The US Marine Corps sheds its tanks and returns to its naval roots

THE OFFICIAL hymn of the United States Marine Corps, a jaunty tune written by Jacques Offenbach in 1867, proudly declares that “From the Halls of Montezuma/ To the shores of Tripoli/ We fight our country’s battles/ In the air, on land, and sea”. But despite their naval origins and ethos, America’s marines have spent most of the past two decades waging war in the deserts, mountains and cities of Iraq and Afghanistan. On March 26th General David Berger, the corps’s commandant, proposed a radical transformation of the force into America’s first line of defence in the Pacific.

The Marine Corps emerged out of the Continental Marines, the naval infantry force raised in 1775 by the American colonies during the revolutionary war against Britain. As soldiers who were deployed at sea, they served as raiding parties and an insurance policy against mutiny by press-ganged sailors. Over the next century they acquired a legendary reputation for far-flung campaigns.