rickusn

Its said an MEU contains approx. 2200 Marines:

40 Command
665 Aviation
300 Support
950 Infantry Battalion
250 Artillery Batterry

And were at 2200 but there are still other elements like the LAR, AAV, tank and and combat engineer platoons to consider for another 150 to 200 Marines I would think.

Anybody got a better breakdown than this.?

Thanks Rick

Ar

rickusn

Well it seems Im am little high on the artillery personnel. It should be 120 but that still leaves some questions in my mind.

Also it brings up another question why does the Army have 230, 288, 307, 344 to 400 assigned to their artiilery batteries? All including the USMC have 6-gun 155mm batteries . Except airborne.

rickusn

Disregard the Army #'s they are not for the most part for only one battery.

rickusn

MEU

909 Infantry Battalion
119 Artillery Battery
37 LAR Platoon
27 Recon Platoon
42 AAV-7 Platoon
20 Tank Platoon
48 Eng Platoon

660 Aviation
38 Command Element
300 Service Support

2200 Total
plus 70 USN

Best I could come up with using various sources at my disposal and some convenient rounding.

Sometimes there are more than 2200 personnel assigned.

Plus im not sure its kosher to leave out the USN personnel but Im too tired to double-check it.

PS I do have further break-down of the Infantry battalion if anyone is interested.

-{SpoonmaN}-

I wouldn't mind seeing a break-down of a US infantry battalion. I've seen one for an ADF infantry Battlation but I dont have a source for it offhand.

rickusn

Sorry to be so slow with this but while I was putting it together Monday night my wife fell and broke her ankle in three spaces plus dislocating it.

Hope its helpful.

MEU Battalion Landing Team

Total 909 Marines plus 69 USN

HQ&SC(203)(Sorry no break down)

3 Rifle Companys (182 ea)(546 total)

HQ (8per company)(24 Total)

Weapons Plt (48 per company)(144 Total)
HQ (3)
MG Sec (22)
Mortar Sec 60mm (10)
Assault sec (13)

3 Rifle Plt(42 per platoon)(126 per company)(378 Total)
HQ (3)
3 Rifle Squads(39)
Leaders (3)
9 Fire Teams(36)

Each Rifle Company has a 5 man Fire Support Team(2 each assigned from the BLT artillery battery and Aviation Component plus one from the Battalion 81mm Mortar Plt) , 14 Corpsman, 3 radio operators from battalion plus an 11 man Eng Squad and a 4 man Javelin Team (both assigned from BLT assets ie Eng Plt/Weapons Co).

Weapons Company(160)

HQ(8)
Heavy Weapons(Anti-Armor) Plt (54)
Mortar Plt 81mm (52)
Javelin Plt (16)
Scout Sniper Plt(30)

Dont know how up-to-date and thus how accurate this is (2000). Another source says that the Weapons Co has 180 men(1997).

I have some other info (limited) such as vehicles, weapons and other equipment assigned if your looking for something more specific.

rickusn

Heres a related article:

http://www.navyleague.org/sea_power/may06-44.php

Sniper will love this. LOL

May 2006

Fast Amphibian

Unique fighting vehicle is an essential part of Marines’ ship-to-shore express

By Glenn W. Goodman Jr., Special Correspondent

After 10 years of development, the U.S. Marine Corps’ next-generation amphibious assault vehicle appears ready for prime time. The Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle (EFV) is in the middle of a Marine Corps independent operational assessment that is expected to lead to low-rate initial production approval by the Pentagon’s Defense Acquisition Board in December.

The 78,000-pound EFV, developed by General Dynamics Amphibious Systems, is an armored, fully tracked, infantry fighting vehicle with what is perhaps the world’s largest jet ski, enabling it to transition rapidly between water and land operations. The EFV now meets or exceeds virtually all of its demanding performance requirements, said Marine Corps Col. Mike Brogan, the EFV program manager.

“We, frankly, have no more technical challenges to overcome before we begin delivering the vehicle,” he said.

The EFV, which has a crew of three — vehicle commander, gunner and driver — will be the primary means of tactical mobility for a rifle squad of 17 Marines during an amphibious landing and subsequent ground combat operations ashore. Launched from the well deck of an amphibious ship stationed safely 20-25 nautical miles out to sea, beyond the visual horizon, the EFV can hydroplane across ocean waves at a speed of 25 knots while still providing a smooth ride for the Marines inside. It then moves ashore without stopping, achieving land speeds up to 45 miles per hour.

Along with the Marine Corps’ new MV-22 Osprey tiltrotor aircraft, which entered full-rate production last September, and the Navy’s over-the-beach Landing Craft Air Cushion hovercraft, the EFV will complete the triad of mobility systems the Corps has long awaited to give life to its Expeditionary Maneuver Warfare doctrine. That doctrine is built on the Marine warfighting concepts of Operational Maneuver from the Sea and Ship-to-Objective Maneuver, which envision the use of strategically agile and tactically flexible forces to threaten wide coastlines and move rapidly ashore at points of their own choosing from their sea base and head straight for their inland objective with uninterrupted momentum. They will no longer have to pause to secure a beachhead.

The vehicle’s high water speed is made possible by its powerful 12-cylinder, 2,700-horsepower diesel engine from Germany’s MTU and twin 23-inch-diameter water jets from Honeywell, which move a total of 100,000 gallons per minute.

The EFV has significant firepower and can shoot on the move with its new and fully stabilized 30mm automatic chain gun and 7.62mm coaxial machine gun in a rotating 360-degree turret. The dual-feed 30mm gun fires high-explosive or armor-piercing rounds accurately in five-shot bursts out to a range of 2,000 meters and 2,500 meters, respectively.

The crew is protected from 14.5mm armor-piercing rounds and 155mm artillery shrapnel by armor panels made of composite materials instead of metal, which helped keep the vehicle light enough to float.

The first lot of low-rate production vehicles will undergo a nine-month Initial Operational Test & Evaluation in fiscal years 2009-2010. Initial deployment is planned in late fiscal year 2010 to early fiscal 2011. A full-rate production go-ahead currently is scheduled for 2011. The Marine Corps plans to buy 1,013 EFVs — 935 personnel variants and 78 command variants — through fiscal year 2018, with final deliveries in 2020. The command variant, which has a crew of three and no 30mm gun, will house an infantry battalion staff or regimental staff of nine and features seven workstations.

Brogan told Seapower, “They tell you at the Defense Acquisition course at Fort Belvoir, Va., that a program manager should not count on more than one miracle in a development program. I’ve had four on this program: the armor, the engine, the water jets and the state-of-the-art command, control and communications software in the EFV command variant.”

-{SpoonmaN}-

3 Crew plus 17 passengers, how big is that thing?

Gun Grape

Just to throw a curve ball into all this. A MEU is task organized and while there is a basic "A MEU consist of...." each one will be different. Just in the last 10 years I have see some of the following. There have been MEUs that left off the tank plt,(SOP until the 26th MEU in 96) some that have left all or part of the arty battery at home (on air alert fly in status), all or some of the LAV platoon (no AT variant) some that included a CB Radar section. It is up to the MEU commander and the way he intends to "Fight the MEU" and the percieved threat indicators for the AO.

Other differences that will skew the numbers are things like the Scout/Sniper Platoon.
Some units the Scout/Sniper platoon is in the H&S company and work under the direction of the S-2, other units they belong to the weapons company. Some commanders have not filled the slots in their battalion Scout/Sniper platoon. When the MEU is formed the MEU commander may detach part of the Recon detachment to the BLT.
Then you will have a MEU Recon element, A BLT Recon element and a Scout/Sniper platoon or possibly a MEU Recon element + a MEU combined recon/sniper element a combined BLT recon/sniper element and a BLT Sniper element. Also some of the Sniper Platoon may be chopped to the MEU and work with the Direct Action Recon element.

I've seen all of the variations mentioned above plus a few more.

Lastly a BLTs elements will be configured differently depending on the TO/E of the parent units. A okinawa based infantry Battalion does not use the same Org chart as a 2d MarDiv Infantry battalion and both are different to a 7th MEB Infantry battalion.

Truly, the best you can hope for is a snapshot of "in the spring of year x, the XX MEU was composed of the following personnel and equipment".

Wraith601

This sums it up nicely.

EFV

__________________
"We always have been, we are, and I hope that we always shall be, detested in France."
-Sir Arthur Wellesley