Should Army and Marines (or components of) consolidate?

Good summation and all that really needs to be said

We establish the beachhead, secure the airfields, and hold the door open while the Army comes in with heavy equipment and builds up its forces... It's a little more than a simple penetration. The Marines are also specialists at MOUT but our bread and butter is our use of combined arms and maneuver warfare to seize objectives, and yes, the Army's job is to take control of the country that the city is in and pretty much everything else that goes on mopping up after the conflict and winning the peace afterward.

Overall I don't think the supposed bureaucratic efficiencies are worth the lose of the unique projection power the Marines bring to the table. The Army has there own, Shock troops in the form of Airborne, Rangers, Air Assault, and SOF assets. We don't really need another group that would specialize in working with the Navy. The Navy and Marines are separate but also share alot of synergies that would be lost if the Army absorbed the Marines. The Marines unique ability to project sea and air power on land adds to the the flexibility of the Armed Forces.

Except for the fact that the Army has secured more airfields and taken more beachheads, I find this a very good thread.
BTW the American unit with the most opposed amphibious assaults? The 7th ID. Second? The 1st Cab Div. Third? The 1st Marine Division.

do youhave the links to those stats?

MAJ Carl Ballinger - Mr. Ballinger has only one bullet in his gun. Ignore him, he is a silly little man.

You are still responding, so you haven't abandoned this thread that I just recently found. Am I a troll, maybe, you are definitely entitled to your opinion. But at least I am not an officer who whines. I can only imagine how little respect you engendered from your enlisted men if your comments here are any indication of your leadership.

I wasn't referring to you in third person. I just wasn't referring to you by your rank. Now why don't you whine to some moderator that I hurt your feelings, sir.

You directly disparaged the Marines in An Bar, therefore it became personal. Your purpose behind this whole charade is you wish to attack the Corps. I base this one the many comments you have made all directed at the Corps being unneeded here and in another similar commentary. Sure, we all smack talk, but you are truly offensive. Just the assumption on your part that the Marines are just another ground force just like the Army and that we have to argue for our existence shows your malevolent arrogance. You can be coy all you want, but everyone can see through your smoke screen. I have made cogent arguments earlier in a similar commentary, but you deserve special attention and now that you have it you try to gaslight me. Look that one up. Let's face it, your problem with the Marine Corps is the Corps gets jobs done the Army can't, and it makes you jealous. When the Army loses ground they bring Marines to take it back (Belleau Wood, Inchon, the Philippines). When President Bush wanted to make an example out of Fallujah, it was Marines who punched through that city with minimal support from the Army. It was a battalion of Marines without armor who held off two divisions of Republican Guards at Khafji at least in part because of the Corps reputation. Marines were amongst the first units into Baghdad. Marines get sent to all the worst places for a reason: Marines lead, and they don't play around, they just hit every enemy full on. Our reputation precedes us wherever we are sent, and it is a reputation well deserved. I'll give you a cogent argument for the Corps, any Marine could make it into the Army, but that's not true the other way around. If I no longer have to show 'tact and decorum' to someone for which I have no respect. Frankly, I think my previous leaders would pat me on the back.

the curse of an LST...

Cpl Robert Clark Large Slow Target, according to my dad, who was a QM2c on an LST.

The manner of thinking expressed by our fine Army Officers is not very forward leaning and it is precisely what keeps the Army stuck in the past licking its wounds.

"If you don't can't beat it, throw more money at it and if that doesn't work, make it go away..."

An amphibious landing, marrying troops up with equipment on Maritime prepositioned ships is a concept pioneered by the Marines and COPIED by the Army. It is a lot more cost effective than burning jet fuel carrying tanks and other heavy equipment into theater... FWIW.

I dunno. US armed forces have been doing the pre-positioning thing in Europe for at least 50 years. My father, as an army Major in 1963, was responsible for watching out for two divisions (HEAVY divisions) equipment in Germany. Army ran REFORGER exercises every two years since 195?. I believe they stopped those in the early 90's. But it's certainly not a real new concept. Now, one thing the marines did do was pioneering the loading of assault ships in such a manner as what was needed first came off first (which meant it was packed last). While inefficient from a space usage viewpoint, tactically it is a huge plus. The problem with pre-positioning is . . . what if equipment and supplies change during the storage period? Of they're destroyed before they can be used? Or the bad guys get there first? There's always something . . .

CPT Michael Barden - See my previous postings about the difference between picking a fight with a weaker country and picking a peer-peer war with someone such as China or Russia. Until you develop helicopters with the cargo carrying capacity of a ship, any peer-peer fight will involve taking ports by force. No one does that better than Marines. You know why Navy calls Marines sea-going bellhops? It's because we have to open the door for the Army.

CPT Michael Barden - Yes, airborne troops would be helpful. Good thing the Marine Corps has Force Recon Units trained to jump (or scuba) into the combat zone ahead of the main breaching forces. Again, sea, air, land, the Corps has it all covered. We just need our friends that wear their bibs on their shoulders to drop us off.

Thumbs up Brother. "Once a Marine, Always a Marine." Marines are their own and like you said, unless you earned that title you don't understand. Period!

You're spot on with the army, but not quite with the Marines. We Marines are a light/ lower end of medium force that specializes in amphibious and expeditonary warfare. We take parts of the other 3 branches and put them into a scalable task force (MAGTF) that relies on one chain of command to operate in a faster manner. We do not have the resources or size to conduct large scale heavy warfare and occupation. We focus on going into combat, quickly destroying the enemy, and getting out. We are the tip of the spear. We are the first to hit the shit when the shit hits the fan. We will always have 2-3 MEUs (reinforced battle land components, reinforced squaudron air component) afloat on ships ready to deploy any time the president orders. The rest of the Corps can be deployed in under a week (to my knowledge anyway).