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A marine squad with an IC is charged. The defending squad was arranged in such a way that the IC is blocked by his own men.

IC's must counterattack first when their squad is assaulted. The question then is, do his men move to allow him to get to the front, or does he have to move around them, and if he does not contact the enemy, then does not get to fight?

I see nothing in the rules that allows one to move men aside ( except for the Templars Emperor's Champion) to allow an IC to get into combat. Am I missing something?

No, you're not missing anything. The IC must move first - if at all possible. If it's not possible for him to reach enemies by moving first then you're under no obligation to do anything extra.

I actually want to expand a bit more on this.

Carefully read what the rule actually says:

"When a unit is reacting to being assaulted, or making a pile-in move, independent characters that have joined the unit must move before other friendly models in order to get into base contact with an enemy where possible."


There are two very important things to note about that rule:

1) The rule doesn't say that the IC must move before ANY other friendly models in the unit.
2) The IC must move in order to get into base contact with an enemy. In other words, if the IC can't contact the enemy then he doesn't have to move first.


So what does this tell us?

When a unit containing an IC reacts to a charge or makes a pile-in move you look at the models in the unit. If the IC can be moved to get into base contact with an enemy then you have to move him immediately to do so in order to follow this rule.

However if this isn't possible then you start making your pile-in moves as normal. However after moving any model in your unit if you now see that the IC can be moved to get into contact with the enemy you must immediately move the IC to do so.