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Status of Forces (as of April 19)
Active duty: 194,370
Selected Reserve: 39,705
- Reservists on active duty: 2,477
It’s been awhile since we did a blog update on the status of forces around the Marine Corps, but we’re going to start in again on making this a weekly feature. The positions above are as of April 19.
Of note, the 26th Marine Expeditionary Units and 15th MEU are moving through their areas of operations, with the 26th MEU’s Kearsarge Amphibious Ready Group near the Gulf of Aden, at the eastern tip of Africa, and the 15th MEU’s Peleliu ARG near in a port call to Hong Kong that began April 15.
The recently deployed Black Sea Rotational Force 13 has troops in Latvia and Romania, where they will be doing contingency and training operations, as well as some humanitarian and goodwill work.
Read more about the deployment here.
Meanwhile, a large contingent of Marines in Morocco are preparing to head back home–after months of training working up to exercise African Lion 2013, the whole exercise was cancelled in a dispute over UN human rights monitors in Western Sahara. Read all about that here.
The deployment photo of the week is from Black Sea Rotational Force 13, where Marines recently enjoyed some local performances while in the country of Georgia:

Georgian Performers entertain U.S. Marines and sailors with Black Sea Rotational Force 13 and soldiers with the Republic of Georgia Army’s 23rd Infantry Battalion during a culture day performance during the closing ceremony for Exercise Agile Spirit 13 aboard Vaziani Airfield, Republic of Georgia, March 30, 2013. Agile Spirit aims to enhance our professional military capacity and increase our interoperability.(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. Michael Dye/released)
Click around the map to find out what other things your Marines are up to.