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Jim Mattis wants you… to wear a face mask during the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic so we can beat this “little bugger.”

“I'm Jim Mattis, and I'm here to talk about that nasty little virus, COVID,” he said in a recent video posted to the official account for the government of the City of Richland, Washington. “We got introduced to it about six months ago, and it's clear this little bugger is not going away on its own.”

In the clip, the retired four-star general and former secretary of defense, appeared to channel a Marine-version of Mr. Rogers rather than the “Mad Dog Mattis” that once famously advised his troops to “be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.”

In the video, Mattis encourages Richland residents to adhere to local safety measures so their town can move forward with reopening following nationwide lockdowns in response to the virus

“We're gonna have to work together on this to get our friends and neighbors back to work, get to phase two, and start working back toward normal,” he said. “So let's wear those face coverings, and let's work together on this to beat Covid.”

It remains unclear why Mattis simply hasn't unsheathed his knife hands, which have an effective kill radius of 5 meters, and dealt with the virus himself.

RELATED: BEHOLD — Mattis' official SecDef portrait shows him sheathing his knife hand in his pocket