United States Marine Corps A decade later, in the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), the Marines made their famed assault on Chapultepec Palace in Mexico City, which would be later celebrated as the "Halls of Montezuma" in the Marines' hymn. In the 1850s, the Marines would see further service in Panama and Asia, attached to Matthew Perry's East India Squadron on its historic trip to the Far East. The Marine Corps played a small role in the Civil War (1861–1865); their most prominent task was blockade duty. As more and more states seceded from the Union, about a third of the Corps' officers left the United
Hispanics in the United States Marine Corps Hernández (USMC, Retired) entered the Marine Corps in 1973 as an infantry officer and served thirty-one years on active duty which included combat in Somalia, El Salvador and Bosnia. The past 20 years have witnessed dramatic increases in the percentage of Latinos (of both sexes) among active duty enlisted personnel. Nearly 15 percent of U.S. Marine Corps enlisted personnel were Hispanic. The various recruitment efforts do have critics, both within and outside the Hispanic community, particularly during this time of war and a growing number of reported Hispanic casualties. In the military campaigns of Afghanistan and Iraq, in what the