troung

A battle has broken out over the role of the first Army commando unit to be formed since the Second World War, with the Royal Marines claiming that the infantry lack "the suitable calibre" to join their force.

While the Marines believe they are doing the Army a good turn by saving an infantry battalion from cuts, senior soldiers have said that they are bringing the under-manned commandos up to full brigade strength. The new unit will be formed when two infantry regiments are amalgamated next year to become 1 Bn The Rifles.

Soldiers from the Devon and Dorsets and the Royal Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Light Infantry are already conducting extra physical training in preparation to become part of the Royal Marines tough 3 Commando Brigade, which at its core has three formations of about 550 men each.

The battalion's officers and men have been unable to hide their excitement at joining the commando brigade but they will be disappointed at the role the Marines have proposed for them.

Under plans seen by The Daily Telegraph, the wartime role of 1 Rifles will be to protect rear head quarters and supply depots and guard prisoners of war. At best they will be allowed to defend a port or oil refinery after it has been stormed by Marines in helicopters or assault landing craft.

"There is the option of them coming across as fully fledged commandos with the same kind of equipment and training as us," a senior Marine officer said.

"But it's a non-starter as the Army don't have the right calibre of people to do that and we don't have the capacity or space to train a battalion of 600 men."

The Army formation will also be used as 3 Commando's "roulement" battalion, fulfilling its slots of mundane six month tours in less popular operations such as Kosovo, Northern Ireland or Iraq while the Marines unit would be kept in high readiness for specialised operations. "What we have at the moment is a highly capable organisation being essentially out of the picture for almost 12 months used on these tours," the senior Marine officer said.

"We want to keep the three commando units for what they are there are best at - as an expeditionary force that can also support special forces."

While the Marines believe it is "not an option" for the soldiers to become a fully fledged commando unit, senior Army sources have indicated that, although in the short term 1 Rifles will take a back seat role, within three or four years they will be fully commando trained and equipped.

"Our view is to get stuck in and become commandos but the Navy seem to have rather backward approach where they see them as poor second cousins who will free up the commandos to go off and do special operations," an Army source said.

A source from an infantry unit criticised the Marines' attitude towards their potential new commando colleagues.

"What they are proposing, essentially giving us rear security, would be intolerable," he said.

"No commanding officer of a battalion of line infantry, having served in Afghanistan and Iraq, would accept that under any circumstances.

"I also find it amazing that they think raw recruits from the Royal Marines would be of a higher calibre than a soldier who has completed three or four very tough operational tours."

The new unit will come under Royal Navy command but will be paid for by the Army.

Anon

You coulda put a "UK" in the title bro.

troung

I had thought about it...

Knew it would piss you off seeing the headline...

dave angel

RM does have a point, the failure rate from walking into the careers office to completing the commando course is astronomical, its certainly much higher than a line Infantry regiment. its probably fair to say that given a choice many recruits would opt for RM - so they have the pick of the potential recruits.

the training is a little longer - 26 weeks total for Infantry and 32 weeks total for RM Commando, on the other hand the LI bn will be one of the fitter bn's and its members will have operational experience.

3CDO BDE will be pretty big when this comes to fruition: 4 rifle bn's, a CDO artillery regiment, a CDO engineer regiment, a CDO logistics Bn and an HQ.

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before criticizing someone, walk a mile in their shoes.................... then when you do criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes.

Anoop C

This is slightly off-topic, but here goes anyway.

What is the origin of the term "line infantry"? Does it come from the lines of yore, where after the first line falls, the second one steps up?

Thanks in advance.

RustyBattleship

I think you're pretty close on that. Actually it goes back to the Roman Legion battle formations. But not necessarily when or if the front line FALLS.

The Roman Legion would only allow it's front line to actually engage in hand to hand (spear and sword) for about ten minutes. Then it would have the second line move up in their place. That first line then falls back to the rear of the Legion to regenerate their wind and strength while the other four or so lines kept up the 10 minute exchange tactic. That way the enemy was fighting a "fresh" line of infantry every 10 minutes.

As the centuries wore on, "official" (or "regular") Infantry always advanced in a broad line even after firearms became the main one-on-one battle weapon. During the War Between the States (sometimes called the American Civil War) second thoughts on holding solid lines came into play because of terrain, in some cases, and repeating arms in a few other battles.

Unbelievably the French army still used the lines of Infantry advances in World War I. Not too effective against Maxim machine guns.

Therefore, today "Line Infantryman" is more of a traditional term.

Anoop C

RustyBattleship,

I didn't know about the Roman tactic either. Thank you for the information.

lemontree

The Royal Marines are being silly. What is the difference between the capabilities of the Parachute Regt and the Royal Marines?...just the uniform and the moth on the chest.

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Cheers!...on the rocks!!

Officer of Engineers

Captain,

1 Rifles is just a line infantry regt.

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Chimo

lemontree

Sir,
I was commenting on the RM forgeting their history and the cdo heritage of the army while running them down. The new battalion being formed will have already filtered the 'unfit' men during the conversion period.

Anon

From a friend of mine who's an officer in the RAF; after seeing this exact article:

"Treat that report with a lot of caution. Yes the integration is ocurring, but the author in question is a poor journalist who has poor sources and tends to run stories from the grape vine and presents them as fact."

dave angel

ah, but you forget Colonel, the LI march at 160 ppm rather than the tradition quick march of 120ppm. being a 'light' infantry Bn rather than a 'mech' infantry Bn won't get in their way either. they are a much better choice than a mech infantry roled unit and a marginally better choice than a non LI roled foot infantry Bn.

LI units - IMHO - have a better standard of fittness than most other inf Bn's.

some of the start up work is being done, they are testing a 'new' commando course to work out the exact requirements and the black maffia is working hard to ensure that LI don't get the shitty end of the stick.

Officer of Engineers

Oh boy,

I sure sound disparaging, don't I. My apologies, gents. It did not come out like the way I intended. What I meant to say was that the 1 Rifles is not the Parachute Regiment ... and that is all I intended to say.