenches.”

Atkins recalled the rough environment that the Marines of OEF went through, explaining that one squad in OEF had lost over a third of their Marines in combat. During OEF, postal, Post Exchange, and dispersing sections came to deliver Marines their mail.

“It reminds them exactly what they’re fighting for and it brings that physical connection of home that they didn’t have,” said Atkins. “Just providing a little taste of home can help build morale and remind someone exactly what they’re going home to and what they are there [OEF] for.”

Even though Exercise Balikatan 2024 does not reflect the combat environment during OEF. Marines are still away from their families.

“Once we had arrived there and started offloading the mail, the Marines sort of started to flock to us,” said Pruitt. “You could tell that receiving the mail had lifted their morale even if only for a bit which I feel was pretty significant given the environment of the Philippines.”

Pruitt explained that receiving and sending mail can help relieve some of the unique living conditions that Marines face while on exercise or deployment. Service members often miss special events like birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays while on exercise or deployment. Before leaving their assigned permanent duty station, Marines are assigned a gear list that limits the amount of items they can take with them or bring back with them. However, with an established post office, Marines can receive items to improve the quality of life and also send souvenirs to family and friends.

When a family member decides to send mail to a recipient Marine in Exercise Balikatan 2024, they will pay for its initial transportation to a gateway in Chicago, Illinois. After that, the Department of Defense pays for transportation of that mail until it reaches its final destination.

Upon the arrival of mail to Chicago, it gets transported to Manila through an air contract along passenger flights. From Manila, mail is transported to Laoag International Airport to be received by the postal Marines. Once received by postal Marines, they are distributed to Marines of 3rd MLR participating in Exercise Balikatan 2024.

“Retaining postal Marines, and the executing training we complete throughout the year to maintain MOS proficiency and deployment readiness, means that if any commander wants to deploy with postal capabilities, it’s done,” said Atkins. “I can send Marines immediately to support units.”