USMC Armour

[95th Rifleman]

I know the US Marines have their own armoured contingent of MBTs, but how many do they have and how are they distributed?

[Adm.Lee]

One battalion per division/expeditionary force, so 3 regular and 1 reservist battalions. There's usually at least a platoon deployed with each expeditionary unit (reinforced battalion afloat). Numbered like the divisions, 1st is on the West Coast, 2nd is East Coast, 3rd is in Hawaii and Okinawa.

Battalion organization is similar the US Army's.

Equipment is older than the Army's. It's not cast-offs, but the Army units in Germany historically got 1st call on the new gear, so the Marines in T2k are just getting M1s while deploying M60A4. IIRC, in real life the Marines had only 1 company of M1 in Desert Storm?

In v1 US vehicle guide, the 3 regular tank battalions (1st-3rd) had M1, and the reservist/wartime battalions (4th-6th) had M60A4.

[Panther Al]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

One battalion per division/expeditionary force, so 3 regular and 1 reservist battalions. There's usually at least a platoon deployed with each expeditionary unit (reinforced battalion afloat). Numbered like the divisions, 1st is on the West Coast, 2nd is East Coast, 3rd is in Hawaii and Okinawa.

Battalion organization is similar the US Army's.

Equipment is older than the Army's. It's not cast-offs, but the Army units in Germany historically got 1st call on the new gear, so the Marines in T2k are just getting M1s while deploying M60A4. IIRC, in real life the Marines had only 1 company of M1 in Desert Storm?

In v1 US vehicle guide, the 3 regular tank battalions (1st-3rd) had M1, and the reservist/wartime battalions (4th-6th) had M60A4.

Yes... and no.

The 8th Tank Battalion has a company in SC - during the 90's it was based in Columbia SC. At the time of the gulf war they had M1's, and in 95 they upgraded to M1A1's.

How, you might ask, did they have them when some active duty marine units didn't?

South Carolina's Patron Saint, Sen. Strom Thurmond. Every time a Procurement bill came through, they had to pay him off to vote for it by ensuring that all reserve and national guard formations had the *latest* equipment. For instance, the SC ANG had Longbow Apache's before the regular army did...


Ya'll have no idea how much that fact - that SC's state troops was better and more lavishly equipped than regular formations - pissed off the Air Force (The SCNG had higher block F16's than most Air Force Units), the Army, and the Marines. Strom joked that when the south stepped up to teach the northerners a lesson again, they would be better equipped than the last time.

[James1978]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

One battalion per division/expeditionary force, so 3 regular and 1 reservist battalions.

Assuming that we're talking late Cold War/T2Kverse, the Marine Reserves had two tank battalions - 4th and 8th.

There's usually at least a platoon deployed with each expeditionary unit (reinforced battalion afloat). Numbered like the divisions, 1st is on the West Coast, 2nd is East Coast, 3rd is in Hawaii and Okinawa.

3rd Tanks moved to Twentynine Palms in 1976. There is a lot more maneuver space in California than in Okinawa or Hawaii.

Equipment is older than the Army's. It's not cast-offs, but the Army units in Germany historically got 1st call on the new gear, so the Marines in T2k are just getting M1s while deploying M60A4.

True, though in real life they started getting their own M1A1s around the time of ODS and were scheduled to complete their buy by 1996. In a T2Kverse where the Cold War never ended and Soviet tank development would have continued, I have trouble seeing the USMC buying M1s and not M1A1s.

IIRC, in real life the Marines had only 1 company of M1 in Desert Storm?

They borrowed 60 M1A1s from the Army and had 16 of their own. As I understand it, these were used by 2nd Tank Battalion and B/4th and C/4th Tank Battalion. 1st, 3rd, and 8th used the M60A1

In v1 US vehicle guide, the 3 regular tank battalions (1st-3rd) had M1, and the reservist/wartime battalions (4th-6th) had M60A4.

Do any of the official materials mention the 8th Tank Battalion at all?

[Adm.Lee]

Originally Posted by James1978

Assuming that we're talking late Cold War/T2Kverse, the Marine Reserves had two tank battalions - 4th and 8th.

Do any of the official materials mention the 8th Tank Battalion at all?

Nope.

[James Langham]

From memory the USMC also had an extra tank in each platoon at least in ODS when they upgraded to M1s. They were planning to drop the extra tank but kept it through the war, not sure if they kept this org afterwards.

[Raellus]

I kind of miss the old days when the Army were equipping with M1s and the Marines were still stuck with M60s- it gave them an underdog quality that I admire.

That said, according to Going Home and the NATO vehicle guide, the 2nd Marine Division were operating several types of MBT, including a German Leopard III (and, IIRC, a T-80 or two), as of mid-to-late 2000.