Marine division gets new commander

The Marine Corps’ storied “Blue Diamond” headquartered at Camp Pendleton received a new leader Thursday, when Maj. Gen. Lawrence Nicholson relinquished command of the 1st Marine Division to Brig. Gen. Daniel Yoo.

Nicholson, who was confirmed this week for a third star, is slated to take command of the Okinawa, Japan-based 3rd Marine Expeditionary Force.

He was described at the Thursday evening ceremony as a leader gifted with two qualities that are essential for Marine commanders as well as football coaches: the ability to make people believe they can win and to make them play as a team. After Nicholson’s two years in command of the division, “it operates as a war fighting team,” said Lt. Gen. David Berger, commanding general of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force.

Nicholson devoted much of his speech to thanking two Gold Star families whose sons died under his command. “How do you grieve, how do you get around that and move forward?” Nicholson asked.

For Jim and Carla Hogan of San Clemente, they started the Socks for Heroes charity to send fresh footwear to deployed troops. Their son Donald Hogan was killed in Nawa, Afghanistan in 2009. The 20-year-old lance corporal was posthumously awarded the Navy Cross for sacrificing his life to warn other troops away from a hand-triggered bomb.

Nicholson also singled out another couple in the crowd, the parents of 1st Lt. Nathan Krissoff. The 25-year-old counterintelligence officer for a reconnaissance battalion was killed in 2006 in Fallujah, Iraq by a roadside bomb. After he died, his father tried to join the Navy as a medical officer so he could treat wounded Marines. Nicholson told the orthopedic surgeon that he was too old, so William Krissoff appealed to then-President George Bush.

Lt. Cmdr. William Krissoff was commissioned as an officer at age 63 and went on to serve on the medical front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Yoo, who oversaw the withdrawal of Marine combat forces from Afghanistan last year, will lead the division for about six weeks before heading to Tampa, Fla. to serve on the staff of U.S. Special Operations Command.

Maj. Gen. Daniel O’Donohue, the commander of Marine Forces Cyber Command, is scheduled to take command of the 1st Marine Division in September.

The leadership shuffle at the West Coast ground combat unit is unfolding while the Corps is deployed to Iraq on a new training and advising mission targeting the Islamic State militant group, among other worldwide commitments.

The division of about 23,000 Marines and sailors at Camp Pendleton and Twentynine Palms includes three infantry regiments, one artillery regiment, and additional units of tanks, amphibious assault vehicles, light armored vehicles, combat engineers, reconnaissance Marines, headquarters and the band.

The 1st Marine Division is the oldest, largest and most decorated of the Corps’ three active duty divisions. It was activated aboard the battleship Texas in 1941 during World War II. The division earned its first of nine Presidential Unit Citations fighting in the bloody Battle of Guadalcanal and served in every major U.S. conflict since.

Yoo, who most recently served as assistant commander of the 1st Marine Division, rose through the ranks holding a variety of infantry and reconnaissance commands, as well as staff positions at the Pentagon, with the Joint Chiefs and Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command.

During an earlier tour to Afghanistan in 2009-2010, Yoo oversaw a regional center advising the Afghan National Army. In 2011, he took command of the recruit depot in San Diego and the Western Recruiting Region.

Yoo is the recipient of the Legion of Merit, a Bronze Star Medal with Gold Star, and a Combat Action Ribbon, among other awards. He is a Marine Combatant Diver, a Military Freefall Parachutist, and a graduate of U.S. Army Ranger School.

Nicholson was wounded by a rocket attack in Fallujah, Iraq in 2004 when he was a colonel in command of the 1st Marine Regiment, shortly before the second battle to subdue the enemy stronghold. He returned months later at the end of the ferocious door-to-door operation.

In 2009 after the Corps redirected from Iraq, Nicholson led the first major Marine force into southern Afghanistan as commanding general of Task Force Leatherneck and the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade in Helmand Province.

Among other recent leadership changes in the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force based in Southern California and Yuma: Brig. Gen. David Ottignon assumed command of 1st Marine Logistics Group from Maj. Gen. Vincent Coglianese on July 24.

Ottignon, a combat engineer officer by training, previously served on staff at U.S. European Command. Coglianese will serve at the Pentagon in the Installations and Logistics Division of Headquarters Marine Corps.

The 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station, currently led by Maj. Gen. Michael Rocco, is not expected to change command until next summer.