Survey Corps

The Scouting Legion (調査兵団), also known as Survey Corps or Recon Corps, is the driving force of the plot and story as it is the branch of the Military most actively involved in Titan combat and human expansion. Despite having little to no success, they still symbolize "the hope of mankind", hoping that someday, their victory will change the world known to humanity, recovering what has been lost.

Duty
This division of the military is in charge of the exploration and the eventual reclamation of human territory from Titan-infested land. Prior to the breach of Wall Maria, they explored the land outside of the Wall, though never getting far due to the heavy casualties suffered by Titans.

Presently, they have been laying down supplies from the Wall Rose Trost District to Wall Maria Shiganshina District in preparation to seal the breach and reclaim Wall Maria.

A more recent unofficial duty has been Titan observation and research. Given the safer nature of exploring within Wall territory (since Titans can only enter Wall at one point), a wealth of information has been revealed such as their tolerance of pain, sunlight dependence, and intelligence.

Structure
The Scouting Legion is the smallest branch of the military, with a maximum size of 300 soldiers. This already limited number is further lowered by constant losses on expeditions.

Erwin Smith is the Commander, with 4 Squad Leaders serving directly beneath him. A single Senior Team Leader serves beneath them, supervising 8 Team Leaders in the field. The Legion also has 6 specialized Medical Officers, Veterinary Officers in charge of caring for their horses, and 5 Remuneration Officers that serve concurrently with Team Leaders. This structure leaves 270 regular soldiers, divided into 10 Teams.

Their stables also include a total of 600 specially-bred horses. These horses are noted to be exceptionally valuable, and bred for great speed, stamina, and calm temperament.

Qualities
Since the Scouting Legion is constantly on the front lines, fighting Titans, its high fatality and low success rate (if at any) discourages most people from enrolling into the legion, as seen when less than 10% of the 104th Training Squad joins them. Thus, the legion suffers an all-time personnel shortage and the only soldiers who enter the Scouting Legion are dedicated to the cause of humanity, usually at the cost of their own lives.

While most soldiers do not survive their first expedition, each successive expedition exponentially increases their chances of survival. This fact makes the veterans some of the most experienced soldiers in the entire military.

Aside from personnel shortage, the discipline and skills of the soldiers are regarded as the best out of the three military branches.

Unfortunately, this branch is also the most pressed one because despite being the best out of the three military branches in terms of soldiers' and officers' quality, the bureaucrats, rich conservatives and many Military Police members dislike the Scouting Legion and view it as a waste of money and resources due to the Legion's lack of definite, decisive successes and high losses of lives. Only from the 'support' of the king does the Legion still remain intact and protected from the greedy bureaucrats and hostile conservatives.

Strategy and Tactics
Due to the constant horrific losses suffered at the hands of Titans, the Scouting Legion has been forced to fight smarter to achieve their goals.

Long-Range Scounting Formation
Developed by Commander Erwin Smith, the key to this formation is Titan avoidance. Because the Scouting Legion cannot afford to fight every Titan out in the open, the entire Legion is spread out over a large area, maximizing visibility. Upon encountering a Titan, a red flare indicates the danger and all soldiers who see the flare fire a red flare of their own, allowing Erwin to quickly be alerted to the Titan's presence. He will then fire a green flare in the desired direction to avoid this Titan with all members firing a green flare as well to allow the information to spread quickly.

However, there are occasionally deviant-type Titans that understand the basic principle of this formation and will atempt to break it apart by ignoring scouts on the perimeter and instead, attack the middle of the formation. In this case, a black flare indicates the danger and the Titan is disposed of as quickly as possible.

The entire formation is in the rough shape of a circle with Commander Erwin in front and scouts surrounding the outside of the circle. In the center of the circle are the supply wagons which keep all the necessary food, weapons, and other supplies for the expedition. Connecting the outer and center of the circle are relay members who keep fresh horses and help spread communication between everyone in the group.

This formation has lowered the Scouting Legion losses by 30%.

Ambush
Although not a 'true' tactic in the sense of common battle doctrine, the Scouting Legion has been involved in two attempts at capture and are worthy of note given their similar procedures.

Scouting Legion Ambush follows this pattern:


 * 1) Target is lured into area where Scouting Legion forces have the maximum advantage. i.e. Leading target into a forest (where 3DMG is most effective) or underground (where Titans cannot move).
 * 2) Target is incapacitated.
 * 3) 3DMG soldiers surround target area and prevent escape.

Trivia

 * It's been noted that even normal soldiers from the Scouting Legion are on average stronger than those from different branches.
 * 21 graduates of the 104th Training Unit joined the Scouting Legion, including Eren Yeager, Mikasa Ackerman and Armin.
 * The symbol of the Scouting Legion is called the "Wings of Freedom"

Aufklärungstrupp