John Alan Coey (November 12, 1950 – July 19, 1975) was a U.S. Marine who served in the Rhodesian Army as one of "the Crippled Eagles", a loosely organised group of U.S. expatriates fighting for the unrecognized government of Rhodesia (today Zimbabwe) during that country's Bush War.

However, his political views led to an acrimonious fall from favor within the SAS, his expulsion from its officer training programme in October 1973 and ultimately to his leaving the unit four months later.

Though not an officer, Coey exerted some influence on tactical doctrine, making numerous suggestions to his superiors and pioneering the combat medic role in the Rhodesian Army, which caused him to be nicknamed "the Fighting Doc".

[5] His attention was caught by the situation in Rhodesia (today Zimbabwe), where a war pitted the unrecognized government, made up predominantly of the country's minority whites, against communist-backed black nationalist guerrilla groups.

[6][7] Coey interpreted this as Rhodesia "holding the line" on the behalf of Christendom against communism,[8] and surmised that he would better serve the United States and the Western world if he fought in the Rhodesian Army rather than the US Marine Corps.

He successfully requested a discharge from the Marines just before he would have received his commission,[5] and flew to southern Africa the day after he graduated from Ohio State in late March 1972 to join the Rhodesian Army.

"[5] He told the historian Gerald Horne that he believed communists had already compromised top levels of the US government, and that by serving in Rhodesia he was helping to unify "his people" against a foreign conspiracy.

Coey performed well during his initial training, and was recognized as one of the Rhodesian Army's top recruits of 1972; after passing out in November that year with the rank of trooper, he was picked out in January 1973 for instruction as an officer.

[2] The political and religious views reflected in his journal continued: on September 18, 1973, he expressed profound joy at the overthrow of Chile's Marxist President Salvador Allende, and painted the incident as a victory for Christianity and the West.

"[21] Coey acquitted himself well in the eyes of his superiors following his move to the RLI, and soon after joining the unit mustered into Support Group as a specialist in tracking, mortars and armored vehicle driving, while also working as a medic.

"[26] On July 19, 1975, a unit from the Rhodesian Territorial Force (TF) contacted a group of guerrillas near a river in the Kandeya Tribal Trust Lands, north-east of Mount Darwin in the area covered by Operation Hurricane.

Incorrectly believing from the inactivity that the cadres had fled, and thinking that the two fallen soldiers were still alive, Major Hank Meyer ordered the leader of 7 Troop, Lieutenant Joe du Plooy, to sweep around the river and send Coey out to treat the men.

[27] He was a noble dedicated man with spiritual insight and political acumen with a keen perception of world affairs and the evils of communism ... he was a soldier of the Cross and a son of liberty.

[12] On arrival, Coey's parents told the Salisbury Sunday Mail that they believed his death had not been in vain, as he had fallen defending "the last bastion for fighting communism that is left in the Western world".

[2] [Coey was] almost hysterical with anxiety about Chinese influence in the region ... by the spring of 1974 his worries had become almost delusional ... [his] anti-communism was mixed liberally with white supremacy, for the arrival of the communists meant the rule of Africans, the falling of 'standards' and the collapse of 'civilization'.

To prevent this catastrophe, any amount of brutality could be rationalized ... On July 28, 1975, Coey received a full military funeral and was buried in the central Rhodesian town of Que Que, where he had been living.

[30] When the family returned to Ohio, Phyllis Coey compiled her son's journal and a selection of his letters home into a book entitled A Martyr Speaks, which she first attempted to have published in 1975.

Because of the controversial views it contained (including Coey's dedication of his journal "to the 100,000 American dead of Korea and Vietnam who were betrayed by their own government"[31]), the book was turned down by publishers for over a decade.