Something to add:
What would current earth's technology be considered relative to the various factions. With the baseline being imperial guard. I believe current earth's technology is at least the equivalent, if not more advanced than imperial guard technology. So, trying to conquer earth would be similar to a Siege of Vracks situation, except worse, because I see current earth's technology as being superior to imperial guard tech.
Some of the fluff we read about where a lone space marine chapter (usually chaos), can massacre billions are just fluff. But generally only possible if the level of technology is far lower.
I mean, if we are talking about earth when the natives were using mostly swords and bows, then a company of space marines who never ever get tired could spend months or years, but they would essentially be unstoppable, and they could mow down whoever they faced and depopulate earth. But if we are talking about modern twentieth century earth, with our missiles and such, then we would be considered more advanced than imperial guard. Then that would make it an almost impossible task for just one mere chapter of space marines.
During the great expansion, space marines operated in legions, not the one thousand man chapters. And they were supported by Mars, imperial guard, etc. It wasn't just one lone chapter of marines here and there. Now, the imperium is just trying to hold on to what it has and fighting fires, so having many chapters spread out all over space so that each can quickly flit over to put out a local incursion is a lot more efficient.
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