Pantano acknowledged leaving a sign on a car above the corpses that said, "No better friend, No worse enemy," but then returned to remove it after one of his colleagues called it 'inappropriate'. This phrase is the motto of his Marine Corps battalion, and is promoted by his battalion commander as the combat philosophy of their unit. The slogan is also a popular Marine saying popularized by Lieutenant General James Mattis, then commanding general of the 1st Marine Division. In an interview with the BBC from March 20, 2005, Lieutenant Pantano said, ""I'm a New Yorker and 9/11 was a pretty significant event for me, our duty as Marines is, quite frankly, to export violence to the four corners of the globe, to make sure that this doesn't happen again.""