How many members of the military really fight in a war?

Answer 1

This often asked question is dependent on a variety of conditions. Aviation and Naval forces require larger support and training Units to maintain a relatively small numbers of actual frontline combatants. Most would agree that the two officers flying a B-2 bomber are in actual combat even if they never see their enemy, returning after each flight to their homes in the States. Is the pilot of a predator drone sitting in Florida and operating an aircraft over Iraq in "combat", while at no personal risk from the enemy. Hundreds are supporting each mission, and they surely aren't in combat. The crew of a large Naval vessel requires a wide range of specialists for its combat functions. Some rarely see the light of day, are at low risk to injury and are essential to the mission. Are they all equally in combat? During WWII each of the six Marine Divisions had about 20,000 members with only nine Infantry Battalions of 1,000 men each. Every member of the battalion can surely claim actual combat experience of some type including its two Navy Doctors all of the Navy Corpsmen and the Battalion's Navy Chaplain. The 11,000 others in each division were called supporting arms troops and many of them saw actual front line combat. The US Army Divisions were generally smaller in numbers, and included more armor, engineerings and artillery support. In WWI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam, probably less then one in four Army or Marine men actually saw "eyeball to eyeball" real combat, and today about six support each actual combatant. In the modern Navy it is now about 15 to one, and in the Air Force it has propably reached 35 to one. They all serve, and all deserve our respect.