Sergeant John M. Stryker, United States Marine Corps

“You gotta learn right and you gotta learn fast. And any man that doesn’t want to cooperate, I’ll make him wish he had never been born.”

Sergeant John M. Stryker is, in many ways, the ultimate example of the strong, efficient squad leader, the stereotype by which others were to be judged and the epitome of the values and ethos of the United States Marine Corps. He is a hard, strong man but also a very human figure who cares enough for his men to make their training harsh so that combat is easy. A combat veteran, he leads from the front and is full of courage. Although a fictional character in the movie Sands of Iwo Jima, his life and how he lived it showed the American public what life was like for a Marine in the Second World War.