In 1968 and 1969 at the height of the Vietnam War, the United States Marine Corps maintained two training facilities, one at San Diego, MCRD, and one in South Carolina, Parris Island.
Each facility had one training Regiment with 48 training platoons each. There were a total of 96 platoons with 3 training NCO’s each, called “drill instructors.” These units turned out the best trained soldiers in the world.
The entire United States Marine Corps was trained by 288 drill instructors in 8 week sessions who turned out about 8000 Marines. Three sessions, totalling 24 weeks, was adequate to supply the entire combat contingent that successfully held the northern half of Vietnam.
These units, which included as few as 9000 combat soldiers at one time (casualties and rotation), saw the majority of the combat during the Vietnam War. When they left their areas of operation they had 100% control during the day and 65% control at night against an enemy that could conquer Afghanistan, Pakistan and probably India as well and have time for lunch.
During the Second World War, a similar force, abandoned with no fire support, food and little ammunition defeated half the miliary forces of Japan on the island of Guadalcanal. In 1918, the 5th Marines, a much smaller unit, stopped the entire German army at Belleau Wood. I belonged to both of these units. For each unit, this was their first combat experience, all were “raw recruits.”
We have been training the Army of Afghanistan and their police force using over 12,000 trainers for 11 years and have created a force that controls 10% of a nation when augmented with a massive US force.
