The major argument in the post-WWII unification fight re/the Marine
Corps had to do with roles and missions. Also, according to the 1486
series of JCS papers, which the Marine Corps only learned about
after a set was surreptitiously given to the Commandant since he did
not sit with the JCS, Eisenhower recommended that the Marine Corps
be reduced in size to a group of battalions used to guard Navy Yard
coal piles, or something like that. The plan also considered doing
away with Marine Corps air. Navy air was also threatened, but the
Navy did not wake up to this until it was almost too late. The whole
matter was legislated in the National Defense Act of 1947 and in the
later Key West agreements, again to which the Marine Corps had no
input. Check Col Robert D. Heinl's "Soldier of the Sea" for the
whole sorry story of how it was planned to do away with the Corps
despite its outstanding record in the Pacific War. BMF