“If the Navy’s unable to get closer in because of the threat, we just can’t sit there and wait,” Brig. Gen. William Mullen said at Sea-Air-Space. The challenge is getting Marines through the threat zone alive.The Marine Corps is caught in a trap.
While recognizing the threat to amphibious ships by anti-ship missiles they still hold onto the belief that anti-air missiles will pose no problems for MV-22's bringing a Company Landing Team ashore!
The fact that people are overlooking this amazes me! The idea that the MV-22 suddenly solves the anti-access problem for the USMC astonishes me!
NOTE: Navy SEALs and Air Force Special Operations had their CV-22's shot up while on approach to a landing zone in Africa, by a primitive force with small arms only...no RPGs, and no MANPADs..the results? Several SEALs wounded and the aircraft having to abort the landing and limp to a nearby friendly base. Oh and this was simply a mission (according to the DoD) to help in the evacuation of US personnel.
Expeditionary Force 21 seeks to fully establish "mini-MEU's" in the form of the SPMAGTF-CR as a permanent formation in the Marine Corps, instead of an adhoc, mission specific, temporary unit as it was designed to be.
EF21 is half baked, seeks to justify the enormous expense of Marine Air in an age of austerity and hopes to give a failed Commandant a legacy that will justify the dysfunction he brought to the Marine Corps.
Or we could revisit your recent re-visitation of LCU-F and work that thinking some more... incl. the picket-boat function.
ReplyDeleteYou want to hunt outgoing Anti-Ship Cruise Missiles threatening the ARG/MEU,
then plant
- either a few Mach-2+ AIM-9 X SIDEWINDER
- or Mach-4 SL-AMRAAM systems
on 6, 10 however many LCU-Fs,
- guided each by the onboard AN/MPQ64 F1s,
and see those A2/AD threats fracture some.
Time to boost EF-21 with constructive options !
why? why a picket? we should instead get fully onboard air sea battle and work to either roll back enemy defenses or create corridors to get the landing force ashore. if the LCU-F is one of the ship to shore connectors to make that buildup happen more rapidly then cool. but the concept is the problem here and its why the Marine Corps is in its current state of malaise.
DeleteTools allow uses.
ReplyDeleteAnd with a broad range of uses at hand, you can do this, and you can do that.
Doctrine does not automatically drive hardware.
Without certain hardware, a lot of best Doctrine can not go far.
Once certain hardware is at hand, you use it as initially proposed - and then go to work pushing its utility further.
And then you can adjust the Doctrine.
Long term, this is much more interesting than any temporary 'scandals'...
i disagree about what comes first. in my mind you always develop doctrine before you buy anything. having said that, the boys that are pushing the LCU-F need to get a bit busy.
Deletethey need to get illustrations, articles etc out on what they're pushing. the next commandant hits in 6 months. you need to pave the ground, even if the current guy likes it doesn't mean the next one will.
Perhaps this is happening as we speak - just not on FACEBOOK, nor may be known by divining the endless bird-'droppings' on and over everything.
DeleteSo, for me it's 'steady as she goes'.
On your other point, Sol,if you can't buy what you need, because your standard-issue Beltway-technologists do not produce it, then you can craft all the fine doctrines that you want, but won't go far. There was no concept of aerial combat until planes, no high-speed ships until steam, etc. Jules Verne dreamt up subs and 'Nemo' but it took more before submarines became a viable element of coast defense- and naval doctrines.
Someone needs to produce the concept, the R-&-D to establish a plausible proposal. Then it's off to building and breaking the thing, while you'd inevitably fool around with it in your head to develop the baseline for a 'New Doctrine' - assuming the thing works to support it.
We might see something intriguing yet.