I repeatly seeing the word troop in the news to define the number of soldier performing some action.
A troop contains how many soldiers?
And while we’re on the subject how many soldiers are in a battilion?
Please clear this up for this civilian…
This has always confused me. But I’ve come to the conclusion that troop=one service member.
Troops, I believe, refers to collective military personnel. e.g., “1000 troops” is 1000 soldiers, marines, or what have you.
Dictionary dot com also says a troop is the equivalent of a U.S. platoon in European armies.
The word “troop” has several military meanings. In the sentence, “The troops were issued ammunition.” it refers to individual soldiers. In the cavalry “troop” used to mean the organizational level equivalent to a “company” in the infantry and at different times consisted of different numbers of men.
In the infantry a battalion consists of three rifle companies and a headquarters company pluss assigned support elements like, transportation, ordnance, signal corps, engineers, quartermaster, supply, intelligence, etc. The battalion itself has ~800 people.
In the media, unless they are referring to cavalry ‘troops,’ they mean one soldier / sailor / marine. In the Army, you will hear units of soldiers as: squad, platoon, company, battalion, brigade, regiment, division, etc…
A ‘group’ in Army terms is usally a brigade size element of a support unit. (For instance, I’m a transporter, and I’m not serving in a combat arms unit, so my battalion’s higher is a group.)
I like to refer to them as a “Gaggle of Gomers.” For the USMC only.
Doesn’t ‘European’ armies imply many armies? So all of them feature the troop as an organisational unit? How odd!
Here in the UK the term troop, as far as the military unit is concerned, I think ‘troop’ is restricted to special forces (SAS) and, IIRC, the Royal Marines. It’s not commonly used with regular infantry units.
This web page gives a good overview of the different sizes of units in the U.S. Army.
Yes, but why? The word is identified as a collective noun in most every definition with which I’m familiar. Is the singular meaning as “troop=one soldier” a common military application, or a media bastardization?
It’s just jarring to hear newscasters refer to “5 more troops killed” when they mean 5 people, and not the collective (as in 5*the number in a “troop”).
Yeah, it would be better if media used the term “trooper” instead.
Nah that won’t work either. “Trooper” can also refer to an individual cavalryman or paratrooper.
Unit size varies according to operational needs and number of people available. A Seabee battalion used to be 782 men, but that can swell in wartime or shrink in peacetime. A squad used to be 13 men and a platoon was 3-4 squads, depending on the function of the platoon.
It propably comes from the same source as “Grunts” or “Doughboys.” 
I learned that a troop comprises three to five platoons. The platoon contains from two to four squads or sections, each of which could have anywhere from eight to 14 soldiers
That’s the definition of a “company”. Next step up from a company is a battalion, then a regiment, then a brigade. A troop used to be a designation for a company of cavalry in the USA. Some armies may still use the designation, but not the American military.
Perhaps relevant to the generally-understood numerical qualities of a “Troop,” is that both the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of the USA have minimums of five (for the establishment of a troop).
Troop is another word for Company. Air Calvary or Armored units.
A Battery is an artillery company.
But, each branch of the military uses different terminology. My dad was in a Air Force maintenance squadron.
True except that the designation is still used in the US military. The reconnaissance units of US Army Brigade Combat Teams are called squadrons (battalion size) and subdivided into troops (company size units). IOW they use traditional cavalry organization nomenclature. The other components of the brigade use infantry, armor or artillery nomenclature for the various levels of unit, as the case may be.
The tendency of recent years to refer to individual soldiers or the number of them as ‘troops’ is to abbreviate. At one time you could say ‘men’ or ‘servicemen’, but now that’s less accurate, such inaccuracy highly frowned upon, and 'servicemen and women ’ is significantly longer. Also it seems there’s more sensitivity now about saying ‘soldier’ referring to ground forces which include members of the USMC, although Marines are also ‘soldiers’ by a dictionary definition (‘one engaged in military service and especially in the army’; they are engaged in military service and while the Marines isn’t ‘the [US] Army’ it is basically ‘an army’ with a small ‘a’).
True except that the designation is still used in the US military. The reconnaissance units of US Army Brigade Combat Teams are called squadrons (battalion size) and subdivided into troops (company size units). IOW they use traditional cavalry organization nomenclature. The other components of the brigade use infantry, armor or artillery nomenclature for the various levels of unit, as the case may be.
The tendency of recent years to refer to individual soldiers or the number of them as ‘troops’ is to abbreviate. At one time you could say ‘men’ or ‘servicemen’, but now that’s less accurate, such inaccuracy highly frowned upon, and 'servicemen and women ’ is significantly longer. Also it seems there’s more sensitivity now about saying ‘soldier’ referring to ground forces which include members of the USMC, although Marines are also ‘soldiers’ by a dictionary definition (‘one engaged in military service and especially in the army’; they are engaged in military service and while the Marines isn’t ‘the [US] Army’ it is basically ‘an army’ with a small ‘a’).
I’d go with a “golly”.