Above you see 2d Cav's artillery bubbas laying down a little rain. Good stuff but they're using M-777's that were designed for light infantry. In my mind that's a huge miss.
A highly mobile unit like the Stryker Brigades...units that depend on high mobility as part of their survival strategy are ill served with towed artillery. Unfortunately an LAV III based solution is not available today (although I believe they were working on a possibility at one time) so that leaves a truck based system as the only alternative.
I'm fond of the idea of mating the MTVR with the M-777 to give Marine units the type of mobile firepower that is needed but the idea has no traction.
Even the artillery community seems numb to the possibilities (can't understand why...they use the M-777 as the prime mover...placing the gun on the truck would seem to be a no brainer). So since we don't have a US solution then we must look overseas. I'm fond of the solutions from France and S. Africa. Denel's offering looks extremely good. Regardless, until this is solved the Stryker Brigades will face issues with their in house fire support. If moving at speed to assault an objective they could quickly outrun their support...if moving at a pace to ensure coverage then they might not be able to exploit gaps and opportunities presented by a successful assault. This needs to be addressed.
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