User:RekonDog/Amphibious Warfare

Colonial Era
The United States’ first role in amphibious warfare was inaugurated when the Continental Marines made their first amphibious landing on the beaches of the Bahamas during the Battle of Nassau on 2 March 1776. Even during the Civil War, the United States Navy’s ships brought ashore soldiers, sailors, and Marines to capture coastal forts. General Robert E. Lee, the Confederate Army commander, declared:
 * "Wherever his [Union] fleet can be brought, no opposition to his landing can be made except within range of our fixed batteries. We have nothing to oppose his heavy guns, which sweep over the low banks of this country with irresistible force."

Advanced Base Force
Expeditionary battalions On the outset of the Spanish-American War, the Marines stormed the beaches of Cuba and captured Guantanamo Bay while the United States Army successfully landed at Santiago. It was First Lieutenant Dion Williams, who raised the United States Flag at Manila Bay in 1898, epitomized the modernized doctrine of amphibious operations, focusing on seizure, preparation, and defense of advance bases, which also adopted the concept of amphibious reconnaissance.

The Marine Corps had began to come to the realization of utilizing methods of seizing and defending objectives on shore. The Marine Corps Commandant, Brigadier General William P. Biddle sent orders to Earl H. Ellis, a Marine Officer, to the Advance Force Base, which in later years was re-established as the Fleet Marine Force in regards to his report and thesis he had written at the Navy War College concerning the setting up of advanced bases. The Advanced Base School was created in conjunction for the Advanced Base Force in New London, Connecticut in 1910.

Fleet Marine Force
By the 1930s, the Fleet Marine Force, which consisted of the United States Navy and Marine Corps was developed. During this period, they began to modernize amphibious warfare that farbricated into the seminal Tentative Landing Operations Manual which was implemented in 1935. The doctrine set forth the organization, theory and practice of landing operations by establishing new troop organization and the development of amphibious landing crafts and tractors. Also, they emphasized the use of aerial and naval support in beach landings for the troops. The final element of the formula was the annual exercises called the 'Fleet Landing Exercises', or FLEX, which were conducted in the Caribbean, the California coast, and in the Hawaiian Islands. similar to the exercices conducted by LtCol Earl "Pete" Ellis on Culebra by the Advanced Base Force in January, 1914. This preparation proved invaluable in World War II, when the Marines not only spearheaded many of the attacks against Japanese-held islands in the Pacific theater of war, but also helped train the United States Army divisions that also participated in the island-hopping campaign.

Amphibious Corps
Throughout the Pacific campaign during World War II, both the United States Army and Marine Corps trained together in joint-amphibious operations. Even the Army conducted its own facility to accomondate the training necessary, establishhing the Amphibious Training Center (ATC). It was pointed out that the number of amphibious troops in the United States was inadequate and that the Marine Corps was undermanned due to expansion problems between the Navy's budget. To futher complicate problems in the development of amphibious warfare amongs the Marine Corps was that they were organized for agressive, but limited objectives, instead of extensive operations that fully relied on larger ground forces that were capable of sustaining longer in combat, due to being well-funded and equipped. A notable result of the ATC was the deployment of Engineer Amphibian Brigades (later called Engineer Special Brigades), which were largely responsible for much of the amphibious resupply doctrine still in use by the United States Marine Corps today.

The United States Navy controlled many joint units of the Army and the Marine Corps. The combined Army/Marine units consisted of two amphibious corps, the Amphibious Corps of the Pacific Fleet and of the Atlantic Fleet. These units represented the sum total of the amphibious forces of the United States, with the exception of small units of the Fleet Marine Force, which had been trained for amphibious raids. It was apparent that the United States Marine Corps did not have sufficient troops trained for the type of operation which was necessary to win the war.

To severe the problems, the United States Navy controlled two joint Army-Marine "amphibious corps", in which the Army and Marine Corps's forces were attached under:


 * 1) Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet (ACPF) — 3d Infantry Division and the 2d Marine Division
 * 2) Amphibious Corps, Atlantic Fleet (ACAF) — 1st Infantry Division, 9th Infantry Division, and the 1st Marine Division

By 1943, primarily due to disagreements between the services, the Army ceded this role to the Navy and Marine Corps, and the Army closed its Amphibious Training Center. Subsequently, the Marine suborndinate units of the Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet (ACPF) were re-designated under the full command of the Marine Corps's V Amphibious Corps (VAC).