Talk:Headquarters and service company

Merger proposal

Note that an existing discussion has been started at the H&HC page:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Headquarters_and_Headquarters_Company

A first step of merge or not merge is the distinction by someone knowledgeable of 1) the key differences between H&S and H&HC companies; 2) what role "service" has in either.

Answering those two questions will determine whether the two articles are mergeable (with sufficient distinguishing content in lede and at least a section heading). Yours, Wikiuser100 (talk) 15:55, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

• Re Q 1) Key Differences: (Comparing the H&S Company of a Marine infantry battalion to the HHC of an Army light infantry battalion): Total manpower H&S - 269, HHC - 170; the H&S has a significantly larger battalion headquarters, communication, service (named "support" in HHC), and medical platoons. This is due to the fact that Marine infantry battalions are designed to operate independently from their parent regimental and division headquarters as the nucleus of a battalion landing team (BLT) to form the Ground Combat Element (GCE) of a MEU MAGTF. US Army light infantry battalions would almost never be tasked to operate independently from their parent Brigade Combat Team, which includes a Brigade Support Battalion (BSB) with a Forward Support Company (FSC) dedicated to direct support of each infantry battalion. The BSB also includes a Distribution Company, a Field Maintenance Company, and a Medical Company. The MEU does contain a small Combat Logistics Battalion (approximately 300 personnel) to provide CSS to the GCE, but in addition to its small size, it also supports the Aviation Combat Element (ACE), and the Command Element (CE), so it is incumbent upon the GCE, ACE, and CE to be as self-sufficient as possible for relatively short periods of time, whereas the light infantry battalion can expect, and indeed must have, near continuous direct support from its BSB/FSC.

• Secondly, while the HHC does contain a small mortar platoon and a small antiarmor platoon, neither of which are organic to the H&S, the light infantry battalion does not contain a heavy (i.e., crew-served) weapons company. The Marine infantry battalion, in addition to having its three organic rifle companies 40% larger than the light infantry rifle companies (182 men vs 130 men each), with a commensurate increase not only in available rifles/carbines and pistols, but also increased numbers of grenade launchers, light and medium machine guns, assault rockets, and antitank missiles in the hands of highly motivated Marine infantrymen, but also contains a 146-man weapons company containing twice as many 81mm mortars and TOW missile systems (8 each vs 4 each), and 50% more heavy machineguns/automatic grenade launchers (6 and 6 vs 4 and 4) than does the HHC mortar and antiarmor platoons. Again, the increase in firepower (and manpower) is evidence that the Marine infantry battalion, including its organic H&S, are expected to operate independently against very strong resistance for up to 15 days (per USMC doctrine for a MEU) without reinforcement or relief. Simply put, Marine infantry units are designed, organized, trained, and equipped for "forcible entry" operations and expect to inflict, and (unfortunately) absorb, significant casualties while accomplishing the assigned mission within the required timeframe.

• Re Q 2) the role of "service:" Firstly, I believe it is mainly a matter of semantics; the Army traditionally calls its headquarters units "Headquarters and Headquarters" because it not only contains the parent unit's headquarters element but is itself a "headquarters" (i.e., command, control, communications, and support) unit. The Marine Corps simply gives its "headquarters" units a somewhat more functionally definitive title in that the H&S company provides two primary functions, viz. command and control (i.e., "headquarters") and the support (or "service") to facilitate the headquarters in performing command and control (including reconnaissance and target acquisition via the scout sniper platoon) and internal, external, and battalion-wide communications support through a large communications platoon (61 members vs 9 in the HHC), as well as providing a moderate level of logistics/CSS (supply, motor transport, weapons maintenance, and dining facility) support via a 59 member service platoon (the Army support platoon contains 33 soldiers, by comparison), and a robust field medical platoon (67 members vs 33 in the HHC) able to operate two Battalion Aide Stations to treat a large number of casualties, if required.

• In conclusion, while to the outsider, or military novice, there may appear at first glance to be almost no difference between an HHC and H&S company, when one understands the rather significant differences in doctrine, organization, functions, missions, history, and ethos of the Marine Corps and the Army, it readily becomes apparent that comparing US Army and USMC units is as problematic as comparing USAF tactical fighter and bomb wings to US Navy Carrier Air Wings, or USCG cutters to Navy AEGIS cruisers, they really are "apples and oranges" comparisons, and the analogies rapidly disintegrate in the light of factual information for informed inquirers. Therefore, a merger is contra indicated.CobraDragoon (talk) 23:32, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Reading T/O documents

The references are full of T/O and TO&E documents but how do you read them? E.g., TO 1037F reads (p. 37):

scroll|
T/O: 1037F   H&S COMPANY, INFANTRY BATTALION
T/E: B1182 N1162 N1167 N1172 N1182
                                                      B T S                  OTHER                  S W      S
LINE                                 BLT ALPHA        R Y T  MARINES        SERVICES NON-CHARGEABLE C P      E S      SERV
 NO.       ENGLISH DESCRIPTION       CRD GRADE  MOS   N P A  OFF  ENL  CIV  OFF  ENL  OFF  ENL  CIV C N EDU  P C LNG  SCH   FTN
 173      BN CORPSMAN                    HM2    8404  N E                          2                  P

The first two lines are just codes – they don't seem to be important. Next are a bunch of column headers. I can make out the three types of 'origin' of the soldier, i.e. Marine, Other Services, Non-Chargeable. They are split up between officers (OFF), enlister (ENL), and civilian (CIV). I don't know what "Other Services" or "Non-Chargeable" mean though.

And what about the other columns, i.e. BLT CRD, ALPHA GRADE, MOS, BRN, TYP, STA, SCC, WPN, EDU, SEP, SC, LNG, SERV, FTN? Is there any document that explains what this all means?

–Tommiie (talk) 08:36, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

Tommie, I can't provide a document reference, but I can decipher most of it for you. Know that the Marine Corps has recently (within the last few years) been transitioning to a new Table of Organization and Table of Equipment format system. I don’t know of a public source for it or if it is even available to the public yet. The system we are here discussing originated around 1940 and has been modified many times over the intervening decades, so some of the column headers, and the information they indicate, are rather outdated or even completely obsolete. However, here we go:

The first two lines provide the Table of Organization (T/O) and Tables of Equipment (T/E) for the unit. 1037F means that this is the sixth (F) iteration, or “series”, of tables for the Headquarters and Service (H&S) Company of a U.S. Marine Corps Infantry Battalion (the U.S. Army uses a different numbering scheme and has its own tables of organization and equipment). The USMC began using this numbering system circa 1940, so this is the sixth modification since then. The different numbers in the T/E line reference difference categories/types of equipment (e.g., vehicles, crew-served weapons, radios, generators, tents, etc.)

Reading from the left, “LINE NO. 173”, is, of course, simply the number of the line as listed in the document followed by the “ENGLISH DESCRIPTION” of what the line represents written in abbreviated Marine Corps terminology—"BN CORPSMAN” is Battalion Hospital Corpsman--a U.S. Navy sailor assigned to a Marine Corps unit.

Continuing to the right, the next column is “BLT CRD”, which means Billet Common Reporting Designation and refers to the “ENGLISH DESCRIPTION”. It is rather redundant, but in the Naval Services a “billet” is the equivalent of a “slot” in U.S. Army manning documents, so it just clarifies the official title of the position in the unit structure.

Next is “ALPHA GRADE”, which is the Alphabetical/Numerical abbreviation for the specified grade of rank for the referenced billet. In this case it is a Hospital Corpsman 2nd Class (a Navy Petty Officer in the pay grade of E-5).

Then comes “MOS”, which stands for Military Occupational Specialty—the Marine Corps uses a four-digit numerical code to classify its occupational fields (OccFld) and specific jobs within those OccFlds. For Navy personnel, Navy Enlisted Classification, or NEC codes, are used to designate various jobs. So, the NEC code for a Hospital Corpsman is “8404”.

“BRN” indicates the Branch of Service of the billet holder—"N” indicates Navy, while a Marine is indicated by an “M”. (Air Force would be an “A “and Army would be “R”.) Any non-Marine Corps numbers here will also show up in the appropriate officer or enlisted column under the “OTHER SERVICES” heading.

The “TYP” column means “Type” and indicates whether the billet is filled by an officer (O) or enlisted member (E). It is also used to indicate if the billet requires an officer designated as a Naval Aviator, or NA (i.e., pilot) or Naval Flight Officer, or NFO (i.e., airborne weapons and sensor systems officers), and is indicated by an “N” or an “F”, accordingly. Lines 35 and 36 on the same T/O show two examples of this use for the billets of Assistant S-3/Air Officer and Assistant S-3/Forward Air Controller, respectively.

“STA” is Status and is used to indicate whether the specified billet is normally manned—if it is blank then, yes, the billet is usually filled; however, an “X” indicates that it is usually not. There are two cases in which this is true.

In many headquarters units, there are some billets that are usually only manned when the unit is deployed, otherwise one of the other billet holders takes on the responsibilities of the position as an additional duty. For example, an infantry regiment headquarters (T/O 1096F) does not normally have an officer assigned as the “ASST S-3/CIV AFFAIRS OFF” (LINE NO. 32) but when deployed it would have an infantry captain in that position, so there is an “X” in this column. The other case is used in aircraft squadrons to indicate billets manned by officers who are Naval Aviators or NAs (viz., Marine Corps aircraft pilots) or, in those few squadrons that have them (e.g., EA-6B and F/A-18D equipped squadrons), Naval Flight Officers or NFOs (viz., Marine Corps airborne weapons and sensor systems officers.

In aircraft squadrons all NAs and NFOs, except for the commanding officer (CO) and executive (XO) officer, have a primary billet line number in the Operations (S-3) section as either a pilot or flight officer. (The CO and XO have discrete line numbers for their respective billets.) The reason for this is that an aircraft squadron headquarters has many of the same officer billets as found in a ground battalion headquarters, but in an aircraft squadron most of them of filled by officers whose primary duty (at least conceptually) is to fly. The reality is that, even in combat, most flying officers spend most of their time working in their “ground” job, whether it be as a staff officer in the squadron headquarters or as a departmental or division officer in the squadron’s Aircraft Maintenance Department. So, while the squadron has billet line numbers for such positions as Administration Officer, Intelligence Officer, Operations Officer, and Logistics Officer in the squadron headquarters staff and the positions of Aircraft Maintenance Officer, Quality Assurance Officer, Aircraft Division Officer, and Line Officer in the squadron’s Aircraft Maintenance Department, those billets are all marked with an “X”, since all those officers have a primary billet line number as a pilot (or NFO). Finally, any billet that has an “X” is also included in the “NON-CHARGEABLE” columns because those numbers are either not usually manned or are accounted for as described immediately above.

Of the last eight columns, “WPN” indicates the individual weapon assigned to the billet holder. It can be “P” for pistol, “M” for M-16/M-4 Rifle/Carbine, “A” for Automatic Rifle/Light Machine Gun/SAW, or “U” for unarmed (used for Chaplains), nonchargeable billets have a dash (-) here to indicate that no weapon is accounted for in this case; and “FTN”, with an asterisk (*) and perhaps a letter, in the column indicates a Foot Note. Some billets will have a footnote specifying certain additional information such as in the case of LINE NO. 29 S-3 (Operations Officer), in the above referenced infantry regiment headquarters, indicated by “*B”, stating “S-5 WHEN NONE ASSIGNED”—meaning that the Operations Officer also performs the duties of the Civil Affairs Officer when that billet is not manned.

The other six columns are rarely (if ever) used. “SCC” is Special Classification Code formerly used for certain civilian positions (and almost never found below a major command level); “EDU” is for Education and would indicate some peculiar civilian education level or degree required for the position—again almost never used; “SEP” is Special Education Program (almost the same as EDU); “SC” is Security Clearance, since all officers and many enlisted members hold at least a “Secret”-level security clearance, this column is rarely needed; “LNG” is Language and would indicate requirement for fluency is a specific language; and “SERV SCHL” is Service School, and again, since all Marines complete some type of formal MOS training school before assignment to the Operating Forces, this column is rarely, if ever used. CobraDragoon (talk) 17:03, 21 August 2017 (UTC)