Compass Points - Rapid Response Contest
Commandant looking for new ideas.
Compass Points - Rapid Response Contest
Commandant looking for new ideas.
June 11, 2025
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It is notable that as the CINC and the SECDEF discussed ordering Marines to prepare for duty on the streets of Los Angeles, neither of them nor their advisors ever questioned the readiness of Marines. No-one said, "wait a minute, we cannot send in the Marines, they changed their focus to being a sensor node in a joint kill chain." If anyone had brought up the misguided Marine missile detour, the senior leaders would have just laughed: "stop kidding, you know the Marines are the 9-1-1 force, always ready for duty anywhere, anytime."
It will take new ideas and better decisions to put more substance behind the Marine Corps’ stellar reputation.
In addition to sitting before Congress and giving repetitive, previously prepared testimony, the Marine Corps Commandant is also on the hunt for new ideas about the Marine Corps. He is searching for more input about Marine Corps global crisis response. It is always good to think broadly, investigate new ideas, and experiment with new technologies. In a search for some new thinking, the Commandant is sponsoring a "Rapid Response Essay Contest."
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2025 Commandant's Rapid Response Essay Contest
Topic: What should the MEU of 2035 look like?
Length: 2000-3000 words
Contest runs: 22 May – 31 August
Both civilian and military writers eligible.
First Prize $1000
Second Prize $750
Third Prize $500
Submit to gazette@mca-marines.org
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If the Commandant wants rapid response ideas, there are some key steps he could take to gather rapid responses.
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Rapid Response #1
Compass Points has thousands of readers who are Marines of every rank and MOS, as well as friends of the Corps from across the defense establishment. All of these outstanding readers have unlimited good ideas about how to make the Marine Corps stronger today and tomorrow. The Commandant is welcome to sit for an interview on Compass Points and get feedback from Compass Points readers. The feedback, no doubt, will be direct, straight-forward, and pointed. But it will also be useful, very useful.
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Rapid Response #2
Chowder Society II has produced a publication about how the Marine Corps can make itself stronger by 2035. The publication is called, Vision 2035. The full text is available at the link below. Here is a sample.
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Vision 2035 is a roadmap for a better way forward. It provides the conceptual foundation for the development of supporting concepts and the identification and fielding of specific capabilities the Marine Corps requires to meet its Title X and Goldwater-Nichols responsibilities, congressional intent, and the global challenges of the twenty-first century. It restores infantry and combined arms as the central components of Marine Corps operations. It ensures the Marine Corps remains ready, relevant, and capable of responding to the crises and contingency requirements of all combatant commanders, not just some.
-- Vision 2035
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Rapid Response #3
The Commandant should take a trip to Quantico. Pull into the General Raymond G. Davis building at Quantico, home of MCCDC/CD&I, Marine Corps combat development. MCCDC/CD&I has the experts and processes to play a crucial role in building the Marine Corp of 2035. The combat development Marines and civilians at Quantico were largely left out of the Force Design detour.
No-one bothered to get a review from combat development about whether is was a good idea to degrade or destroy so many combined arms units, equipment, and capabilities including armor, air, infantry, artillery, engineering, snipers, and more. No one asked combat development if the Marine Corps should change its focus from global crisis response to a narrow, regional, focus on Marine sensor and missile units off the coast of China.
If MCCDC/CD&I had been more involved before the plan to create island missile units, then the Marine Corps would still have its combined arms MAGTFs and full MEFs intact today. Drones and missiles and sensors could have been added to the MEF for deployment as appropriate with outgoing MAGTFs.
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Rapid Response #4
After visiting MCCDC/CD&I at Quantico, the Commandant should drive over to the Al Gray Research Center and spend an afternoon reading worthwhile articles. A curated list of more than 300 articles is included at the link below. Here are just three examples.
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Marine Times (marinecorpstimes.com) 07/07/2023
How capable is today’s Marine Corps to answer a 9-1-1 call? Not very
By Gen. James Conway (retired) and Gen. Anthony Zinni (retired)
Timely and effective global response across the spectrum of conflict requires a combination of amphibious lift for forward presence, maritime prepositioning for rapid deployment and sustainment, and a combined arms force that can be task organized for everything from humanitarian assistance and disaster relief to major combat against a determined enemy. Neither the Navy nor the Marine Corps can meet these essential requirements today.
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Marine Corps Gazette
2023 MajGen Harold W. Chase Prize Essay Contest: First Place
Thinking Bigger
By Colonel Seth Milstein
Like a latter-day Schlieffen Plan, the answer is not committing to a single course of action that crams a significant fraction of the Marine Corps’ operating forces into the beaten zone of a massive amount of PRC firepower. Parking limited and relatively immobile combat power in isolated and predictable locations cedes the initiative and offers plenty of opportunity for enemy target practice. At the same time, retrenching from the rest of the globe offers a vacuum for the pacing threat and ambitious adversary to fill. Worst of all, this approach wastes a historic Marine Corps strength: excellence at expeditionary operations.
https://mca-marines.org/blog/gazette/thinking-bigger/
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The National Interest (nationalinterest.org) 12/13/2022
Force Design 2030 Is Trying to Solve the Wrong Problem
The most valuable contribution the Marine Corps could make in preparing for future conflict is to focus its force design efforts on preserving or restoring the ability to maneuver in the age of precision weapons rather than on developing capabilities that are already core competencies of other services.
By John F. Schmitt
https://nationalinterest.org/feature/force-design-2030-trying-solve-wrong-problem-205991?page=0%2C1
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Rapid Response #5
After the Commandant has visited MCCDC/CD&I, and then read some articles at the Gray Research Center, perhaps the next step for new ideas would be to find comfortable seat somewhere, take out his cell phone, and take time to speak with Marines who he should be close with. Take time to exchange views with Marines who have sat in his chair and faced similar pressures and similar opportunities. In other words, take time to call and seek new ideas from the former Commandants: Charles C. Krulak, James L. Jones, Michael W. Hagee, James T. Conway, James F. Amos, Joseph F. Dunford, Robert B. Neller, & David H. Berger.
These visionary leaders, almost to a man, would advise the Commandant to restore and enhance the Marine MAGTF with the most advanced weapons and technologies, so that once again the Nation would have an always deployed, offense focused, combined arms, ready, relevant, and capable Corps of Marines.
An essay contest is a fine thing, but if the Commandant is genuinely in search of new ideas, he can find outstanding rapid response ideas from other people, including those at MCCDC/CD&I, and from the former Commandants. Just pickup the phone.
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Vision 2035
A Better Way Forward for the U.S. Marine Corps
https://mega.nz/file/crxlUJoC#G-Wh2nlQllKnIXUuCvCdolmQEWg_fk4_Jv6KQuRe3us
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Chowder Society II - Index of Articles v7. 6 of June 1, 2025
INDEX OF PROMINENT ARTICLES ADDRESSING USMC ISSUES
The primary index version 7.6 of June 1, 2025, (topic areas A-J) consists of 195 articles, authored or coauthored by 109 different writers, and published in 53 different media outlets. The index of supporting articles (topic area K) consists of an additional 145 articles, authored or coauthored by 120 different writers, and published in 57 different media outlets.
https://mega.nz/file/ZrgXEZgJ#fv_vpLaTykZ5mpRVrlycwYIkjnjGmGRlEVCuf9E2c9I
You can’t solve a problem until you recognize you have a problem. I applaud the Commandant for seeking new ideas for rapid response and hopefully sustainment. The Marine Corps is at risk of losing its 911 mantle without more operationally ready amphibious ships, a more robust fleet of maritime prepositioning ships, and the combined arms capability to fight and win across the range of military operations.
The President was at Fort Bragg yesterday. In front of the XVIII Airborne Corps headquarters was a large banner that read, “America’s Contingency Corps.” But is it? Marines know that rapid response without sustainment is a hollow promise. It does not replace the rapidity of combat power that comes from the sea and sustained by sealift. This should be a Marine Corps core competency.
Bravo Zulu to the 39th Commandant for wanting his Marines to regain their unique role in the national defense.
Sometimes the simplest things are the most difficult things to do!