ARTICLE

June 2002

When Terrorists Lurk, This Team Comes FAST

by Harold Kennedy

The Marine Corps’ Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Teams, based at Norfolk, Va., have seen a surge of activity in recent years. The FAST units are part of the Marine Security Force Battalion (MCSFB), within the newly organized 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade.

The 4th MEB—based at Camp Lejeune, N.C.—was organized last fall to merge the Corps’ existing anti-terrorism capabilities. Its other units include the Marine Security Guard Battalion, which protects U.S. embassies and other diplomatic posts; the Chemical and Biological Incident Response Force, and a new anti-terrorism battalion.

The MCSFB’s day-to-day mission is primarily to provide security at U.S. naval bases around the world, explained the battalion’s executive officer, Lt. Col. Michael J. Popovich. It has units conducting routine patrols in locations as distant as Bahrain, Japan and Guantanamo Bay.

The battalion also includes two FAST companies, whose duties are anything but routine, Popovich said. “The FAST companies provide short-term security in emergency situations,” he said. One unit is always on standby, ready to deploy within hours.

FAST units are deployed only when requested by combatant and fleet commanders-in-chiefs, or CINCs, and approved by the chief of naval operations, Popovich said. Their job is to augment installation security when the threat is beyond the ability of local forces.

Each FAST company is made up of five or six platoons of 50 or so enlisted Marines and an officer. “The officer is usually a captain, not a lieutenant, as would ordinarily be the case,” Popovich said.

The reason is that the platoon commander must be experienced enough to advise senior military and diplomatic officials in the use of his platoon, sometimes under difficult combat conditions. After the 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, for example, FAST platoons went in to guard the cleanup, and after the attack on the USS Cole in 2000, one flew into Yemen to secure the ship.

In such situations, Popovich said, the Marine captain has to be willing and able to give frank advice to, even to disagree with, a regional commander. “He has to go out there, as I like to say, alone and unafraid.”

All FAST unit members are trained in infantry tactics, security skills and combat marksmanship with a wide array of weapons, including non-lethal ones. The FAST arsenal includes rifles, grenade launchers, pistols, submachine guns, shotguns, squad automatic weapons, machine guns, mortars and anti-tank rockets. Each company has designated marksmen, who receive specialized training.

“There are a lot of options between ‘halt’ and a round between the eyes,” he said. “Most of the things that we do require the ability to escalate or deescalate as required.”

The FAST companies were established in 1987, after a series of deadly attacks directed at Americans, Popovich told National Defense. Just two years later, a FAST company deployed to Panama to help depose dictator Manuel Noriega. During Operation Desert Storm, FAST Marines helped beef up security at U.S. naval facilities in Bahrain.

Originally, the Marines had two security force battalions, one in the Pacific and one in the Atlantic regions. But they were consolidated into one battalion, beginning in the mid-1990s as part of the general downsizing of the armed forces.

The process is still going on, Popovich said. This January, the 50-year-old Marine Corps Security Force Company in Naples was deactivated. One in London will follow later this year. The two companies will consolidate in Rota, Spain. Security companies also remain in Iceland, Bahrain and Cuba, as well as in the U.S. states of Georgia and Washington.

Back To Top