Navy Matters Blog and the logistics requirement of an MEU.

Navy Matters Blog (highly recommended) wrote an article covering the logistics of an amphibious assault and the capability of an MEU to conduct one.  Read it here.

The problem with the article?  The Marine Corps has failed to provide the public...and bloggers, a definition of an MEU's capabilities.  This is the best definition I could find on the interwebs, via Military Factory....

The Marine Corps standard, forward-deployed, sea-based expeditionary organization.  The Marine expeditionary unit (special operations capable) (MEU[SOC]) is a Marine expeditionary unit, augmented with selected personnel and equipment, that is trained and equipped with an enhanced capability to conduct amphibious operations and a variety of specialized missions of limited scope and duration. These capabilities include specialized
demolition, clandestine reconnaissance and surveillance, raids, in-extremis hostage recovery, and enabling operations for follow-on forces. The MEU(SOC) is not a special operations force but, when directed by the Secretary of Defense, the combatant commander, and/or other operational commander, may conduct limited special operations in extremis, when other forces are inappropriate or unavailable. Also called MEU(SOC). See also aviation combat element; combat service support element; command element; ground combat element; Marine air-ground task force; Marine expeditionary force; Marine expeditionary force (forward); Marine expeditionary unit; special purpose Marine air-ground task force; task force.

The key words?

Limited scope and duration.

That means that an MEU will not be conducting an amphibious assault.  An amphibious raid?  Yes.  An assault?  No.

Which brings me to my last point.  The MEU while extremely useful, capable and combat proven has to be used wisely.  Below is the equipment fit and you'll see that its still a pretty light force....Check out the equipment table here and consider a fictional assault with 4 M1 Abrams MBTs?  15 AAVs? 6 AH-1Zs?  Etc....

Marine Corps doctrine states that a Marine Expeditionary Brigade is the smallest unit capable of conducting an amphibious assault....and with good reason.

Amphibious Warfare Industrial Base Coalition---Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) by another name.

I've got several alerts to a DoD Buzz article about the Amphibious Warfare Industrial Base Coalition writing US Senators about the need to ensure that the Navy-Marine Corps team buys enough amphibs.  You can read the story yourself here.

What has my mind zooming is the fact that Loren Thompson wrote an article just a few days earlier that stressed the need for more LPD based LSDs to enter service soon.  Check that out here.

I'm a bit disappointed.

I have been a fan of Huntington Ingalls and believed that they were selling a valuable product that would serve the Navy and Marines well.

I also thought that their plan to use the hull of the LPD-17 class as the basis for a new LSD had merit.  Using the same hull for a hospital ship, command ship, even anti-ballistic missile ship I thought was ingenious.

But this?

Not cool.

As far as Thompson is concerned, I've seen enough.  Hired guns do what hired guns do.  I just hope that he's prepared for the fallout when his advocacy of a particular "product" leads to the wrong system being selected and our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen or Marines end up killed or injured because of it.

Defense Procurement is a nasty business.  HII and Thompson just made it a little nastier.

Ultra Light Combat Vehicle (ULCV)? The Army tried it in the 1980's!

Something about the Army's solicitation for the Ultra Light Combat Vehicle has been bothering me.  It reminded me of something they had done before but I couldn't put my finger on it.

Then I checked an old book that I had an Army Heraldry and ran across the passage on the 9th Infantry Division (Mechanized).

Remember the Navy SEALs running around in Dune Buggies?

Remember Army Rangers upgunning humvees and using them for gun trucks?

The 9th ID did it before all of them.  Check this out from Wikipedia....

Following the Vietnam War the division was stationed at Fort Lewis Washington until its inactivation in 1992. Beginning in the mid-1980s the division served as the high-technology test-bed for the army. This led to the division testing the concept of "motorized infantry", designed to fill the gap between light infantry and heavy mechanized forces. The idea was to create lighter, mobile units capable of rapid deployment with far less aircraft than a heavier mechanized unit. Motorized infantry doctrine concentrated on effectiveness in desert warfare.[citation needed]
By 1989 the division had fielded two complete brigades of motorized infantry in battalions designated as "Light Attack," "Light Combined Arms" and "Heavy Combined Arms". Motorized battalions traveled in the new Humvee and generally fought as traditional light infantry once engaged. Attack battalions utilized the Fast Attack Vehicles (later re-designated the Desert Patrol Vehicle), first developed at Fort Lewis. Essentially a Volkswagen- engined dune buggy mounted with either a 40mm Mk 19 grenade launcheror .50 caliber M2 Browning machine gun, the FAV was designed to provide highly mobile firepower that could attack the flanks of heavier mechanized units. Some variants also mounted TOW missiles. All of these weapons systems were attached to the FAV by a mount designed to break away if the vehicle rolled over, which they were prone to do. The FAVs were problematic at best and were eventually replaced by various versions of the HMMWV

Nothing is new.

This "concept" of making certain Army units expeditionary by giving them ultra light vehicles has been done before.

Unlike what the Marine Corps and Army are doing today however, the old skool guys actually tested the concept before rubber stamping it and declaring it a war winner.

So when you keep track of this latest effort remember this...its been done before. 

ARES Modular Flight System

Formerly known as Transformer (TX), ARES is an unmanned VTOL flight module system capable of transporting a variety of payloads.

Jaguar ambushing Crocodile...A Chris Dawson Film.

Delta strikes and its caught on tape...

Jalopnik has a pretty nice write up on Delta conducting a snatch and grab (I think that's what they call it) of a suspected terrorist.

Its pretty fascinating stuff.

On this one I have absolutely no idea how its done.  Do they have backup? What type of weapons are used?  What are procedures if they are interfered with by local police? Etc...

This is definitely upper tier stuff and I usually don't go for those labels.

Read the article here.

Sino-SeaHawk via Chinese Military Review

I don't know if I should be upset or just consider this the price of a misplaced decision by business executives.

Sikorsky license built BlackHawks in China under the ruse of them being only for non-military use.

Of course the Chinese simply modified it and are now preparing to use it against us (and our allies).  

How the Air Combat Element (USMC) is destroying the Marine Corps.

Thanks to USMC 0802 for pointing me to this article!

LtCol J.W. Hammond (USMC, Ret.) wrote an outstanding article about an issue that has consumed so many pages here on SNAFU! Blog.

The Air Combat Element is destroying the Marine Corps.

Everyone inside the Corps sees it.  Everyone senses that this is wrong.  But few have been able to put into words how dangerous this is to the USMC as an organization.

Consider the above table.

Take it in and look at the costs of those birds.

Then consider the rationale behind the cancellation of the EFV, the 10 year (!) delay to the MPC, and even the delayed upgrade of the AAV.

WE HAVE THE MONEY...ITS JUST GOING TO THE WING!

Read the entire article here and weep for the Marine Corps.

CH-53K close to first flight.

In January 2014, Sikorsky powered 'on' the three GE 7,500 shaft horsepower class engines of the first CH-53K heavy lift helicopter prototype - known as the Ground Test Vehicle - and spun the rotor head without rotor blades. The event continues safety-of-flight tests started in December with pilots at the aircraft's controls. The Ground Test Vehicle is anchored to the ground at Sikorsky's West Palm Beach, Development Flight Center in Florida. Four additional test aircraft are being prepared for flight test, beginning in late 2014. (PRNewsFoto/Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation)

Mike Sam and the real issue with "gay" agenda.

The Mike Sam issue crystallizes the gay agenda to me in a nutshell.

If I walked down the street and Mike Sam was coming from the other direction I could tell that he's African American.  I could tell that he is an athletic guy.  And if I was within earshot I could tell if he was well spoken or not.

I COULD NOT TELL IF HE WAS GAY OR STRAIGHT!

And that's why I have so much heartburn with the gay agenda.

I don't give a damn who Mike Sam or anyone else is screwing behind doors (as long as they're adult and a willing participant).  I don't need to know and don't want to know.

But for some reason the gay community is insisting on finding the tallest rooftop and having athletes or whatever is the flavor of the month to do so.

Dirty secret about Sam?  He's a bubble player.  NFL Analyst say that he's a third day draft pick.  NOT THIRD ROUND!  THIRD DAY!

This guy is going to have to bust his butt to make an NFL roster and all he's doing is using his sexuality to increase his chances of getting selected.

The NFL is all about winning----still.  If he can't contribute to a team winning and all he brings is a social agenda, then he won't last past training camp.

If he can then he'll win a roster spot.  And in the end that's what this should be about.  His sexuality is irrelevant.  His play is.  Sam needs to remember that.   

Did the USMC retaliate against the Marine Corps TImes?

Huge thanks to Eric at ELP Blog for giving me the heads up on this.

via Marine Corps Times.

Marine Corps leaders have ordered the independent Marine Corps Times newspaper removed from its prominent newsstand location at base exchange stores worldwide and placed instead in areas away from checkout lines, where it is harder to find and fewer copies are available.
The move raises troubling questions about motive and closely follows a directive prohibiting commanders from using budget funds to buy Marine Corps Times and a number of other publications.
Marine Corps Times is widely recognized for its comprehensive coverage of the Corps, focusing on everything from career tracks, to pay and benefits, family and spouse issues, and employment after leaving the military.
Throughout much of the past year, the paper has published dozens of articles as part of an ongoing investigation into allegations the service’s commandant, Gen. Jim Amos, abused his authority to ensure Marines were punished for an embarrassing war-zone scandal. Numerous reports have captured the attention of mainstream media outlets, including NPR, CNN and Time magazine, among several others.

This is troubling and both the Marine Corps and Marine Corps Times comes out looking the worse because of this...

1.  The Commandant has been caught up in controversies of his own making.  Because of that and because of many decisions that he's made, he is probably the most UNPOPULAR/LEAST RESPECTED leaders that I've ever heard of.

2.  Because of #1, this move looks like retaliation against the one publication that has been all over the story of the Commandant's misconduct.

3.  Unfortunately Marine Corps Times jumped the shark this weekend in the way that they characterized a reply from HQMC to a Congressman.  I wrote a post where I actually defined Amos.  I didn't like doing it but MCT was plain wrong.

All in all, I'm beginning to detect something else that I've never seen from the Commandant's office.

A bunker mentality.

But its different in a weird way.   Its not the Marine Corps against the world (that's normal operating procedure)....no, this time its HQMC walling itself off from the rest of the Marine Corps and attempting to regain lost trust, and respect.

Moves like this won't help. 

Goodbye World

With all the problems families have to face, I can certainly understand why it is easier to ignore the vulnerabilities our society faces.

But the threats are too big to ignore aren't they?  And now Hollywood is making movies about things that were once considered fringe.

Interesting.

Blast from the past. FMC's LVT00 Concept.

How long has the Marine Corps been planning on replacing the AAV?  How about since the early 80's!

I was surfing the web and ran across the above advertisement from FMC (later United Defence and after that BAE) that shows a concept LVT00.

I'm digging for more info as we speak, but it looks like its just an evolutionary AAV.  More to come...I hope.

All this to pay for one airplane?

Thanks for the link Mark!

via Flight Global.

Some of the US Air Force’s most venerable aircraft will likely head to the boneyard in fiscal year 2015, victims of projected military funding cuts, budget analysts predict.
Lockheed U-2s, Fairchild Republic A-10s, McDonnell Douglas KC-10 tankers and Beechcraft MC-12 surveillance turboprops will likely be retired next year, says Mackenzie Eaglen from public policy group American Enterprise Institute.
“I expect all of those to be near entirely retired, or most of the fleets,” Eaglen says on 6 February at a defence conference in New York City hosted by investment company Cowen Group.

The military procurement that occurred during the 1980's paved the way for the successes during the 1st and 2nd Gulf Wars.

If the USAF Chief of Staff is wrong (and I believe he is) then he is paving the way for the failure of our forces in the future.

When people talk legacy they're usually referring to the President, but the Joint Chiefs need to be concerned too.

Will a future Chairman decry some of the decisions made by all the service chiefs during this time period?  Time will tell.  Read the story here. 

Payloads over Platforms....via Dutch Force 21...

Dutch Force 21 Blogspot takes to task the idea that the platform is the key to war winning and instead looks at the payload.

Quite honestly I sat back in shock.

The US Navy is choosing payloads over platforms in its push for the LCS.  Mission modules are the key they say, not the performance of the ship.  With the LX(R) they're doing the same thing.

Payload is the driver, not the platform.  He said simply what the Navy has been struggling to get over with the LCS.  But he does one other thing.  He again shows how that same concept should be applied to airplanes...

Read it here.

NOTE:  I didn't want to pollute the concept by stating the obvious but it must be pointed out.  The US Navy is choosing this same concept with their evolution of the Super Hornet.  This payload over platform theory is why the F/A-18 Advanced Super Hornet can be a low cost but effective platform into the future.

The Expeditionary Airfield. The Navy and Marine Air Wing's Ace on the ground.

An F/A-18 lands on a runway using the M-31 expeditionary arresting gear at Al Asad air base, Iraq. (U.S. Marine Corps photo)

A UH-1Y Huey helicopter and AH-1W Cobra attack helicopter with Marine Light/Attack Helicopter Squadron 367 takeoff using a mobile expeditionary airfield AM2 mat with minimum operation strip lighting system (MOSLS). (U.S. Marine Corps photo)

Tell me again why using a combination of Harrier II's and Super Hornets can't carry the day until we design a proper AND affordable replacement for the long serving Harrier?

If you're saying that it will "diminish" the Marine Corps expeditionary flavor then I tell you you're wrong.

Meet again (yeah I've posted on this before but it bears repeating) the Expeditionary Air Field.  Little talked about but a tremendous asset if we're being serious about fully exploiting the capabilities of the Marine Expeditionary Force, the EAF can help bring the fight to the enemy.  Its backbreaking to install but once functioning it is a sight to behold.

via NAVAIR.

Description:
Expeditionary Airfields (EAF) allow military aircraft to launch and land in any flat terrain, making it an in-disposable commodity for our armed forces and NATO allies.

EAF is a shore-based, aviation support system that permits rapid deployment and recovery of aircraft within range of ground forces. Although an EAF can be as basic as a grass landing zone to support helicopter operations, the installation of one or more EAF subsystems adds versatility and/or durability to the site. EAF equipment provides not only mobile matting, but also arresting gear and lighting for “runway” guidance.

Introduction of aircraft like the MV-22 Osprey and the ongoing testing of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, keep the EAF team continually evolving its equipment and methods to provide fleet Marine forces with flexible, practical and advanced systems. The proven success of joint service operations involving the deployment of U.S., NATO, and other allied nation aircraft, guarantees the presence of EAF systems in future combat operations.
EAF products:
*AM-2 matting and accessories
*Light and extreme lightweight matting
*M-31 expeditionary arresting gear
*Airfield lighting and terminal guidance
*Minimum operating strip lighting system
*Maintenance shelters
*Airfield design
*Airfield communication system

Taliban capture an allied Military Working Dog??? via Outside

Read the entire story here.

CNN is saying that US military sources are saying that its a British MWD.  I don't know.  What I do know is that this is pathetic.  How do you let these barbarians backwards ass fucks capture a friend?

You're making me defend Amos. Get it together Marine Corps Times.

Marine Corps Times has been doing sterling work in their coverage of the allegations of undue command influence by General Amos.

But their recent story is forcing me into an uncomfortable position.  I'm having to defend not only Amos, but also HQMC.

Read the story here, but this is the operative paragraph (the one where HQMC "raps" a Congressman for supporting a whistle blower)....

At Marine Corps headquarters, which has made few public remarks about the allegations surrounding Amos, a spokesman took aim at Jones for divulging his letter to Fitzpatrick. “The commandant has made it his practice to not share, neither publicly nor privately, official correspondence from his desk to fellow general officers or other senior government officials, in particular members of Congress,” said Col. Chris Hughes. “As such, he elects not to comment on Rep. Jones’ public disclosure of his personal letter, nor the motivation behind doing so.”

Like I said.  Read the entire article, but if thats HQMC and Amos "raps" ing a Congressman then either the writer of the article or the editors need to get out in the real world.

That's soft as charmane to 99.9% of the population.  You could probably find pockets of people in New York, San Francisco, Washington D.C. or perhaps Chicago that thinks thats playing rough but rainbows and unicorns don't fly over the rest of the country.

Get it together MCT.  Report the news.  Don't invent it. 

Cherokee Nation gets armored vehicle to use in severe weather

The Cherokee Nation is getting taken for a ride....and in a bad way.  Not only are those vehicles a pain in the ass to get into, but I can't even imagine how they're going to lift a gurney into the back of it.

Additionally they're big heavy vehicles that will cost more to recover than they realize.  Snow covered roads with ditches on the sides?  Yeah I can see these ambulances needing a big rig wrecker truck and the sick person still needing a ride to the hospital.

The should have been given Humvee Ambulances...

Or if the terrain is extremely rugged or particularly impassable during snow storms or the rainy season then maybe even a M-113 ambulance....

But an MRAP to do rescue work?

Not gonna cut it.  I see trouble ahead.

Modest Proposal. A short procurement time out.

Consider the following...

1.  The EFV highspeed requirement has been shelved.  At the time of the cancellation, General Dynamics offered the same vehicle without the "transforming" hydraulics.  The Marine Corps said no.

2.  The USS America was built without a well deck.  Soon after construction started the "ground side" of the Marine Corps all said at the same time WTF! and now we have the next vessel in cue being designed with a well deck.

3.  The MLP was petitioned for by the USMC to the Navy and once it was built, we have two of these ships immediately going to SOCOM to become AFSBs.  A Navy Admiral is quoted as saying that we'll have sailors figure out how we're going to use these ships.

The list goes on.

The problem?

The hoped for advances that Marine Corps theorist thought possible have not panned out.  Amphibious Assault from over the horizon (about 25 miles) is now just as risky as setting up within view of the beach.  As a matter of fact 200 nm offshore will still put you in range of some land based anti-ship missiles.

Buying gear without a plan is foolish. 

A short procurement timeout is necessary.  Maybe 6 months to review plans, and policies regarding how we approach amphibious warfare.  Additionally we can determine what the "real" numbers are when it comes to gear we end up buying.  Fewer squadrons?  Fewer F-35s.  Fewer Battalions?  Fewer MPCs and ACVs...etc.

Thats how the Marine Corps regains the trust of the nation.  By demonstrating that we are once again good stewards of the taxpayers dollar....as well as a kick ass military force.