{"id":32075,"date":"2025-04-08T15:23:51","date_gmt":"2025-04-08T15:23:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/uncategorized\/2025\/04\/08\/back-to-13-marine-squads-and-a-new-company-for-infantry-battalions\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T21:03:29","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T21:03:29","slug":"back-to-13-marine-squads-and-a-new-company-for-infantry-battalions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.sightlinemg.com\/defensenews\/newsletters\/2025\/04\/08\/back-to-13-marine-squads-and-a-new-company-for-infantry-battalions\/","title":{"rendered":"Back to 13-Marine squads and a new company for infantry battalions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. \u2013 The 13-Marine squad is back, and the Corps is creating a new company<\/a> within the infantry battalion to meet its modern war-fighting needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Commandant Gen. Eric Smith announced those changes Monday at the Navy League\u2019s annual Sea, Air and Space Exposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fighting unit had grown to 15 Marines during infantry battalion experiments<\/a> in recent years. That included adding an assistant squad leader and a squad systems operator to manage the many sensing and firing platforms being added to the unit\u2019s arsenal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dropping back to the 13-Marine configuration still gives Marines more personnel than the standard nine-soldier U.S. Army squad. It also returns the squad to its previous size, but instead with a sergeant, rather than a staff sergeant in charge of three fire teams and an organic precision fires specialist in the ranks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The infantry battalion will also see the formation of a reconnaissance and fires company outside of the headquarters and service company ranks. That new company will include the battalion\u2019s 81mm mortars, organic precision fires, such as drones, and the scout platoon for reconnaissance assets, Smith said.<\/p>\n\n\n\t