US Army moving closer to Armored Airborne Force. Updated.

Thanks to Jonathan for the link!

via Army.mil

"The AMPV is anticipated to satisfy critical missions necessary to tackle ground combat situations alongside the ABCT [Airborne Brigade Combat Team] fleet," Army officials said.

Read the whole article if you must.  Its just talk about doing software reliability. I personally found that part boring.

The talk about the AMPV workign with the ABCT though.

That made me pause.  I've been screaming from the rooftops that the Army is making moves in the expeditionary arena that deserves a bit more attention from the Marine Corps.

I ARROGANTLY hung my hat on the fact that while HQMC is pushing the "MV-22 Enabled MEU" bullshit, the guys in the FMF were still doing the hardwork of making sure we had enough armor, artillery....they were making sure that the famed Marine Air Ground Task Force remained the unit of choice for our nation's leaders.

Now this.  We're getting indications that the Airborne Forces are about to be totally revolutionized.  They've always had strategic mobility second to none.  The latest hotness of adding tactical mobility by way of Polaris RZRs was nice but didn't impress.

But what happens if they develop airborne armored forces?

What if they finally achieve strategic (second to none)/tactical mobility , increased battlefield survivability/lethality and couple that with some pretty decent light infantry (even by Marine Corp standards)?

HQMC is singing jointness  while Big Army is out to drink our milkshake. 

UPDATE: It is Armored and not Airborne Combat Team.  ARDEC changed it and didn't even bother to put a correction or update notification on their page.  Well done ARDEC.  Big Army has taught you well.  Special thanks to Umberto for letting me know of the change and apologies to the Army Dogs in my audience that recognized the fuck up and tried to let me know.  Once again I gave "authority" in the form of the writers of the article too much credit for actually KNOWING WHAT THE FUCK THEY WERE TALKING ABOUT than they deserved.