Patch 1st Reconnaissance Battalion USMC US Army Marine Corps Patch

The 1st Reconnaissance Battalion (abbreviated as 1st Recon Bn) is a reconnaissance battalion of the United States Marine Corps. It is a self-contained battalion with no parent regiment. Instead, it is directly under the command of the 1st Marine Division. The 1st Recon Bn is located at Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton in San Diego, California.

The 1st Reconnaissance Battalion was reactivated on July 5, 2000, as part of Commandant General of the Marine Corps James L. Jones' mission to revitalize Marine Corps reconnaissance.

The mission of the 1st Reconnaissance Battalion is to provide organized forces to conduct amphibious reconnaissance, ground reconnaissance, battlespace shaping operations, raids, and specialized insertion and extraction.

The United States Marine Corps, acronym USMC, also known in Italian as the Marine Corps, is one of the armed forces of the United States. Although in the early years of its foundation it was almost exclusively concerned with ship security and amphibious operations, the Marine Corps has evolved to the point of assuming multiple roles, making it a special case in the military apparatus of the United States.

With 203,000 active duty personnel and 40,000 in reserve (2009 data), the Marine Corps is the second smallest armed force in the United States, with only the Coast Guard, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, having a smaller force. However, the Corps is larger than the armed forces of almost every major country: it is larger than the United Kingdom Army, for example. The Bulldog is their mascot.