I know you like to answer questions and be helpful, but you don't need to try to answer every single question that's asked on these forums. If you don't know the answer 100%, then don't post up speculation. Let the people who actually know the answer put up a post so that there isn't any confusion on the topic.
I agree, and confess my knowledge is limited to what I have read re MARSOC and it's formative years circa 2002-2006. I think their are some nuances re MEU vs the old MEU(SOC) designation. My limited knowledge is that the old MEU(SOC) certification has been retired. The original MEU(SOC) designation goes back to the 1980s regarding 'special operations capable' Marines forces, which you correctly noted. Apparently the "(SOC)" was a certification-based designation for those Marine Expeditionary forces, presumably based on specialized training and equipment, etc. Again, that's only what I have read. I get the sense that after 9/11, a re-evaluation began of broadening the SOCOM forces to include the Marine Corps, and new designations were created to accommodate that transition...
(2011 article)
In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, President George W. Bush and his military advisers came to four primary conclusions: The hijackers were members of Osam
www.defensemedianetwork.com
"The MEU(SOC)s and FORECON bridged a gap between traditional conventional forces and the still-evolving special operations components of SOCOM in the early years of OEF and Operation Iraqi Freedom. At the same time, they helped create the template upon which the Marine Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC) would be built – and paved the way for significant changes in how today’s conventional forces think, train, and fight.
"Osborn said today’s MEUs are, in many ways, even more “special operations capable” than when they were certified as MEU(SOC)s. Now, what had been the primary “SOC” piece of the pre-MARSOC MEU is called the Maritime Special Purpose Force (MSPF), centered around a Force Recon platoon and trained up to a special ops capable level, but without IHR.
...“So the difference between MEU(SOC) and MEU, realistically, is not great. The certification process today is almost exactly the same as it was in the 1990s, with similar – but more advanced – mission sets, having taken some equipment from the MEU(SOC)s and SOCOM, including the ability to communicate with SOF forces,” Osborn said. “The MEUs worked then and now in the clandestine and overt environment, not in the SOC covert world. So the breakpoint is clandestine overt versus covert.
“Because of the piracy and maritime raid target issue a couple of years ago, the Maritime Raid Force was stood back up as a proof-of-concept with the 15th MEU, centered around the Force Recon platoon for the full-spectrum mission, bottom up and top down. All six MEUs on both coasts – and the 31st in Japan – are expected to train to that level now in all maritime raid target sets – oil refineries, near shore, all those things in the overt mission action area for forces around the world.”
"
Mission-functionality wise, today’s MEU can do everything the old MEU(SOC)s could do – and more. The training level we take the MEUs to now is designed to operate in support of, adjacent to, and with SOF,” Campbell concluded. “On our last deployment, the 15th MEU had Marines embedded in various SOCOM task forces for almost the entire seven-month deployment.
“With V-22s and Huey-Yankees [UH-1Y Venom, aka Super Huey] and Cobra-Zs [AH-1Z Viper, aka Super Cobra], today’s MEUs are far more capable than the MEU(SOC)s in the early 2000s, with a much greater ability to range targets in early darkness or greater distance. The old metric of a couple of hundred miles being a hard mission has changed to 600 miles being not unusual.”
***
...I could have mis-interpreted that article and the book on MARSOC that outlines the historical formation of MARSOC, but it suggests that as of Feb 24, 2006, the old MEU(SOC) forces and the 2004-2006 "proof concept" called Marine Corps Special Operations Command Detachment One (aka Det One) forces - were formally moved under the brand new MARSOC organization, then commanded by Brig. General Dennis J. Hejlik. Hence my understanding that the old "MEU(SOC)" certification is sort-of a pre-MARSOC era designation, but it apparently stuck around a little longer. I found one MEU that earned the SOC certification in 2007, but not sure how much longer that certification existed.
The 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit received its Special Operations Capable certification Feb. 16. The Special Operations Capable Exercise, held Jan 29-Feb 8, was a test every element of 11th MEU and
www.11thmeu.marines.mil
Here's what Wikipedia states re MEU(SOC):
"Marine expeditionary unit (special operations capable) (MEU(SOC)) was a program created by the United States Marine Corps and the United States Navy in 1985 for Marine expeditionary units (MEU).[1][2] As of 2013 the term MEU(SOC) is obsolete.[3]
....I was never a Marine, so certainly no expert on this topic area, but it seems the MEU(SOC) term is no longer used, that was all I was trying to impart.
Back when MEUSOC first hit the scene I liked their 1911 pistols so much I had one built sorta as a quasi clone so to speak.
Well, you might like this project from years ago, when 'Hobby Lobby' still existed and the guys who built these were still there. (I subsequently traded it for Unertl scope to finish my M40A1 project). Never shot it, and probably should have kept it...but I'm just more into rifles than pistols.
Before picture ($200 for this nickel-plated, and stripped 1943 Colt pistol project)
After picture (same frame, but built to perfection):
