This is just a WAG on my part, and I certainly did not do any research into it (I don’t have any cites), but I think it stems from two basic reasons.
First, we have many jobs similar to what the Army has, but we also have our own ships as well as our own airplanes and helicopters. So in some ways we are also like the Navy and also like the Air Force. Even within the Marine Corps we have some inter-Marine rivalry. For example Marines in ground combat positions (like me, I was artillery), make fun of Marines in the Air Wing. We jokingly say they have long hair, wear sunglasses, and sleep in air conditioned buildings and are not ‘real Marines’.
Secondly, it’s a size thing and I think Marines have a bit of a chip on our shoulders because we are so small compared to the other branches. For example, at the end of WWII the Army was about 17x bigger than the Marine Corps. A massive size difference. Today the size difference is closer to 3x. We use that size difference as a marketing ‘advantage’. We are The Few, The Proud.
We hire a ton of veterans in our company (supermarket and big box retail often do)
My experience is that sensitivity to mistakenly being called “soldiers” or referring to their “time in the army” seems to be much milder in (“regular?”) Navy and Air Force than Marines. Not that the sailors and airmen don’t get annoyed. You just don’t feel like it’s life threatening.
I would say almost like mistaking a Korean or Vietnamese person for Chinese versus using a full on racial slur for East Asian people.
Most of the people making these mistakes are first generation immigrants. I’m not sure if in Spanish and Portuguese the terminology used is different than in English.
In abstract terms they’re both soldiers. In US military culture, it matters very much that Marines aren’t soldiers. Marines in particular feel that they’re something more special than a soldier.
In general, military culture likes to create ironclad distinctions for no real reason other than flexing the authority to do so. If you refer to your M-16 as a gun, they will mercilessly correct you and say “this is a rifle, that as a gun” (pointing perhaps to a pistol or a howitzer, both of which very much have rifled barrels, rendering the obsessiveness somewhat silly).
Anyway, the point is that Marines are soldiers, but you must never call them that, because they think they’re much more special than that, and there’s a tradition of verbally distinguishing the two. On the other hand enlisted in the Navy are sailors, because it would be silly to refer to a guy working on a boat as anything but a sailor, and enlisted Airforce are Airmen because they don’t do anything that qualifies as soldiering or sailoring.
Actually a sizable number of junior sailors are seaman. Made me glad in that one respect to be a fireman.
The E1 to E3 ranks are in 5 categories:
Seaman, Hospitalman, Fireman, Airman & Constructionman
E1 is xxxman Recruit
E2 is xxxman Apprentice
E3 is xxxman
The majority of e3 and below are Seaman, followed by Fireman, the ships engineers are electricians EM, boiler techs BT, machinists MM, Engineman EN, Hull Techs HT & Damage Controlman DC, Interior Comms IC (usually work with EMs), Gas Turbine GS, Machinery Repair MR and for some reason Navy Divers ND.
And it appears Boiler Techs (BT) were merged into Machinist Mates (MM) as of 1996.
Not in the US Navy. Maybe elsewhere, but not US. Though that was a part of their job to some degree in the days of wooden ships. There #1 mission was ship to ship fighting.
The Marines were brought back in 1794 along with the US Navy. It was largely with an eye towards piracy in the Med.
The Marines first got to shine in the First Barbary War 1801-1805.
BTW: Navy here, not Marines. But in general the Marines are a very large special forces, at least by the definition that they are largely a fighting force and most of their support jobs are handled by Navy or civilians. A lot of the Army is support job.
You are a Marine or you are not. Being a Marine and all that entails is for life. You may never serve on active duty again, but you remain a Marine forever, with all of its honor and obligations. So my father taught me, a Marine of the Greatest Generation. Apparently many Marines of latter generations no longer subscribe to the lifelong commitment of honor and obligations.
And if you were talking about the converse question about how many members of the U.S. ground forces might be required to defend Taiwan (assuming we’re still doing that these days), you would properly refer to the number of U.S. troops required, likely made up of soldiers and Marines.*
(Although “troops” is its own problematic word, since it is almost always referred to in the plural only. Even the singular word “troop” refers to a group, and “trooper” sounds dumb and even condescending.)
*And could also include Navy SEAL teams, which are comprised of special-operations forces who are neither soldiers or Marines. I suppose they are technically sailors, but they would probably bristle at that even more than Seebees (as noted by @Chefguy). Again, the SEALs and Seebees consider themselves smaller, more elite sub-branches of the U.S. Navy.
As the great Ted Williams (baseball) said, and as I get older the more I feel this way —
“It’s a funny thing, but, as years go by, I think you appreciate more and more what a great thing it was to be a United States Marine… I am a U.S. Marine and I’ll be one till I die”.
When I was 18 it was just something I did. Just something to do. I had no appreciation for the long history and the heroes of the past. I didn’t grow up desiring to serve in the military or wanting to be a Marine. I’m the first in my family to serve. My parents and grandparents didn’t serve. I really kind of just stumbled into it.
If someone had told me at 18 that I would spend a career in the military, I would have laughed hysterically. Furthest thing from my mind, quite literally. My stepfather was Army in WWII. My brother joined the Army in the last week of the Korea campaign and never left Alaska. The draft came looking for me and the rest is history.
