The Marine Corps is reinventing the Landing Craft Tank (Rocket)

via AOL Breaking Defense.

When you absolutely, positively have to blow up everyone right away, however, you need more than a mortar. You need a Multiple-Launch Rocket System like the MLRS or HIMARS. If you’re a Marine making a landing, you need it mounted on something that can float. The Naval Surface Warfare Center’s solution to this problem is the Autonomous Landing Craft – Air Cushion. A-LCAC takes the venerable five-man Navy hovercraft, capable of carrying an M1 tank from ship to shore, and turns it into an unmanned rocket launcher that skims over the water at 45 miles an hour. That’s the kind of firepower that can clear a beach in a real hurry.

Of course the media  is going crazy over this "innovation" but we're just doing what was done before.  What am I talking about?  They're reinventing the Landing Craft Tank (Rocket)!

While everyone is shouting "cool" I'm shouting that we aren't being innovative enough!  Why saddle a low density asset like an LCAC with this mission? Give this job to our Landing Craft Utility! Even better?  Put the US Army's Multi-Mission Launcher!  Then it can flex into a variety of missions.

Read the whole article but why design a robot glider when we know the Kamax unmanned helicopter works and can carry a useful payload!

Is this exercise highlighting new tech or are they just re-inventing the wheel?