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| Maritime Prepositioning ship USNS Sgt. William R. Button floats three miles off the coast off Camp Pendleton's Red Beach during Pacific Horizon 2011. Button and the Maritime Prepositioning ship SS Curtiss are supporting the 14 day exercise which provides the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and the Navy's Expeditionary Strike Group-3 the opportunity to exercise essential core competencies at the brigade level to rapidly respond to an emerging crisis with a flexible, full spectrum capability. (Photo by Sgt. Jason Fudge) |
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| A crane offloads a beach landing module from Maritime Prepositioning ship USNS Sgt. William Button anchored three miles off Camp Pendleton's Red Beach, during exercise Pacific Horizon 2011. Button and the Maritime Prepositioning ship SS Curtiss are supporting the 14 day exercise which provides the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and the Navy's Expeditionary Strike Group-3 the opportunity to exercise essential core competencies at the brigade level to rapidly respond to an emerging crisis with a flexible, full spectrum capability. (Photo by Sgt. Jason Fudge) |
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| An amphibious assault vehicle with 3rd Amphibious Assault Battalion drives onto a roll on/roll off discharge facility attached to USNS Sgt. William Button near Camp Pendleton, Calif., during Pacific Horizon 2011. Button and the Maritime Prepositioning ship SS Curtiss are supporting the 14 day exercise which provides the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and the Navy's Expeditionary Strike Group-3 the opportunity to exercise essential core competencies at the brigade level to rapidly respond to an emerging crisis with a flexible, full spectrum capability. (Photo by Sgt. Jason Fudge) |
Lee sent me the link to this story on the Military Sealifts Command participation in Exercise Pacific Horizon 2011...thanks guy!!
But the thing thats hitting me more than almost anything else..especially with this re-emphasis on amphibious operations is the role that the Follow-on echelon and the ships in the MPF play in sustaining combat power ashore after the initial assault.
MEU's and the larger MEB-MEF are able to sustain themselves for at least 30 days ... but high intensity combat will chew up men, vehicles and supplies at a much higher rate so the importance of these ships increases with the level of resistance...in short...I've been concentrating on the sharp end of the stick but the shaft is just as important....
The only way that the MEB-MEF gets to 30 DOS is IF an MPSron follows with its 100,000 tons (about) of cargo. And that number is changing upwards since the MPS rons are being reconfigured to include LMSR and tankers.
ReplyDeleteI have also heard that a JHSV will be assigned to each MPS ron.
The big quesion is whether the Marines will lose MPSRON ONE in the Med?
With the revolutions in North Africa, the near future of that area will remain... fluid.
ReplyDeleteSo with the Suez, not to mention Israeli security still a strategic issue for the US, I doubt MPS1 will be stood down.
are you sure anonymous?
ReplyDeletei can think of very few strategic reasons for us to remain in the area.
outside of oil in Saudi Arabia...and maybe Iraq...we just don't have a real strategic interest there. and we've got stuff already prepositioned in those areas. want to cut costs while taking on a reasonable amount of risk?
then that means you could lose one MPSRON and its associated staff.
I think that there are enough allied bases around the Med that would mitigate against having that much Marine gear tied to the AO?
ReplyDeleteAnd I believe some of the MPS and cargo will be blended into rons 2 & 3 to beef them up much more.
That also means the other rons assets can be used in more places at once?
Historically during DS/S MPSron 2 came in from DGAR, Ron 3 was turned around from going back to CONUS for maintenance, and Ron 1 came throught the Suez. BTW that adds up to more than a quarter millions tons of cargo! the other prepo ships brought in just under 100,000 tons. The Tyranny of Tonnage~