Compass Points – National Security Team

Dig down beyond smooth phrases

Compass Points – National Security Team

Dig down beyond smooth phrases

November 13, 2024

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Vague, smooth phrases can be a problem. Sometimes people speak in vague, smooth phrases because they do not want to reveal something. They are trying to hide the actual situation. The President elect is selecting his new national security team. Some of the recent choices have been expected; some have been surprises. Every national security team member is charged with some aspect of US national security. Every national security team member should take time to understand at least a little about the condition of America’s 9-1-1 force, the US Marine Corps.  Anyone who wants to understand the actual condition of the Marine Corps today will have to dig down beyond the vague, smooth phrases too often used by the Marine Corps’ current senior leadership.

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The planning guidance and frag order from the Commandant and other official statements from Marine leadership all repeat certain vague, smooth phrases. The phrases sound fine on the surface. But to gain the real meaning of these overused official Marine phrases, it is necessary to drill down deeper.

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The top four official Marine Corps vague, smooth phrases:

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1. Smooth Phrase - "The MEU remains our crown jewel.”

Drill Down Deeper – The MEU is valued because it can arrive at a crisis quickly. But the MEU also has far greater power when it can be rapidly augmented, reinforced, and expanded with the supplies and equipment from Maritime Prepositioning Ships, together with MEF supplied fly-in-echelons. MEUs are produced from robust MEFs. It is the Marine Expeditionary Force -- not the MEU -- that is designed to be the “repository of capabilities” including three MEUs or two Marine Expeditionary Brigades (MEBs). If the MEU is going to shine, the MEF must shine first.

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2. Smooth Phrase - MEUs are a "persistent, global, forward presence."

Drill Down Deeper - Current Marine Corps leadership often say they have an unwavering commitment to making sure MEUs have a persistent, global forward presence. Those are nice sounding words and a worthy goal. Unfortunately, that is not the reality around the globe.  Today Marine Expeditionary Units (MEUs) are not forward deployed year-round as they have been in the past. Today, there are weeks and months when there is no MEU available in entire regions of the globe. During recent crises, there was often no MEU in either the Persian Gulf or in the Mediterranean and no estimate of how long national security policy makers would be unable to count on the Marines.

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3. Smooth Phrase - "We will advocate staunchly for a mission-capable amphibious force."

Drill Down Deeper -   To be truly “mission capable” means the ability to lift and support a MEB at a minimum and that means no less than a resource constrained 38 amphibious ships. The actual global ship requirement to meet the needs of the regional combatant commanders is "upwards of 50" as General Neller testified. In addition to amphibious ships, a "mission capable" force requires a robust Maritime Prepositioning Force. SecNav has announced a block buy of amphibious ships. That is good, but amphibious ships take time to build. To get healthier now, the Navy and Marine Corps must experiment with ships available now, like the Expeditionary Sea Base, the Expeditionary Fast Transport, and others.

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4. Smooth Phrase - "Combined arms is now all-domain, incorporating effects in and from cyberspace, space, the electromagnetic spectrum, and the information environment."

Drill Down Deeper - Since the beginning of history, military forces have used information operations to enhance their combat power, but that does not change combined arms. Today military forces around the world define combined arms as the coordinated employment of infantry, armor, cannon artillery, engineers with breaching and bridging equipment, and close support aircraft.  New technologies in cyber and information bring additive and complementary capabilities to these elements, they do not replace any of them. Marine Corps leaders should not suggest that somehow cyber is a substitute for genuine combined arms.

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Sometimes people speak in smooth phrases to hide and obscure the real situation. To get to the real meaning, it is necessary to drill down deeper.  Perhaps some civilians can be temporarily fooled by the smooth phrases, but nations hostile to the US are not fooled. In addition, not all members of the US Congress are fooled either. Compass Points salutes all those in Congress and in the new national security team working to rebuild and rebalance the Marine Corps so that smooth phrases are backed up with genuine capabilities. With ongoing threats and challenges around the world, the US needs a global, crisis response, 9-1-1 force. The US needs the Marines.