The United States Marine Corps traces its founding to 10 November 1775, when the Continental Congress raised the Continental Marines in Philadelphia as infantry able to fight at sea and ashore. The Corps carried out its first amphibious assault at Nassau in the Bahamas in March 1776 and went on to serve in the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War and the Spanish-American War before its defining twentieth-century role: island-by-island amphibious campaigns across the Pacific in the Second World War. It has since fought as an expeditionary and counterinsurgency force in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and more recent conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, and numbered approximately 169,000 active-duty personnel as of 2024.
Facts
Force TypeNaval infantry: amphibious and expeditionary landing force 1 Founded Year Cross-Tradition Connections
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