I seem to remember a Marine friend of mine telling me years ago that a member of the USMC (a Marine) is NEVER called a ‘soldier.’ He went on to explain that ‘soldiers’ are members of the Army and that Marines are referred to only as ‘marine’ or ‘Marines.’ Is this true?
And, what about the term ‘troops’? Does that only refer to Army forces? Or is it a generic term that covers Marines, too? Are sailors (Navy) called ‘troops’? What about Air Force personnel?
Marine are a desendant of marine infantry that was deployed on frigates to fire down into the rigging of sailing ships. Ask a jarhead for exact details.
I don’t recall where the term soldiers comes from , but the italian word soldati comes to mind so it could be from the legions of rome days , but thats just guessing on my part.
Troops , I think is a sub-designation , ie , a cavalry company back then , was called a squadron , and the platoon would have been a troop , and the individual soldier would have been a trooper.
Again , everything above is an opinion , not fact
Declan
As I recall, Marines are called Marines because they, in a sense, are both soldiers and sailors. Every sizeable ship in the fleet has some Marines on it, for example.
The couple of marines I know only refer to themselves and their fellows as “marines”. They don’t like to be called “soldiers”. In less formal situations they call each other “devil dogs”, as in “Hey devil dog, get over here.” The devil dog thing is supposedly a nickname from the WWII-era, when certain German units nicknamed the U.S. Marines “teufelhunden” (hence Devil Dogs). I’m sure someone whose German is better will be along to correct the spelling of the aforementioned term.
Paging UncleBill…
While we are on the topic of Marines:
Is it socially permissable for a civilian or other service member to use the phrase ‘semper fi’ when speaking with a Marine, or is that purely a Marine to Marine acknowledgement?
To get a little more specific: If a member of the U.S. Marines is killed in battle, should the on-screen headline in a TV news report about the war in Iraq read ‘Soldier Killed’ or is that inaccurate?
Similarly, if 5,000 Marines are deployed to Iraq is it correct to say “5,000 troops were deployed to Iraq today…” or must one say, “5,000 Marines were deployed to Iraq today…” because TROOPS would mean Army instead of Marines?
Any jarheads in here??
No, Marines are not soldiers. Anyone who’s spent any time around both knows they are quite different. Marines are somehow more “gung ho”.
Even more than special forces, etc. Maybe I should say they’re gung ho in a different way?
Peace,
mangeorge
Marines tend to call everybody “sir”. 
All good comments! And correct too! Nice call on the “Devil Dog” history, very accurate. Marines are sometimes calles “Soldiers of the Sea”, but rarely. Mostly we are just called Marines, and we like it that way. To break it down further, Army = Soldiers, Navy = Sailors, Air Force = Airmen (or Women) and Marines = well, Marines. Dont know if this clears anything up. And Semper Fi (Fidelis) is latin for always faithful. As far as I know we dont have a copyright on that phrase, although it is our motto. And for the most part non-Marines dont say this. I have worked with some civilians who have used the term towards my Marines, and none of them were offended. And yes, we are fanatical, Gung Ho or more extreme than most of our counterparts. And we do call everyone “Sir” its a respect thing. S/F Gunny…
Welcome to the board lancev32 .
Thanks for the information.
Though of course not too many Marines today fight anywhere but on the ground like regular soldiers. What was the last time US Marines fought a shipboard battle anyway?
Never call a Marine a Soldier! Never, he is a Marine and only a Marine. Semper Fidelis!
Websters says:
"2 : one of a class of soldiers serving on shipboard or in close association with a naval force.
So I guess it’s okay.
Well, “soldier” has two applications: a generic one that refers to a ground combatant, and a specific one that refers to members of the armed service known as “Army”. Just as that latter word can be used specifically to refer to that armed service or generically to refer to any large armed land force.
If you KNOW you are referring to member/s of the USMC, you should use the term Marine/s – capitalized. If you don’t know, you can get away with the generic “soldiers” or “troops”, or the even more generic “service personnel”.
These days (and not really since passing of the age of sail) most major naval battles don’t occur within small arms range, so sharpshooting from the rigging isn’t the role of modern marines. I believe that in WWII and the post-war era, the Marines typically manned one or more of a battleship’s turrets as well as some major weaponry on other capital ships.
Currently, Marines in the fleet are used as an embarked amphibious force. That is to say, they Marine Corps forces are carried in Navy amphibious support ships, which are able to sail to a world trouble spot. From shipboard, the Marines can stage an air-supported invasion over the beach, by helicopter or through some other insertion means.
In Afganistan, the Marines made such a heli-borne assualt, taking a major airfield that became a major the base of U.S. operations.
I don’t know how the Marine Corps forces currently in Iraq were introduced, but I believe a good chunk of them came over and invaded from a shipboard base.
How about “grunts”? Is that genaric?
A grunt is someone who has a combat MOS, more specifically an infantry MOS, as the Marine MOS 03.
I take offense if someone refers to me as a soldier. It’s a sense of pride to be titled Marine.
You would never call the Chief of NavOp a sailor.
You would never call the Air Force C of S an airman.
You would never call the Army C of S a soldier.
But the Commandant of the Marine Corps would be proud to be called Marine.
I married a marine, and he goes nuts when I refer to him as a soldier. It’s ALWAYS marine. I don’t get it, but then, I don’t have to.
Marines are included in the descriptive class called soldier, regardless of what it meant countless years ago. Too bad, so sad. It pretty much refers generically to any ground serviceman, nowadays. So when marines are operating on the ground, yes, they can be called soldiers.
Just not to their faces.
Doc-
I apologize for hijacking, but I had a question that doesn’t necessarily deserve it’s own thread.
I notice there are more than a few Marines responding to this thread, so this is geared toward them. I am aware of the roots of “Leatherneck” but forgot “Jarhead”. While I do not have the nads required to refer to a Marine as “jarhead” to his face, and I don’t do so in real life anyway (I’ve learned too much from R. Lee Ermey to disrespect Marines like that, and my uncle is a Lt. Colonel (Ret.) from the USAF) what about “leatherneck”? Is that considered derrogatory as well?