Bring back the 11th Airborne Division. Why? Because the Army needs strategic mobility in the coming "turn to the Pacific" and while the 82nd is good, it can't be in two places at once.
But, wait the boys from the 101st will say. We have unmatched mobility. That's true...once they get to the battlefield. But getting them to the scene requires as much work as moving a heavy division. Additionally Strykers have lost any chance of being a truly strategically mobile force. They're too heavy, too vehicle dependent which means that they have too big a logistics tail to be supported at distance.
Which brings me back to a Infantry centric, strategically deployable force. Which in the US Army means another Airborne Division.
It really wouldn't be that hard to do either. The 173rd Airborne Brigade would serve as the foundation of the new unit and you could go from there. Quite honestly I find the Army's new focus on aligning units regionally to be a mistake, but if they did have two divisions (the 25th ID were once known as jungle fighters so they're a natural) allocated to the Pacific with one forward deployed it would allow them to get into that fight. If one of those units was a forward deployed Airborne unit (Australia anyone??? They're doggies so we'd have to keep them in the Northern Territories to keep from scaring small children), then the Army would almost have to be part of the Pacific fighht game plan....as a side note, the 82nd could be responsible for the Atlantic area of operations and the 11th for the Pacific. How's that for regional alignment?
I like this idea! Whether we're going to take the fight to Islamic extremists or the NorKs....it would be good to have another unit capable of dynamic insertion, oriented in PACOM.
ReplyDeleteThe demise and sidelining of the Airborne divisions started when they gave up their M551s for the M8 that never came.
ReplyDeletei disagree. it would have been nice if the Airborne got M8's but that didn't lead to their demise. what hurt Airborne is the Stryker and FCS. Shinseki thought that he could give regular army formations the kind of strategic reach that only resides in its airborne formations.
Deletesince that didn't come to be, its time to place the Airborne back on its elite pedastal and get them special roles and missions again. like the Marine Corps they might not be special ops (well i guess you could say Force Recon is special ops but i say give them to MARSOC and be rid of them) but they are elite. airfield seizure. 82nd. humanitarian missions at speed? 11th airborne. forcible entry? 82nd and 11th. you get the idea.
While I'd agree we need more strategically deployable units in the US Army I'm not sure we actually need more airborne infantry battalions. Besides the 82nd and 173rd there's also an airborne brigade in the 25th inf div (AK), the 75th, etc. If anything it might be worth considering if need more light infantry (the 25th actually is down to 1 brigade with the others Stryker [2] and airborne) except the Army actually has 10 brigades. The trouble IMHO is that they're spread out 1 per division here and there, except in the 10th Mountain.
ReplyDeleteFrom a big picture perspective we have enough units to constantly transport by air until the ships start showing up some weeks later after a build up begins. So more light forces probably doesn't make sense unless the AF gets more transport, which is not going to happen, unless of course we require more light forces in a sustained conflict. That's an interesting question to think about.
If anything I'd suggest we need more fast transports to move whatever forces required quickly to where they are needed. The 8 ships we do have can collectively move a heavy Army division at 33 knots. They're 40 years old. I'd suggest we need 16 new ones.
I think we need to enhance our light infantry brigades to A LEAST have full vehicular mobility down to the company or battalion level. This will increase their deployment footprint but will make them far more flexible. A higher degree of vehicular mobility is a main reason the 82nd was used in OIF, rather than a light infantry division.
ReplyDeleteArmored HMMWVs would fit the bill. JLTV is too heavy and expensive, IMHO.
On the airborne side, what is the heaviest load we can airdrop these days? I started wondering if we could develop an air-droppable tank with modular armor fit in the 25-30 ton range that could accept up-armor packages to 40-45 tons. If it was a compact design, a tank with this level of protection could stand toe-to-toe with the T-72/T-80/T-90s of the world (which are in the same weight range). Obviously it would have to be dropped from a C-17, but is that a major restriction?
I realize there is no money in the budget for this type of thing. Just thinking out loud.
Good idea. Unfortunately this is in the news... Army Still Faces Nearly $14 Billion Shortfall In FY-13 O&M Accounts.
ReplyDeleteIts because the Army continues to think like its the big boy on the block instead of leveraging the capabilities found in the other services...most notably the USAF.
DeleteWant to save money? Switch it up! Move an Airborne Brigade to a USAF C-17 base. make it a joint base and have the troops where the transports are...force the DoD to pay for barracks, save on transportation costs, make it where you're able to actually say we can get wheels up in 12 hours for a worldwide mission and mean it.