The Imperial Marines
The Terran Confederation Line Marines were reorganized after the last war into a more cohesive organization with greater centralized command available directly through the Emperor, or through His various governors and senior admirals. This was done for similar reasons to those of the Navy: less disparity in training/equipment/supply among the various units, faster communication through the chain of command over greater distance since messages will have to travel through fewer hands, and improved morale through greater esprit’de corps. One of the lessons of the last war was that while the TC Line Marines were a colorful and impressive organization that was the most heavily armed and best trained force in the Terran Confederation it was too diverse in command structures and cross-unit training to be able to respond rapidly and with enough concentration to be as effective as it was expected to be – and ought to have been.
Case in point was the action at Dismas where three full battalions of Line Marines were unable to properly coordinate their response to an Askorrian drop assault because none of those battalions had not only ever trained together in regular combat exercises, but one of the units was lacking the communications gear to match the equipment in the battlesuits used by the other two units. As a result, one battalion was cut off and slaughtered while the other two couldn’t talk to each other until they were able to fight their way into physical contact.
After Boards of Enquiry after the war found that far too many similar incidents and issues of lax training, poor supply, and false reporting of readiness had been going on – and that it was only by the fierce determination and tradition of making do with what little could be improvised and adapted allowed the Line Marines to hold the line as well as they did. As a result of the Board’s findings the organization was gutted and reorganized.
One of the first and most important changes was the Imperial Order that greater funding would be provided to allow the individual worlds within the Empire to raise and maintain their own Armies, and that a greater emphasis would be placed on the ability of those armies to hold their own in defending their homeworlds. The Imperial Marines would no longer be relied upon as a shotgun for the Empire; it would now be the sniper’s rifle. The size of the Marines would be reduced, first by reductions in the upper ranks of the officer corps, then by reducing the TO&E to what would be needed to arm the fleets, then to something that could be rapidly deployed to bolster the planetary armies. Cadres were detached and now train and liaison with the planetary armies. The average ratio of Imperial Marines to Homeworld Defense Forces is currently 1:4, which is almost the opposite of the ratio from the Terran Confederation. The past mission of the Marines was to bear the brunt of the fight and now it is to support the local forces and, if necessary, to finish the fight themselves only if no one else can.
The Imperial Marines are currently armed and equipped to full TL-15 standards. The typical Marine can be arguably called a weapon system equipped with either a standard TL-15 Battlesuit with all its integrated weapons (finger laser, tac missile racks, and CQB systems), defensive armor and armament (Shatterspray PDWS, ECM, and bonded superdense skin) or a heavy Assault Suit with integrated fusion gun or 2cm collapsing round support gun. Jump Troopers are equipped similarly, but with more “stealth” gear added to the Assault Suits, including the new nanoskin sheathing that mimic not just background color, but texture and motion.
The Imperial Marines are organized into regiments consisting of 2 battalions (500 combat soldiers each) with a regimental command HQ of 50 staff. Each Battalion is organized into 2, 200-man Heavy Companies with a 100-man Light Company that is trained and equipped for recon and commando in lighter versions of battle dress. In addition to the infantry units a Regiment will have various artillery and support units attached to it on an as-needed basis. Armored regiments consist of 46 MBT’s with assorted support vehicles.
The Main Battle Tank of the Marines is the M-8b Bulldog, a grav tank upgraded from the original M-8 of the TC forces. In addition to some updates to the electronics and ECM suites the M-8 also has the vehicle version of the Shatterspray PDWS added to it with increased lethality against personnel as well as incoming smart weapons. The armor has also been supplemented with Smart-skin sensors and nanoarmor sheathing to allow for a certain amount of “self-healing” of the tank’s armor. The actual name and means of this technological breakthrough is still highly classified, but it shows incredible promise in defensive applications across all the Services.
The Normandy-class 175kt Imperial Marine Assault Carrier (also armed for planetary bombardment and fire support) is the standard transport for the Imperial Marines, with a smaller class of Fast Response Carriers (50kt Hastings-class) used for independent cruising along the borders of the Empire. The HMS Normandy can carry 2 full Marine regiments and 1 Armored regiment, along with all the needed support to maintain operations for 14 days of sustained combat. The HMS Hastings carries 1 Marine regiment with a company of attached armor, and can sustain combat operations for a similar amount of time.
IDT (Special Forces)
The Imperial Drop Troops are the Special Forces of the Marines within the Empire’s current TO&E. Previously they were a separate branch entirely, but it was found that this led to a “firewall” between the two ground combat arms that caused strategic and tactical tasking problems. Too much overlap resulted when tasking the forces and the unique advantages and abilities of the drop forces was too often wasted.
Currently the forces are used as a surgical strike force in combination with Scout recce regiments who act as pathfinders for the drop units and stand by to aid in recovery ops. During the time of the Terran Confederation the drop troops were used too often to establish a beachhead for a full Marine soft landing assault, but this (while still a function for which they train and prepare to perform) too often resulted in heavier than acceptable losses among a highly technical and “light” infantry force since they all too often found themselves in untenable positions that couldn’t be reinforced rapidly enough to save them. Because these losses were prohibitively expensive to replace within the timeframe that the last war occurred in it was decided by the Board of Inquiry that the new primary mission of the drop troops was surgical strike and fast recovery. Secondary consideration was given to being the first ones in to establish a beachhead since now the Imperial Marines are better disposed and equipped to perform this task than under the Terran Confederation.
Known as “Frogs” (both for how they enter combat as well as obscure historical reasons long forgotten) the IDT is equipped to TL-15 standards and use the heavy Assault Battlesuit and SSG-88 as a squad support weapon in its shoulder fired configuration. The basic sidearm is the FGMP-14, or FGMP-15 for garrison duty in combat armor. The 75kt Athena-class Drop Carrier is the primary standard transport for the IDT and can deploy two regiments (520 men + support techs each) of IDT forces within 5 minutes, then act as support for fire missions with its missile ortillery batteries. Recovery is made by the Recon Scout force that acts a pathfinder for the assault group in Valkyrie-class 500 ton assault landers – heavily armored and armed landers with 6g acceleration and advanced ECM capabilities to make recovery of casualties or an IDT under fire is required. Four assault landers are carried in an Athena and they can recover 150 in each lander; casualties take up 2 slots each. The landers are also equipped with 6 drone bays to launch Casualty Recovery Drones (known as “Nightingales” among the troops) and fire support hunter-killer drones firing VRFGG’s and anti-armor (or nuclear) tactical missiles. HK drones can also be equipped with autocannnon railguns for firing collapsing rounds in bursts – usually for rapid area suppression during recovery operations.
