When was the last time the Marines were legitimately relevant to warrant being an entire branch versus being another paratrooper division or what have you?
Why do we need to spend all of that money and energy producing the VTOl variant of the f35? Why do they need to launch aircraft off flat tops designed for helicopters, when if they actually need to use such aircraft they would have a carrier group at their disposal?
During ww2 they were supported by the navy's main carriers, and if we were to ever need the Marines to fulfill their intended role instead of being army 2, then they would have such support once again.
I say we ought to gut the marine branch of the military.
The Marines are one of the biggest reasons the F-35 is such a godawful money pit. Buy more Cobras, you dumb fucks.
Grayson Cook
The most logical thing for the US would be either rolling the Chair Force and the Muhreens into the Army, or to abolish everything but the Navy and the National Guard. Remember, the Marines are part of the Navy, and so they would be still there in the later case. The armed forces of the USA are currently in this situation because they are supposed to both defend (American interests in) Europe and East Asia from the land powers, and also play police in third world countries. Currently the later is the main focus, which is a mistake, because instead of playing police they should just install friendly dictators in those countries and send them money and advisors. Of course, US foreign policy is dictated by competing lobbies and think tanks, and so it lacks common sense. Actually, it seems to be completely insane by the 2010s.
Josiah Garcia
The marines are the ONLY relevant force of the US military. Here's what you do. You cut the US army, all of it. You keep the National Guard, the Marines, the USAF, the Navy. You still have enough combat expeditionary forces to bitchslap anyone that doesn't have nukes (which you will never bitchslap), enough reserves to actually deter any other power to do anything stupid and you save Trillions of $US per year.
The US Army is the useless part, remnant of WWII and the CW occupation of Europe. Not the USMC.
Aaron Richardson
The marines have been pointless since inception, sure having beach landing specialists is useful but that can be integrated into the navy.
Connor Ross
How else will we deploy people who specialize in beach landings to countries that are 99% ocean such as Afghanistan?
Anthony Fisher
In their capacity as a shipboard garrison/naval infantry? They haven't been relevant for a while. As the only part of the US ground forces who seem to be able to do their job and are more or less free of the poz … they're the best you have.
Ryan Flores
This is mostly accurate. Every combat video shows marines being in control of the situation to the highest degree possible while army footage always seems chaotic and without a clue as to what they're actually doing and whom they are fighting and where their targets are. They always group hug behind cover somewhere and end up firing anything anywhere. I've seen a man fire an M14 and forgetting height over bore, resulting in rounds striking the top of the roof he was trying to shoot over. This may be due to different MOs and different tasks resulting in different situations, but anecdotal evidence I have been privy to suggests this to be fairly accurate. Quite a few people that have served in the US Army in the past have also spoken out about this, making me think my assessment may be true. In stark contrast to this is the fact that the Army has the highest tier commandoes and general purpose special forces available to USSOCOM. They have a really weird gap in their capability levels, it seems. Therefore, assimilating should be done a bit more carefully, with integration of units in to the Marines wherever needed.
The best joke is that the marines were not part of the most famous landing OP the US ever committed to. Not a single marine was present in Normandy due to infighting between branches iirc.
On the issue of the F35: Marines wanted a harrier replacement. They have their own logistics, they rarely deploy these planes from the big stick ships, they are almost exclusively flown from small dirt strips and heli carriers. Integrating them in to the F35 line was, as far as front line logistics go, not all that useful. They should have split the program, giving the more maneuverable contender to Air Force and Navy, with the Marines getting the version more suitable for CAS, VTOL/STOVL with selected parts interchangeability, like engines. I'm surprised they didn't. This would have allowed for pork for Rep.s and Sen.s from both Boeing and Lockmart.
Jason Collins
Every single war your country has ever had was fought primarily by Marines. Navy, Air Force, and Army were just dicking around doing fuck all, occasionally dropping a bomb or a shell in the right place.
If anything you should delete the three "real" branches and merge them under the authority of the Marines.
Joshua Robinson
Or they could just train regular army infantry a little better and boom, now they are marine-level
