Few Good Men The Story of the Fighting Fifth Marines

A Few Good Men: The Story of the Fighting Fifth Marines Ronald J. Brown 1: Genesis Modern U.S. Marines enjoy a standing second to none as fighting men of the world. The Marine Corps is a unique expeditionary force manned by "the few, the proud" highly skilled and extremely motivated warriors with a worldwide reputation for physical toughness and steadfastness under fire. The Marine Corps is the largest and best-trained amphibious force in the world. But U.S. Marines are much more than that. In our contemporary lexicon, the word Marines is indicative of the best of the best. This high standing was not always the case, however. In fact, at one time the Marines were considered almost superfluous by the Navy Department; they were a force without a mission. It was not until the early twentieth century that the current image of the Marine Corps as a fighting elite began to come into focus. For more than 140 years, from the creation of the Continental Marines in1775 until World War I, the Marines Corps was a small organization whose primary function was to serve as a naval constabulary. American Marines enforced discipline on board U.S. warships and fought from the sail tops during ship-to-ship engagements during the first half of the nineteenth century. The coming of the post-Civil War "steel-and-steam" navy virtually ended the necessity for these traditional roles, so the Marines spent several decades searching for a raison d'etre. During the doldrums, Marines guarded navy yards, served on board capital ships where they were relegated to basically ceremonial duties, manned secondary batteries, or participated in occasional landing parties to protect American lives and property overseas. The Spanish-American War in 1898 was a watershed for the Marine Corps. After that conflict it became plain that Marines were needed to conduct advanced base operations, specifically the seizure and defense of overseas coaling stations and shore facilities. On a less theoretical level, the Marines became experts in the conduct of small wars when they were repeatedly used to occupy American overseas territories or to prop up shaky governments in Latin America. But it was not until World War I that the Marines achieved their current reputation as a first-class fighting outfit. The initial opportunities to showcase the "new" Marine Corps occurred in the Philippines and Latin America between the end of the Spanish-American War and the onset of war in Europe fifteen years later.Brown, Ronald J. is the author of 'Few Good Men The Story of the Fighting Fifth Marines' with ISBN 9780891417361 and ISBN 0891417362.