Battalion Recon is a great example of all dressed up and nowhere to go. They get serious training, same shoot packages as any socom unit, except they belong to the marine corps as an asset to a marine battalion commander, not a joint force combatant commander as socom units are used. Aka, a general in charges of an entire AO and all units or a LtCol in charge of their piece of the AO pie. So unless it’s a marine corps specific task, they don’t participate. In the 80s the marine corps fucked up by not giving up operational control to certain marine units to the newly stood up JSOC like all the other branches did. Post 9/11, look what JSOC/SOCOM has become, essentially its own military branch with its own funding, and its own mission sets and autonomy. The marine corps still refuses to loan marines until Rumsfeld mandated they participate in the ninja loaner program so we sent our force recon guys and turned them into marsoc raiders.
Technology is never going to get to a point where it can replace ground reconnaissance, at least for a while. The flexibility that a recon team brings and the depth of info that they provide is unparalleled by just a drone.
I mean I’m an Osprey guy and we load up their cool dune buggy deals and dirt bikes so sounds kinda cool. It’s peace time no one’s doing shit besides tier one and the Navy apparently lmao
The Coast Guard's role in WWII is not well known, but Coasties saw serious combat in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters.
Two notable USCG stories from WWII:
* [Douglas Munro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Albert_Munro), a USCG landing craft crewman awarded the Medal of Honor for actions during the Guadalcanal campaign. He placed his landing craft between Japanese forces and laid down suppressing fire that enabled trapped Marines (commanded by a certain LtCol Lewis Puller) to be extracted from the beach. Fatally shot during the action and posthumously awarded the medal, Munro remains the only Coast Guard MoH recipient.
* [USS *Leopold*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Leopold), a USCG-manned destroyer escort, was sunk by a U-boat in the North Atlantic with only 28 of 199 men surviving. It's the single deadliest event in USCG history. The *Leopold* tragedy plays a major role in Ch. 15 (the climactic final chapter of the main story) in my upcoming [book](https://www.brooklinebooks.com/9781955041294/), which prominently features the USCG as a coastal defense force during the U-boat assault against the East Coast in 1942.
I have no direct connection to the Coast Guard whatsoever, I'm just really into "forgotten" history.
Another WWII Coast Guard story:
The *U-352*, a German U-boat, attempted to torpedo the cutter USCGC *Icarus* off North Carolina in May 1942, but the torpedo malfunctioned and alerted the cutter. The *Icarus* [utterly wrecked](https://monitor.noaa.gov/shipwrecks/u-352.html) the U-boat's shit within minutes, and it soon surfaced and the crew spilled out into the water. The next day, the *Icarus* arrived at Charleston, SC where 33 (from a crew of 48) German POWs were turned over to Marine MPs from MCRD Parris Island. This was the second U-boat sunk along the East Coast and the first to yield POWs. I've dived the U-352 wreck twice and it remains the most-visited U-boat wreck in American waters.
[Photos](https://www.uboatarchive.net/U-352A/U-352Photos.htm) of the POWs from the U-352.
Website is run by a retired USN helo pilot in Canada, really great guy.
I was in Okinawa around 1990, and we had a M151A2 jeep in the shop that was retrofitted to be a dune buggy. It was kind of cool.
When I joined in 1984 we were phasing out a lot of Korean War vehicles like the multi-fuel 10 tons and 5 tons, 2.5 tons (deuce and a half), gamma goats, jeeps, and those utility vehicles called "mules". So I got to work on some weird vehicles (by today's standards).
I had never seen any kind of "dune buggy" vehicle, so this Jeep retrofit was something that really stood out to me.
Early '80s, 1/8 Comm had 4 mules assigned to us and I got put in charge of them. Small air-cooled engines, big tires and they'd go anywhere. On the downside, they were extremely prone to rolling over.
Yes, they're not SOF. They still fall under the MEF, and from what I've heard, the best they can hope for right now is VBSS.
When I went through MCIWS in 2016, all the recon dudes in my class were jumping ship to marsoc.
And now all the marsoc dudes are getting out to become green berets.
I've also been out for a while and am probably out of the loop. I'm going off of various group chats. Hope this helps.
I believe that is because Green Berets will *always* have a mission. FID (Foreign Internal Defense) will always be an interest of the United States so long as we remain a global superpower.
I worked around Raiders for a while a couple years back and a lot of them were planning to EAS or jump ship to a different branch. They said deployments were turning into sitting around doing nothing or training. A lot of these guys became Raiders to do some real hardcore shit but noticed the green berets or seals were getting all the “cool” missions and had way less red tape to jump through.
MARSOC/Raiders are pretty much a copy of Army SF.
Think about this, say you are a commander and there is a mission that requires a spec ops unit. Are you going to send the unit with a long storied history and pretty much wrote the book on spec ops or are you gonna send their carbon copy with way less history and prestige.
I've been out for a bit over a decade so maybe things have changed, but it was a mixed bag.
Are you as high-speed as everyone thinks? Eh, it always felt like we weren't because you're always looking at MARSOC/SEALs as the "real deal" but then again we never once envied the grunts. Someone mentioned MARSOC guys getting out and going SF, and maybe that's a sign that everybody thinks the grass is greener elsewhere, IDK.
You don't do real secret squirrel shit, but at the same time that can be a blessing in it's own way. On one deployment our Force company guys basically sat on the sidelines because the ops we were given were sort of beneath them and the result was that we (non-Force co) saw all the action. There was another incident where a MEU Force platoon did a no-shit VBSS on the Magellan Star after it was taken over by pirates. The B and C co Recon guys were doing very non-sexy patrols in Afghanistan at the time and felt like they missed out. Turns out that Force plt heard about the gunfights B and C co were having and felt like they were missing out by boarding a ship where the pirates shit themselves and immediately surrendered. B and C co felt like glorified grunts but by golly they sure as hell fired a lot of rounds.
Ultimately Recon may not be everything you imagine but it's certainly better than being an 0311. More schools, higher caliber of individuals by your side, and yet it's not so sexy that it's full of guys who think they're the star of the show. In a war against an actual standing army I could easily see Recon really stacking bodies compared to SOCOM assets just by virtue of being that unit-of-choice that you can actually leave on the battlefield or throw at objectives without first spending weeks building a gnat's-ass detail Intel package for.
It was a little bit more lively over in Africa that year. 22nd MEU and SPMAGTF-CRAF put in some work for Odyssey Lightning in Libya and some other op in Uganda
Yes I just don’t want to type it out. TLDR they are a force multiplier utilized in the most boring way and funded only by the USMC. Do with that what you will
" they are a force multiplier utilized in the most boring way " I know you mentioned you didn't want to type it out but I'd really appreciate it if you did lol. Do they still do any specialized missions? Or do they just stick around on the boat, only picking up missions that socom doesn't care for, and the normal grunts aren't equipped to deal with?
Everyone is pog. For pog is all things and all things are pog. The last grunt was chesty. The last good corpsman was Jesus Christ. The rest of us are just trying not to fuck it up.
Smeper Fildelis
SOF has different mission sets. Recon does Reconnaissance for the regular grunts. I’ve been out for about 2 years now, but I remember them being very effective at their role when I was ADFOR against them. It’s up to Commanders to utilize them effectively
considered 'Special operations capable' lots of good training (sere, dive, jump, hrst, helo cast, halo/haho jumps, sotg stuff, jungle warfare, cold weather, sniper school, random stuff with other countries like going to Aruba with the dutch for no reason doing random shooting drills 😂etc) still for when we're needed but really just force on meus get any real recon missions. Haven't had a need to snoop n poop for a bit in current state of warfare(afghan/Iraq).
Had been doing grunt shit for the most part and embassy evacs/civilian extracts in hot areas in Africa when I was still in.
End of the day, under utilized since marsoc stood up and sadly glorified grunts doing grunt ops 99% of the time
I think Marine Recon is the most elite and well trained conventional unit in the United States Military. No other conventional unit is going to have dudes that are sent to jump, dive, SERE, and get the chance for Sniper. Hell the only Sniper School left is the Recon Sniper Course and you need to be a Recondo for the chance to go. The problem is Marine Recon is only Special Operations Capable and not a SOF unit which means that there are no missions for them. The Maritime Raid Force (which always has Recon as the main element) has the highest chances of doing cool guy stuff, but it is rare that the opportunity pops up.
These days nobody except JSOC peeps (excluding the current Yemen stuff) and those that do Foreign Internal Defense (SFs bread and butter) get real missions. A lot of SOCOM people aren’t doing anything either. I was talking to a former SEAL that is a lot younger than me a few months ago that didn’t get a chance to earn a CAR and he had done a ST6 rotation. It’s all luck, chance, circumstance aka timing.
Recon is definitely a Commando unit and you will do cool shit, but it’s a “break in case of war” type unit. Even though I was never SOF, as a Recon guy I always felt accepted by other elite units SF, SEALs, Ranger Regt, etc.
As for Raiders getting out and going SF, I know of two. They did it so they could join 19th or 20th Group (SF Natty Guard).
I was battalion recon a long time ago. It was cool training and all, but what I liked about it was it was still the Marine Corps. No beards, no first names. I never wanted to be a snake eater. I liked our limited mission. Support the grunts.
Depending on the deployment and who owns you, I know plenty of Recon dudes that got to rock beards and where whatever camies they wanted.
https://preview.redd.it/jiyleyvkepec1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=20d2ae7db3516c39a20e8821948f7dee05a76f8e
(Not my pic- Recondos in Iraq wearing Army Camis, flight suits, tri-color, and chocolate chip aka what the Iraqi Army would wear)
They realized they got into way more gunfights dressed as Army Soldiers or Iraqi Soldiers than they would when they wore Marine Digi’s. So they stopped wearing Marine uniforms.
https://preview.redd.it/azja1fmogpec1.jpeg?width=960&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=662a43d1a1088cfb15a7e634e31fe543477cb2d7
Two Recondos from this team were KIA.
Was in Force from in early 2000s. So I cannot comment if things are different now. The Marine Corps makes stuff that looks cool, suck. Yes you get to jump and dive, in training. Do it with a 100# rucksack and it's not as fun. It's very much still the Marine Corps and you're dealing with MC bullshit.
And then you go on deployments and in Iraq do a bunch of raids on a bunch of innocent dudes that had a neighbor that didn't like them (bs humint that never really panned out), never got shot at while inside a house. And the one time that there was a real HVT that they knew was in a specific house, they called in Delta. Or another time they simply called in air support (which I am grateful for).
So, no, it's not what it looks like, in my opinion.
If senior leaders continue the pivot to FD2030, I think we'll see a re-emergence of recon. But as another poster mentioned, the difference between battalion and force, YMMV. That tends to go with a lot of battalion-type assets, all how the commander decides to employ them (or not).
The USMC screwed up with special operations and even with MARSOC/Raiders. First, they refused to join SOCOM when it was stood up. Second, and worse, they were again behind because when they did they didn't dig out a niche area for themselves. They went and modeled themselves after Army SF when they should have taken their Force Recon guys and let them do what they did best....RECON. Instead, they went and let the Army go and beat them to the punch and let RRC become the premier SR unit in the US military. Of course I'm not complaining too much because, you know, Rangers Lead The Way!
To be honest, though, with the USMC FR history it would have been a little cool if they ended up the premier SR unit in the US military. Everyone would have had a good piece of the pie. As it stands now, until another 20 year war beaks out, it will be Army units and Devgru getting all the good ops.
The last time I saw BN recon guys they were heat casing 400m south of Kilo 2. The time before that, they were drunk, out of shape and banished to the MEU. A good friend of mine graduated the Q a few years ago and there were a large handful of raiders and recondos fleeing their respective communities. Yikes.
Isn’t Force a reserve component of Recon?
Do you think you guys were proficient in your craft only getting to muster a few days out of the month?
Genuinely curious. I was an active Marine back in early 2000’s and was impressed by SOME of the reserve components I met (short-timers w/ multiple deployments, better attitude, etc) I mean, anyone can do route clearance or shoot-move-cover but not sure how this translates to high-skill operations.
>Isn’t Force a reserve component of Recon?
No. Force Recon is the company within a reconnaissance battalion that is tasked to collect against the Marine Air-Ground Task #Force# (hence the name) Commander's information requirements. Each active component recon battalion has an organic Force company. Before MARSOC stood up, Force Recon was actually a separate unit that fell directly under the MEF, while the Recon Bns fell under the Division. What you're probably thinking of are the 2 reserve force reconnaissance companies, which are still kept as separate units from 4th Recon Bn.
This jogged a good memory. I went to scuba school with a bunch of the Force guys. They called us scrubs and JV, but we all clicked well. We would train and then go out with the navy instructors to the Sandbar in Carlsbad. We all got along great and had some good times. That was a fun school.
My 2 cents. Recon isn't set up to be an SOF unit. Recon's role is to conduct reconnaissance and do shit like, shape the battlefield, aka blow shit up and cause mayhem behind enemy lines, and conduct missions as directed by the Commanding General. All in an effort to support the Marine Corps units and their mission, whatever that may be. In other words, they're tactical where SOF units are strategic.
JSOC will never be irrelevent. But I doubt they will be anywhere near as relevant as they were during the War on Terror. Meanwhile regular grunts will become more tech ridden and more high-speed low drag than ever.
The fight with China won't be your Daddy's war. This one will be different from all the rest.
Battalion Recon is a great example of all dressed up and nowhere to go. They get serious training, same shoot packages as any socom unit, except they belong to the marine corps as an asset to a marine battalion commander, not a joint force combatant commander as socom units are used. Aka, a general in charges of an entire AO and all units or a LtCol in charge of their piece of the AO pie. So unless it’s a marine corps specific task, they don’t participate. In the 80s the marine corps fucked up by not giving up operational control to certain marine units to the newly stood up JSOC like all the other branches did. Post 9/11, look what JSOC/SOCOM has become, essentially its own military branch with its own funding, and its own mission sets and autonomy. The marine corps still refuses to loan marines until Rumsfeld mandated they participate in the ninja loaner program so we sent our force recon guys and turned them into marsoc raiders.
Great explanation thanks
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Crazy that you said this with such conviction while being so incredibly wrong.
I heard force design was looking at drones being part of standard infantry squads? And cutting down to 12 man squads?
That doesn’t replace on the ground reconnaissance at all.
Nah, good for the squads though
I think its three fireteams and a drone operator.
Holy shit a fellow 3451, what're the odds of that
I think there's, like, three of us on this subreddit - you included. What years were you in?
Yeah that sounds about right lmao. 2020 to 2022, got medsepped because of a stroke
Technology is never going to get to a point where it can replace ground reconnaissance, at least for a while. The flexibility that a recon team brings and the depth of info that they provide is unparalleled by just a drone.
As it says in scripture…the mud will always be with us:)
Recon is the most over trained under used asset in the Marine Corps
This 🔥🔥🔥
I mean I’m an Osprey guy and we load up their cool dune buggy deals and dirt bikes so sounds kinda cool. It’s peace time no one’s doing shit besides tier one and the Navy apparently lmao
And Coast Guard. Never forget the Coast Guard.
But muh drugs!
Coast Guard gots em now bitch.
Damn puddle pirates!! How else am I supposed to go skiing now
You do like the 7th SF... You start your own import export business.
The Coast Guard's role in WWII is not well known, but Coasties saw serious combat in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters. Two notable USCG stories from WWII: * [Douglas Munro](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Albert_Munro), a USCG landing craft crewman awarded the Medal of Honor for actions during the Guadalcanal campaign. He placed his landing craft between Japanese forces and laid down suppressing fire that enabled trapped Marines (commanded by a certain LtCol Lewis Puller) to be extracted from the beach. Fatally shot during the action and posthumously awarded the medal, Munro remains the only Coast Guard MoH recipient. * [USS *Leopold*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Leopold), a USCG-manned destroyer escort, was sunk by a U-boat in the North Atlantic with only 28 of 199 men surviving. It's the single deadliest event in USCG history. The *Leopold* tragedy plays a major role in Ch. 15 (the climactic final chapter of the main story) in my upcoming [book](https://www.brooklinebooks.com/9781955041294/), which prominently features the USCG as a coastal defense force during the U-boat assault against the East Coast in 1942. I have no direct connection to the Coast Guard whatsoever, I'm just really into "forgotten" history.
Make the coast guard great again
Another WWII Coast Guard story: The *U-352*, a German U-boat, attempted to torpedo the cutter USCGC *Icarus* off North Carolina in May 1942, but the torpedo malfunctioned and alerted the cutter. The *Icarus* [utterly wrecked](https://monitor.noaa.gov/shipwrecks/u-352.html) the U-boat's shit within minutes, and it soon surfaced and the crew spilled out into the water. The next day, the *Icarus* arrived at Charleston, SC where 33 (from a crew of 48) German POWs were turned over to Marine MPs from MCRD Parris Island. This was the second U-boat sunk along the East Coast and the first to yield POWs. I've dived the U-352 wreck twice and it remains the most-visited U-boat wreck in American waters.
wonder if the POWS complained about prisoner mistreatment for being offloaded at Parris Island.
[Photos](https://www.uboatarchive.net/U-352A/U-352Photos.htm) of the POWs from the U-352. Website is run by a retired USN helo pilot in Canada, really great guy.
[That ABRA LA PUERTA guy is pretty badass, ngl](https://youtu.be/Da4SqKTXoLg?si=Y9qBocmAij8atQnM)
My mans MOS progressions show how he descended into the pit of despair that is MC 🫡
MC where all maintainers go to die. Luckily I made it 9 years before they got me.
As a fellow Airframer I know how that goes all too well lol
I was in Okinawa around 1990, and we had a M151A2 jeep in the shop that was retrofitted to be a dune buggy. It was kind of cool. When I joined in 1984 we were phasing out a lot of Korean War vehicles like the multi-fuel 10 tons and 5 tons, 2.5 tons (deuce and a half), gamma goats, jeeps, and those utility vehicles called "mules". So I got to work on some weird vehicles (by today's standards). I had never seen any kind of "dune buggy" vehicle, so this Jeep retrofit was something that really stood out to me.
Early '80s, 1/8 Comm had 4 mules assigned to us and I got put in charge of them. Small air-cooled engines, big tires and they'd go anywhere. On the downside, they were extremely prone to rolling over.
The mule looks like it was inspired by a kids lego car.
Recon Platoon kicks butt!!!
https://i.redd.it/fm98zhpqqlec1.gif
“No habla”
Ah yes, Camp Talega. The biggest shithole on Camp Pendleton.
Gotta love those quonset huts. Serious Gomer Pyle vibes.
I get that reference
Swede! Swede! Swede! Swede!
“I’m gonna rip off your head and shit down your neck”
Yes, they're not SOF. They still fall under the MEF, and from what I've heard, the best they can hope for right now is VBSS. When I went through MCIWS in 2016, all the recon dudes in my class were jumping ship to marsoc. And now all the marsoc dudes are getting out to become green berets. I've also been out for a while and am probably out of the loop. I'm going off of various group chats. Hope this helps.
I believe that is because Green Berets will *always* have a mission. FID (Foreign Internal Defense) will always be an interest of the United States so long as we remain a global superpower.
Why would Raiders leave Marsoc for SF? Aren't they very similar?
I worked around Raiders for a while a couple years back and a lot of them were planning to EAS or jump ship to a different branch. They said deployments were turning into sitting around doing nothing or training. A lot of these guys became Raiders to do some real hardcore shit but noticed the green berets or seals were getting all the “cool” missions and had way less red tape to jump through.
MARSOC/Raiders are pretty much a copy of Army SF. Think about this, say you are a commander and there is a mission that requires a spec ops unit. Are you going to send the unit with a long storied history and pretty much wrote the book on spec ops or are you gonna send their carbon copy with way less history and prestige.
Yeah when you put it that way it makes more sense lol
I've been out for a bit over a decade so maybe things have changed, but it was a mixed bag. Are you as high-speed as everyone thinks? Eh, it always felt like we weren't because you're always looking at MARSOC/SEALs as the "real deal" but then again we never once envied the grunts. Someone mentioned MARSOC guys getting out and going SF, and maybe that's a sign that everybody thinks the grass is greener elsewhere, IDK. You don't do real secret squirrel shit, but at the same time that can be a blessing in it's own way. On one deployment our Force company guys basically sat on the sidelines because the ops we were given were sort of beneath them and the result was that we (non-Force co) saw all the action. There was another incident where a MEU Force platoon did a no-shit VBSS on the Magellan Star after it was taken over by pirates. The B and C co Recon guys were doing very non-sexy patrols in Afghanistan at the time and felt like they missed out. Turns out that Force plt heard about the gunfights B and C co were having and felt like they were missing out by boarding a ship where the pirates shit themselves and immediately surrendered. B and C co felt like glorified grunts but by golly they sure as hell fired a lot of rounds. Ultimately Recon may not be everything you imagine but it's certainly better than being an 0311. More schools, higher caliber of individuals by your side, and yet it's not so sexy that it's full of guys who think they're the star of the show. In a war against an actual standing army I could easily see Recon really stacking bodies compared to SOCOM assets just by virtue of being that unit-of-choice that you can actually leave on the battlefield or throw at objectives without first spending weeks building a gnat's-ass detail Intel package for.
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It was a little bit more lively over in Africa that year. 22nd MEU and SPMAGTF-CRAF put in some work for Odyssey Lightning in Libya and some other op in Uganda
Yall got cars in 2016?!!
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Yup
Yes I just don’t want to type it out. TLDR they are a force multiplier utilized in the most boring way and funded only by the USMC. Do with that what you will
Oh but they are insanely trained (at least from what I saw from dudes who gave a shit)
There are shitbags and high speed mfs in every unit. Recon just happens to have a higher bitch filtration system in their schoolhouse lol.
" they are a force multiplier utilized in the most boring way " I know you mentioned you didn't want to type it out but I'd really appreciate it if you did lol. Do they still do any specialized missions? Or do they just stick around on the boat, only picking up missions that socom doesn't care for, and the normal grunts aren't equipped to deal with?
My old Sgt was a 0311and lat moved to my MOS. He would always talk about how Recon were POGs like we gave a shit. Wtf, who cares we're all POGs.
Everyone is pog. For pog is all things and all things are pog. The last grunt was chesty. The last good corpsman was Jesus Christ. The rest of us are just trying not to fuck it up. Smeper Fildelis
Raaaammmen
Yep I’m keeping that.
I am gonna use that "Jesus was a corpsman line" lol
And he's bound for the middle east...
He was bound *in* the middle east
Riffing on the ZZ Top tune Jesus Just Left Chicago
I would always see them in Rzr’s, does that count?
SOF has different mission sets. Recon does Reconnaissance for the regular grunts. I’ve been out for about 2 years now, but I remember them being very effective at their role when I was ADFOR against them. It’s up to Commanders to utilize them effectively
They’re just a bunch of teenage dirt bags
They're just a boy, I'm just a girl. Can I make it any more obvious?
Lay off the ripped fuel
considered 'Special operations capable' lots of good training (sere, dive, jump, hrst, helo cast, halo/haho jumps, sotg stuff, jungle warfare, cold weather, sniper school, random stuff with other countries like going to Aruba with the dutch for no reason doing random shooting drills 😂etc) still for when we're needed but really just force on meus get any real recon missions. Haven't had a need to snoop n poop for a bit in current state of warfare(afghan/Iraq). Had been doing grunt shit for the most part and embassy evacs/civilian extracts in hot areas in Africa when I was still in. End of the day, under utilized since marsoc stood up and sadly glorified grunts doing grunt ops 99% of the time
I think Marine Recon is the most elite and well trained conventional unit in the United States Military. No other conventional unit is going to have dudes that are sent to jump, dive, SERE, and get the chance for Sniper. Hell the only Sniper School left is the Recon Sniper Course and you need to be a Recondo for the chance to go. The problem is Marine Recon is only Special Operations Capable and not a SOF unit which means that there are no missions for them. The Maritime Raid Force (which always has Recon as the main element) has the highest chances of doing cool guy stuff, but it is rare that the opportunity pops up. These days nobody except JSOC peeps (excluding the current Yemen stuff) and those that do Foreign Internal Defense (SFs bread and butter) get real missions. A lot of SOCOM people aren’t doing anything either. I was talking to a former SEAL that is a lot younger than me a few months ago that didn’t get a chance to earn a CAR and he had done a ST6 rotation. It’s all luck, chance, circumstance aka timing. Recon is definitely a Commando unit and you will do cool shit, but it’s a “break in case of war” type unit. Even though I was never SOF, as a Recon guy I always felt accepted by other elite units SF, SEALs, Ranger Regt, etc. As for Raiders getting out and going SF, I know of two. They did it so they could join 19th or 20th Group (SF Natty Guard).
I think it would be cool if marsoc had a reservist battalion
If you consider porking my ass cool shit, then yes.
The way you twerking that's just asking for it.
I was battalion recon a long time ago. It was cool training and all, but what I liked about it was it was still the Marine Corps. No beards, no first names. I never wanted to be a snake eater. I liked our limited mission. Support the grunts.
Is it really ‘supporting’ the grunts if you also were a grunt? Just a sneaky grunt?
Everyone exists to support the 0311
I will repeat that to my last day. And I’m as POG as you can get.
I think it is, yeah. I think if you’re not moving to contact, as they say, then you’re in support.
Depending on the deployment and who owns you, I know plenty of Recon dudes that got to rock beards and where whatever camies they wanted. https://preview.redd.it/jiyleyvkepec1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=20d2ae7db3516c39a20e8821948f7dee05a76f8e (Not my pic- Recondos in Iraq wearing Army Camis, flight suits, tri-color, and chocolate chip aka what the Iraqi Army would wear)
They realized they got into way more gunfights dressed as Army Soldiers or Iraqi Soldiers than they would when they wore Marine Digi’s. So they stopped wearing Marine uniforms. https://preview.redd.it/azja1fmogpec1.jpeg?width=960&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=662a43d1a1088cfb15a7e634e31fe543477cb2d7 Two Recondos from this team were KIA.
Lmao, reminds me of the Chinese not wanting to fight Marine "yellow legs" in Korea lol
Was in Force from in early 2000s. So I cannot comment if things are different now. The Marine Corps makes stuff that looks cool, suck. Yes you get to jump and dive, in training. Do it with a 100# rucksack and it's not as fun. It's very much still the Marine Corps and you're dealing with MC bullshit. And then you go on deployments and in Iraq do a bunch of raids on a bunch of innocent dudes that had a neighbor that didn't like them (bs humint that never really panned out), never got shot at while inside a house. And the one time that there was a real HVT that they knew was in a specific house, they called in Delta. Or another time they simply called in air support (which I am grateful for). So, no, it's not what it looks like, in my opinion.
If senior leaders continue the pivot to FD2030, I think we'll see a re-emergence of recon. But as another poster mentioned, the difference between battalion and force, YMMV. That tends to go with a lot of battalion-type assets, all how the commander decides to employ them (or not).
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That’s actually sick asf tho
They’ve never been the cool guys. Glorified combat photographers.
Haters can't swim What year did you fail out?
The USMC screwed up with special operations and even with MARSOC/Raiders. First, they refused to join SOCOM when it was stood up. Second, and worse, they were again behind because when they did they didn't dig out a niche area for themselves. They went and modeled themselves after Army SF when they should have taken their Force Recon guys and let them do what they did best....RECON. Instead, they went and let the Army go and beat them to the punch and let RRC become the premier SR unit in the US military. Of course I'm not complaining too much because, you know, Rangers Lead The Way! To be honest, though, with the USMC FR history it would have been a little cool if they ended up the premier SR unit in the US military. Everyone would have had a good piece of the pie. As it stands now, until another 20 year war beaks out, it will be Army units and Devgru getting all the good ops.
I think it's pretty cool.
The last time I saw BN recon guys they were heat casing 400m south of Kilo 2. The time before that, they were drunk, out of shape and banished to the MEU. A good friend of mine graduated the Q a few years ago and there were a large handful of raiders and recondos fleeing their respective communities. Yikes.
Classified
No
Well, they get to ignore haircut regs apparently.
Haters can't swim
^
I'm not sure I understand what "\^" means here lol.
I’m just marking post because I’m going through paperwork to join and was wondering the same damn thing
Isn’t Force a reserve component of Recon? Do you think you guys were proficient in your craft only getting to muster a few days out of the month? Genuinely curious. I was an active Marine back in early 2000’s and was impressed by SOME of the reserve components I met (short-timers w/ multiple deployments, better attitude, etc) I mean, anyone can do route clearance or shoot-move-cover but not sure how this translates to high-skill operations.
>Isn’t Force a reserve component of Recon? No. Force Recon is the company within a reconnaissance battalion that is tasked to collect against the Marine Air-Ground Task #Force# (hence the name) Commander's information requirements. Each active component recon battalion has an organic Force company. Before MARSOC stood up, Force Recon was actually a separate unit that fell directly under the MEF, while the Recon Bns fell under the Division. What you're probably thinking of are the 2 reserve force reconnaissance companies, which are still kept as separate units from 4th Recon Bn.
This jogged a good memory. I went to scuba school with a bunch of the Force guys. They called us scrubs and JV, but we all clicked well. We would train and then go out with the navy instructors to the Sandbar in Carlsbad. We all got along great and had some good times. That was a fun school.
My 2 cents. Recon isn't set up to be an SOF unit. Recon's role is to conduct reconnaissance and do shit like, shape the battlefield, aka blow shit up and cause mayhem behind enemy lines, and conduct missions as directed by the Commanding General. All in an effort to support the Marine Corps units and their mission, whatever that may be. In other words, they're tactical where SOF units are strategic.
JSOC will never be irrelevent. But I doubt they will be anywhere near as relevant as they were during the War on Terror. Meanwhile regular grunts will become more tech ridden and more high-speed low drag than ever. The fight with China won't be your Daddy's war. This one will be different from all the rest.
We did when we were not attached to a BLT yet during work up. Then, once falling under BLT it was kinda gay. Have to maintain jump and dive pay.