The United States Marine Corps is assigned by the National Command Authority to be primarily the Department of Defense's expeditionary force-in-readiness, and the Department of the Navy's contingent landing force—amphibious by nature. Before 2006 (i.e., the formation of the Marine Corps Special Operations Command (MARSOC)), the Marine Corps was the only branch of the Armed Forces that did not have any of its special warfare elements participating in the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), due to confining its special operations capabilities only for the purpose to the Fleet Marine Force.
President Ronald Reagan approved the establishment of USSOCOM in April 1987; a month later the other military branches reassigned their own respective special operations forces (SOF) units to the USSOCOM Headquarters in Tampa Bay, Florida at MacDill Air Force Base. However, as the Marine Corps was reluctant to make the subtle change, its specialized assets assigned to the FMF's Marine Air-Ground Task Forces are not recognized by the charter signed in 1987.
Commandant of the Marine Corps General Alfred M. Gray announced on 5 February 1988, that in response to the current and projected realities of the world, they were changing the designations of the Marine Air-Ground Task Forces that constitute its fighting formations. The word "amphibious" was replaced by "expeditionary". The new term signified that the Marine Corps would not be limited to amphibious operations but rather would be capable of a wide spectrum of operations in littoral areas around the world, in conventional and unconventional warfare.
Because of its status in expeditionary warfare, the Marine Corps fundamentally bases its combative strategy on its ground combat element—all air/ground elements are primarily organic support to the Marine infantry—arguing that strategic bombing does not win battles. Its assigned expeditionary roles assigned by the Unified Combatant Command requires it to be fully trained and functional either as a quick reaction or show of force to any place and environment around the globe within 24 hours. To become adaptive to the Fleet Marine Force protocol, it established its own specialized assets to support the Navy/Marine force commanders to suit its maritime (amphibious) light-infantry capabilities.
Famous quotes containing the words united states, united, states, marine, corps, special, operations, capable and/or forces:
“I am a freeman, an American, a United States Senator, and a Democrat, in that order.”
—Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908–1973)
“The United States is a republic, and a republic is a state in which the people are the boss. That means us. And if the big shots in Washington don’t do like we vote, we don’t vote for them, by golly, no more.”
—Willis Goldbeck (1900–1979)
“I do seriously believe that if we can measure among the States the benefits resulting from the preservation of the Union, the rebellious States have the larger share. It destroyed an institution that was their destruction. It opened the way for a commercial life that, if they will only embrace it and face the light, means to them a development that shall rival the best attainments of the greatest of our States.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)
“God has a hard-on for a Marine because we kill everything we see. He plays His game, we play ours.”
—Stanley Kubrick (b. 1928)
“Ce corps qui s’appelait et qui s’appelle encore le saint empire romain n’était en aucune manière ni saint, ni romain, ni empire. This agglomeration which called itself and still calls itself the Holy Roman Empire was in no way holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.”
—Voltaire [François Marie Arouet] (1694–1778)
“The line that I am urging as today’s conventional wisdom is not a denial of consciousness. It is often called, with more reason, a repudiation of mind. It is indeed a repudiation of mind as a second substance, over and above body. It can be described less harshly as an identification of mind with some of the faculties, states, and activities of the body. Mental states and events are a special subclass of the states and events of the human or animal body.”
—Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)
“You can’t have operations without screams. Pain and the knife—they’re inseparable.”
—Jean Scott Rogers. Robert Day. Mr. Blount (Frank Pettingell)
“If the soul doth think in a sleeping man without being conscious of it, I ask, whether during such thinking it has any pleasure or pain, or be capable of happiness or misery? I am sure the man is not, no more than the bed or earth he lies on. For to be happy or miserable without being conscious of it, seems to me utterly inconsistent and impossible.
”
—John Locke (1632–1704)
“The modern world needs people with a complex identity who are intellectually autonomous and prepared to cope with uncertainty; who are able to tolerate ambiguity and not be driven by fear into a rigid, single-solution approach to problems, who are rational, foresightful and who look for facts; who can draw inferences and can control their behavior in the light of foreseen consequences, who are altruistic and enjoy doing for others, and who understand social forces and trends.”
—Robert Havighurst (20th century)