Outgoing Marine Corps Installations Pacific Sgt. Maj. Anthony Easton, who’s retiring after 31 years of service, speaks during his relief-and-appointment ceremony at Camp Foster, Okinawa, on July 8, 2025. (Keishi Koja/Stars and Stripes)

CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa — Anthony Easton closed out 31 years with the Marine Corps this week by turning over his duties as sergeant major of Marine Corps Installations Pacific to his successor and saying farewell.

A former combat engineer with a penchant for “blowing things up,” Easton, a native of St. Cloud, Minn., concluded his career during a relief-and-appointment ceremony Tuesday at Foster’s Officers Club. Sgt. Maj. Jorge Ortiz, a former field radio operator from Sacramento, Calif., on his second tour on Okinawa, took up the post.

More than 300 Marines and guests were on hand, including Marine Corps Installations Pacific commander Maj. Gen. Brian Wolford and 3rd Marine Expeditionary Brigade commander Brig. Gen. Trevor Hall.

Retiring Sgt. Maj. Anthony Easton, center, relinquishes the sword of office for sergeant major of Marine Corps Installations Pacific to Maj. Gen. Brian Wolford at the Officers Club on Camp Foster, Okinawa, on July 8, 2025. Sgt. Maj. Jorge Ortiz, right, is Easton’s successor. (Brian McElhiney/Stars and Stripes)

Easton, a veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, recounted the highs and lows of his service during a June 26 interview at his Foster office.

“To this day, it still puts a smile on my face, getting to go out and work with C-4 and TNT and dynamite and working with landmines,” he said, referring to his military occupational specialty. “I love that MOS — I literally had a blast.”

Easton arrived on Okinawa in 2022 after the COVID-19 pandemic but in time to see a series of allegations of sexual assault and attempted sexual assault against U.S. service members, including a handful of Marines.

Two weeks before Easton’s retirement ceremony, a Japanese court sentenced Lance Cpl. Jamel Clayton to seven years in prison for choking a woman while attempting to sexually assault her in May 2024.

Since September, two other Okinawa-based Marines have been charged in separate cases with injuring women during sexual assaults. In December, a Japanese court convicted Air Force Senior Airman Brennon Washington of kidnapping and sexually assaulting a minor a year earlier.

This torii gate stood outside the home of Marine Corps Installations Pacific Sgt. Maj. Anthony Easton at Camp Foster, Okinawa. He received it as a memento after relinquishing the post at Foster’s Officer Club on July 8, 2025. (Brian McElhiney/Stars and Stripes)

All these cases, and others, roiled the Okinawa community, generating numerous official complaints and prompting U.S. military officers and diplomats to make apologies. Liberty rules for all U.S. troops in Japan were tightened in October.

Easton acknowledged the problem but said most Marines are inclined to do something good on Okinawa — beach cleanups, building construction and holiday toy drives.

Drunken driving incidents involving service members are down, he added, proof that efforts to educate service members are paying off.

The installations command and the prefectural government together hosted a series of lectures last year aimed at eradicating drunken driving, according to an August news release from the command. U.S. military and Okinawa authorities, during the first Okinawa Community Partnership Forum in May, also discussed improving the briefing given to service members new to the island.

“Morale is still really good here,” Easton said.

Jorge Ortiz give his first speech as sergeant major of Marine Corps Installations Pacific during a relief-and-appointment ceremony at the Officers Club on Camp Foster, Okinawa, on July 8, 2025. (Keishi Koja/Stars and Stripes)

During his stint on Okinawa, the Marine Corps activated a second littoral regiment on the island as part of its Force Design initiative. Force Design calls for a more agile, expeditionary force capable of countering China’s growing military presence in the Pacific.

Easton described the new 12th Littoral Regiment — about 2,000 Marines — as “exactly what we need” in the Indo-Pacific region.

“The challenges in the Pacific are different than other places, because the Pacific is set up differently,” he said. “It’s the Pacific — there’s islands out here. When the commandant put Force Design 2030 in place, he was thinking about those things.”

Easton, during the interview, also spoke of his time in Iraq in summer 2004 with 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marine Regiment, 1st Combat Engineer Battalion. He paused for a few seconds to collect himself while remembering a fellow Marine there.

Lance Cpl. Bryan Kelly, of Klamath Falls, Ore., died July 16, 2004, of wounds he received in Anbar province, the Associated Press reported at the time.

Easton said the key to “getting back on the horse” after experiencing a combat death is having conversations about what happened.

“We loved our Marine and we’re going to honor our Marine, but the mission doesn’t stop just because you lose somebody,” he said.