Before the operations of Iwo Jima, two officers and twenty enlisted scout-recon Marines from the scout and sniper platoons of 4th and 5th Marine Division and three amphib recon Marines from Company B of VAC Amphib Recon Battalion, FMFPAC were detached to composite together a "provisional amphibious reconnaissance group" made up of recon Marines and four Underwater Demolition Teams (#12, #13, #14 and #15). The reason was to expedite the passage and briefing of raw beach and enemy information to their own respective parent operations (S-3) and intelligence (S-2) staffs. Embarking on the augmented recon and UDT team, along with the four UDTs embarked on high-speed transport ships , , and , and headed to Iwo Jima, arriving just off the eastern beaches of Iwo Jima on the morning of 17 February 1945, two days prior to D-Day (D-2).