Will the U.S. Marine Corps Become A Second Land Army?
BY Herschel Smith
14 years, 2 months ago
The U.S. Marines are allegedly trying not to become a second land army by focusing on sea-based forcible entry via the EFV. But recall the view expressed here at TCJ? The Orange County Register shows it pictorially.
Note the question at the left. “Would helicopters and Ospreys ferrying troops to shore, landing behind enemy beach positions, remove the need for a beach landing under fire?” Yes, we had better hope that it does. And I haven’t seen any advocate of this position except here at TCJ.
But the hugely expensive and troublesome EFV and the concept of forcible entry under heavy fire is the only differentiating factor now in its vision and the Army’s vision. The return to the sea apparently requires the EFV according to current Marine Corps doctrine, and without it, the Marines are dead – or so we are told by the U.S. Marine Corps thinkers.
In every other way the Marines are doing everything in their power to ensure that they become a second land army. Lose their rifleman skills? Sure. Start up some heretofore unneeded cyber command within the Marine Corps? Sure. Why the Marine Corps needs a cyber command is anyone’s guess. What these Marines are going to do is anyone’s guess, and they as much as say so. The balance of the branches have robotic stuff, so how about the Marines? Sure. After all, the Corps must stay up with the other branches, right?
Where is the strategic and innovative thinking? Where are the original concepts? Where are the scholar-officers in the Corps? While the Corps turns to robotic mules, heavy equipment, cyber warfare and green power, and turns away from being able to get fresh water from their own environment when dropped into the battle space, the nation continues to turn more to special operations forces and the SOCOM chain of command to perform its expeditionary and irregular warfare.
So be it. The stubbornness and lack of adaptability of the old and outdated Marine Corps vision will ensure its irrelevancy and expendability.
On October 18, 2010 at 9:11 am, Warbucks said:
When equipment is designed perfectly for the function it needs to serve, there is immediate understanding. Usually it takes a science fiction writer to create the perfect tool, like the landing craft used in Aliens (http://bit.ly/LandingCraft) at 33 seconds into the trailer.
It took Burt Rutan and Paul Allan working privately in the Mojave Aerospace Ventures to break the old paradigm that all space flight is always hypersonic.
Sometimes it’s useful to bring in new minds to take a fresh look at solving old challenges.