History
After the First World War and until the mid-1930s, appropriations for the United States Navy were small. Ships fitted as troop transports were not priorities for the Navy in fact or in theory, so as a stop-gap measure the responsibility fell to battleships and cruisers to lift Marine landing forces. As a consequence of the standard davits on Navy ships, a length of 30’, the spacing of the davits fitted to these ships, and a weight of 5 tons (the maximum capacity of the davits) were imposed as basic requirements for all new landing craft
Soon after the formation of the Fleet Marine Force, plans were made for training the FMF in landing operations in the Caribbean. The northwest peninsula of Culebra Island was chosen as the training area. The experimental problem used for the training involved a landing attack by the Fleet Marine Force embarked on Navy vessels moving from ship to shore in ship’s boats and cutters. The Training Squadron consisted of the battleships Arkansas, Wyoming, and a destroyer squadron. In December 1934, a conference between Brigadier General C. H. Lyman of the Fleet Marine Force and Admiral C. S. Freeman was held aboard the flagship Trenton at St. Petersburg. Florida, to develop plans. The Marine contribution to the exercise included the 1st Marine Brigade, stationed at Quantico, composed of two infantry battalions, an artillery battery from the 10th Marine Regiment, and small engineer and service units.
Read more about this topic: Fleet Landing Exercises
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