User:Moss/Sandbox/Starfleet Marine Corps

Starfleet Marine Corps
Part Of:	Starfleet
Allegiance:	United Federation of Planet
Branch:	Marine Combined arms
Role:	Ground forces
Motto:	Semper Fidelis
Command Staff
Commandant of the Starfleet Marine Corps:	Brigadier General Ashley Roberts
Deputy Commandant of the Starfleet Marine Corps:	Colonel Duncan Blair
Sergeant Major of the Starfleet Marine Corps:	Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps Sevan
Source

The Starfleet Marine Corps, or SFMC, is a department of Starfleet founded in 2320, charged with being the dedicated peacekeeping, ground assault of the United Federation of Planets. The Corps represents the practical reality that, despite the vaunted ideals of the Federation which Starfleet embodies, they exist in a continuously hostile and aggressive galaxy and require a dedicated military arm to deter hostile actions and provide a dedicated force of soldiers to augment Starfleet's otherwise defensively-oriented military operations.

They are a relatively small department, and routinely detach groups of Marines to starships on an as-needed basis, depending on the mission and the commanding officer's desires.

Starfleet Marine Corps members can be distinguished by the forest green colored undershirt to the traditional Starfleet uniform and their unique rank pips.

History

MACOs

The Starfleet Marine Corps is not a department that was present at the founding of the Federation in 2161. United Earth Starfleet, the forerunner organization to the Federation's Starfleet, borrowed personnel from Military Assault Command Operations, also known as MACOs, to fulfill the ground assault role for starships and act as an extra protective force. Once folded into the Federation, the United Earth Space Probe Agency Starfleet became the United Federation of Planets Starfleet, but Military Assault Command Operations stayed separate.

For nearly a century and a half, the MACO office at West Point, New York, was an independent body, comprised of trained military personnel and Starfleet officers in brevet positions within the structure, lending tactical expertise and advanced training facilities for Starfleet Security. Officer and enlisted exchange was common between the two organizations; Starfleet Security saw that the training was valuable for keeping their personnel sharp, and the MACOs benefited from the mobility of the Starfleet organization.

Merging with Starfleet

Starfleet had been eyeing the MACO structure for quite some time, envious of the special operations structure that the MACOs had developed. In turn, the MACOs relied very heavily on Starfleet to ferry them around, and their harmonious relationship often brought up talks about their merging. Several times, there was unsuccessful efforts to have the MACO structure join Starfleet. The most worthwhile movements for this were put on hold in 2293, after the Klingon Empire and the Federation entered into the Khitomer Accords, and several MACO bases of operations were no longer needed along the Klingon border. Also, an embarrassment occurred when Colonel West, tactical advisor to the President, was discovered to be in the Cartwright conspiracy, and was killed during a botched assassination attempt of both the President and the Klingon Chancellor.

Other parts of Starfleet, the people who wanted Starfleet to continue on the science and exploration and to be less viewed as a military force, kept pushing the MACO structure away. Several Starfleet captains denied their own personnel training at West Point due to this conflict; some even were very prejudiced towards the people that had received the training, a feeling that still runs through Starfleet to this day. Considerable conventional resistance was encountered at every step of the way, with Starfleet's peaceful exploration pushing the MACO structure away. From 2295 to well into the 2310s, this was the situation.

MACO merged with Starfleet on 10 November 2320, after tensions with the Klingon Empire and the start of a Cardassian-Federation conflict stretched Starfleet Security too thin to guarantee the safety and security of the Federation. An Executive Order issued by the Federation President at the time and ratified by the Federation Council amended the charter of Starfleet to form the department known as the Starfleet Marine Corps.

2320 to the Dominion War

Almost immediately, there were challenges for the newly-minted department. Members of the Joint Chiefs of Starfleet were unhappy about having to devote resources to the new department, and the exploration arms, particularly Science, did not like the Marines in Starfleet, and wanted them removed. The President mandating their merger and creation created a lot of resentment overnight.

Regardless, the Starfleet Marine Corps was pressed into service right away, setting up bases of operations along the Cardassian border, as well as the Gorn and Tholian border regions. The Marines were also always the first ones to react to Talarian invasions during the Talarian Wars of the early to mid 24th centuries. With a technological advantage, the Marines had the upper hand in most of the conflicts, but suffered from a shortage of manpower in the beginning as the troops were deployed at first very sparsely along all the border regions, then increased as time progressed and the new department's training numbers increased exponentially.

Battle wasn't the only thing the Marines were used for. When a Federation member asked for a peacekeeping force to enter their planet, the Marine Corps was asked in to represent the Federation. Marines were first used as the first line of defense for all Federation embassies scattered around the galaxy in 2339, and, in a joint operation with Starfleet Security, still make up Federation Embassy Security to this day.

Starfleet Security has always eyed the Marines with scrutiny. Several attempts during this time were made to convince the sitting Federation President to dissolve the Marine Corps into Starfleet Security's numbers, as they felt Security's usage in these situations was more optimal. This has caused a rivalry in between the Marine Corps and the rest of Starfleet, most of the time friendly but sometimes heated. However, Marine usefulness was about to be put to the ultimate test. Already a few skirmishes with the Klingons in the corridor in between the Cardassian and Klingon empires had been fought in 2372 and 2373, and when formal war broke out between the Federation and the Dominion in late 2373, the Marine Corps was ready.

Dominion War

The Dominion War started in late 2373, and the Marines were there to answer the call of battle. Being a mobile infantry corps armed with advanced weaponry, Marine bases were the only places to at least hold their lines during the first assault of Cardassian and Dominion troops on the ground along the Cardassian border.

The ground operations during the First Battle of Chin'toka was fought mainly with Marines and Klingons working side by side, representing a joint operations in mind that quelled some of the distrust of the former combatants in the brief Federation-Klingon conflicts of 2372. Further operations include three failed operations to retake Betazed in 2374 and the fourth successful push in a joint operation with Reman commandos in 2375.

Post Dominion War

After the Dominion War, the state of the Federation was quite different than before. Most of the commanders in Starfleet and politicians in the Federation were more cautious, and the usefulness of the Starfleet Marine Corps once and for all was sealed after their list of ground assault victories. They were pressed again into service, but the abundance of numbers of a Marine unit in a peacetime Federation meant that many could either retire or get trained into different departments, keeping their Marine rank while going into starship operation command. Starting in 2376, Marines were allowed to wear different colored collars instead of their traditional Marine colors when permanently assigned to a different department in Starfleet, such as Command. However, no Marine has been permitted to join Starfleet Medical or Starfleet Sciences department per mandate, but medical and science personnel can join the Marine Corps, though this practice is rare.