So the senior leadership walked away from the time-honored SPMAGTF in a feeble attempt to bestow relevancy on Force Design and EABO.
The folks who thought up the name “Littoral Combat Force” would do well to remember this quote from Captain John W. Thomason, Jr.’s book “Fix Bayonets”: “There is nothing particularly glorious about sweaty fellows, laden with killing tools, going along to fight. And yet-such a column represents a great deal more than 28,000 individuals mustered into a division. All that is behind those men is in that column too: the old battles, long forgotten, that secured our nation - - Brandywine and Trenton and Yorktown, San Jacinto and Chapultepec, Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Antietam, El Caney; scores of skirmishes, far off, such as the Marines have nearly every year in which a man can be killed as dead as ever a chap in the Argonne; traditions of things endured and things accomplished, such as regiments hand down forever…”
And maybe the senior leadership should have read Thomason’s book before changing the name of the 3rd Marines to the 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment and the 12th Marines to the 12th Marine Littoral Regiment.
Exactly, General. Its a very feeble attempt to maintain relevancy. If they keep repeating "littoral" enough, maybe we'll forget the true terms for Marine organizations. Its like rewriting the truth!
Well, looking for the pony in a horse stall full of hobucky, or in this case FD something or other, which was full of missiles, that didn't exist, and "sensors" human or otherwise, we hit upon the potential that there is a pony of sorts to found after all; with the use of LCF-24, ergo the Southcom commander at least has something to work with, verses nothing; as with the EurCom commander when he asked for help in Turkey with humanitarian relief after a catastrophic earthquake rocked that nation. (Who for the moment anyway is still a member of NATO) For a whole host of reasons the Corps could not respond. While The Littoral Combat Force, may seem a little unwieldy, it is a response force. Marines from roughly 1898 to 1939 operated with a wide swath of capabilities to quell revolutions, put down insurrections, support Sea Lines of Open Communication (SLOC's) and so on and so forth in the Caribbean Basin. Monroe Doctrine basically enforced. Back to the future, it also proves the point that Generals Wilson and Barrow pivoted to, during their tenures. 6 MAGTF MEB's. 6 MEB's could be composited into 3 MEF's. Coverage for the Pacific, Atlantic and 1 for the sake of argument for that "something" that always comes up. If there were ever a time for senior level aka Flag leadership to get off the dime and take advantage of whatever ships are available to prove we are flexible and able in our thinking, to project force, now is that time. Let's hope some courage can be found and brave ideas beyond the LCF are brought forward. MAGTF's are still the best bang per buck in the War Department arsenal. Time to take back our seat at the planning table as a major contributor. We have 3 seconds and 2 just died. Better hurry up!
One must ask the obvious question. How much combat capability must a 170,000 person Marine Corps need to be able to muster and deploy to remain relevant? What conventional combat capability should these formations have? How will they be logistically supported? How mobile are they?
The answer is obvious to any semi professional
Observer. All four questions are easy to answer. Not enough, insufficient, not possible and not at all.
How many trained and ready Marines are currently deployed on US Navy ships? That is the metric. All else is spin, smoke screens, lies by commission and omission. When does it all become too embarrassing to tolerate? Is anyone looking in the mirror in the morning?
These dilettantes mincing around HQMC have always been enamored with Special Ops because they never mastered Combined Operations, readiness and the logistics necessary to support them.
Simplistic, cheap and little effort seem to be today’s watchwords. Heavy equipment, preventive maintenance, oversight and responsibility must be avoided at all costs…Divest! Semper Fi
I see absolutely no need to re-name a MEU or a Special Purpose MAGTF.
The MAFTF has served the Corps well since 1963.
Someone should have read MCO 3120.3 December 1963 or at least read Wikipedia under MAGTF.
At least when the LCF Activation Order was staffed at HQMC, Quantico, MarFor HQs, etc. someone should have realized that a very important word is missing from Littoral Combat Force’s title.
The word is Marine.
Marine Littoral Combat Force
Did you know the Philippine Navy has a Littoral Combat Force too?
I bet there is a working group at Leavenworth Combat Arms Command talking about an:
CP discussed using Expeditionary Fast Transports & Expeditionary Sea Bases a few posts ago, and here we are still holding an empty bag. If the CMC was serious about getting Marines aboard ship, these assets would be in use (a long time ago). While the SP MAGTF CR force is a good start, it still needs more naval transport than just one LPD. Plus, it needs whole lot more. Does it have an arty battery? Does it have a LAV platoon or company? I hope it is packing some serious ground firepower besides its 81mm mortars. As an immediate crisis response force, it needs to have a complete toolbox of combat capabilities: the proverbial Swiss Army Knife!
So now we have a LITTORAL Combat Force-24 (LCF-24) based on an LPD. The word “LITTORAL” is not going to solve the US Navy’s short term amphibious ship building and maintenance problem. What is wrong with using the ESB and EPF idea that CP proposes?
The LPD is a great and capable Amphibious Ship but it is three amphibious ships short of a full ARG. The LPD can billet about 600 Marines, with two helo/V-22 spots, and a well deck for three LCACs. I imagine the Marine F-35s will be stationed in Porta Rico along with the heavy and medium lifters. The LPD will have room for a Marine Command Group and probably a reinforced rifle company. There is not going to be a lot of room left for the usual MAGTF task organization.
The USMC use to be very good at merging ARGs at sea after using their strategic mobility to respond to a crisis hot spot. The Marine Corps needs to be careful of these ”modified” MAGTF ideas. I also remember the post Viet Nam war operation to free and siege the Mayaguez (1975).
A Marine rifle company seized the Mayaguez by “going over the side” of a US Navy destroyer. In addition to a Marine Battalion (forming in Okinawa) conducting a helo-assault in US Air Force rescue helicopter’s that went very badly. When a full operational and trained ARG sat in Subic Bay MAU camp.
The US Navy has been looking for an EPF mission since its initial concept. Starting with theater support for special operations support, humanitarian assistance and disasters relief, counter-drug operations, counter piracy patrols, limited amphibious logistic support, and (the latest) expeditionary medical support. Here an EPF would be turned into a floating medical emergency room with forward surgical and resuscitation capability. Please understand I hate saying this because I am not a fan of the MLR, but the MLR needs small amphibious ships that are currently years out in the US Navy’s ship building plan. I would think a couple of EPF’s stationed in the Philippines might help with the current MLR mobility and support problem.
Has the US Navy forgotten that Amphibious Warfare is their mission? During WW2 Admirals were responsible for amphibious operations in the Pacific, the Atlantic, and the Mediterranean Sea. Admirals became experts at not only amphibious operations but also transferring command and control to the Landing Force Commander.
The US Navy Leadership is missing the point that ARG’s (USMC MAGTFs) are the basic building blocks for responding to global crises because of their strategic mobility.
CNO’s are usually carrier guys when was the last time the CNO or his Deputy was an Amphibious Warfare guy? S/F
So the senior leadership walked away from the time-honored SPMAGTF in a feeble attempt to bestow relevancy on Force Design and EABO.
The folks who thought up the name “Littoral Combat Force” would do well to remember this quote from Captain John W. Thomason, Jr.’s book “Fix Bayonets”: “There is nothing particularly glorious about sweaty fellows, laden with killing tools, going along to fight. And yet-such a column represents a great deal more than 28,000 individuals mustered into a division. All that is behind those men is in that column too: the old battles, long forgotten, that secured our nation - - Brandywine and Trenton and Yorktown, San Jacinto and Chapultepec, Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Antietam, El Caney; scores of skirmishes, far off, such as the Marines have nearly every year in which a man can be killed as dead as ever a chap in the Argonne; traditions of things endured and things accomplished, such as regiments hand down forever…”
And maybe the senior leadership should have read Thomason’s book before changing the name of the 3rd Marines to the 3rd Marine Littoral Regiment and the 12th Marines to the 12th Marine Littoral Regiment.
Sad, very sad.
Exactly, General. Its a very feeble attempt to maintain relevancy. If they keep repeating "littoral" enough, maybe we'll forget the true terms for Marine organizations. Its like rewriting the truth!
Well, looking for the pony in a horse stall full of hobucky, or in this case FD something or other, which was full of missiles, that didn't exist, and "sensors" human or otherwise, we hit upon the potential that there is a pony of sorts to found after all; with the use of LCF-24, ergo the Southcom commander at least has something to work with, verses nothing; as with the EurCom commander when he asked for help in Turkey with humanitarian relief after a catastrophic earthquake rocked that nation. (Who for the moment anyway is still a member of NATO) For a whole host of reasons the Corps could not respond. While The Littoral Combat Force, may seem a little unwieldy, it is a response force. Marines from roughly 1898 to 1939 operated with a wide swath of capabilities to quell revolutions, put down insurrections, support Sea Lines of Open Communication (SLOC's) and so on and so forth in the Caribbean Basin. Monroe Doctrine basically enforced. Back to the future, it also proves the point that Generals Wilson and Barrow pivoted to, during their tenures. 6 MAGTF MEB's. 6 MEB's could be composited into 3 MEF's. Coverage for the Pacific, Atlantic and 1 for the sake of argument for that "something" that always comes up. If there were ever a time for senior level aka Flag leadership to get off the dime and take advantage of whatever ships are available to prove we are flexible and able in our thinking, to project force, now is that time. Let's hope some courage can be found and brave ideas beyond the LCF are brought forward. MAGTF's are still the best bang per buck in the War Department arsenal. Time to take back our seat at the planning table as a major contributor. We have 3 seconds and 2 just died. Better hurry up!
One must ask the obvious question. How much combat capability must a 170,000 person Marine Corps need to be able to muster and deploy to remain relevant? What conventional combat capability should these formations have? How will they be logistically supported? How mobile are they?
The answer is obvious to any semi professional
Observer. All four questions are easy to answer. Not enough, insufficient, not possible and not at all.
How many trained and ready Marines are currently deployed on US Navy ships? That is the metric. All else is spin, smoke screens, lies by commission and omission. When does it all become too embarrassing to tolerate? Is anyone looking in the mirror in the morning?
These dilettantes mincing around HQMC have always been enamored with Special Ops because they never mastered Combined Operations, readiness and the logistics necessary to support them.
Simplistic, cheap and little effort seem to be today’s watchwords. Heavy equipment, preventive maintenance, oversight and responsibility must be avoided at all costs…Divest! Semper Fi
I see absolutely no need to re-name a MEU or a Special Purpose MAGTF.
The MAFTF has served the Corps well since 1963.
Someone should have read MCO 3120.3 December 1963 or at least read Wikipedia under MAGTF.
At least when the LCF Activation Order was staffed at HQMC, Quantico, MarFor HQs, etc. someone should have realized that a very important word is missing from Littoral Combat Force’s title.
The word is Marine.
Marine Littoral Combat Force
Did you know the Philippine Navy has a Littoral Combat Force too?
I bet there is a working group at Leavenworth Combat Arms Command talking about an:
Army Littoral Combat Force Rein with Missiles
When you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.
CP discussed using Expeditionary Fast Transports & Expeditionary Sea Bases a few posts ago, and here we are still holding an empty bag. If the CMC was serious about getting Marines aboard ship, these assets would be in use (a long time ago). While the SP MAGTF CR force is a good start, it still needs more naval transport than just one LPD. Plus, it needs whole lot more. Does it have an arty battery? Does it have a LAV platoon or company? I hope it is packing some serious ground firepower besides its 81mm mortars. As an immediate crisis response force, it needs to have a complete toolbox of combat capabilities: the proverbial Swiss Army Knife!
Solve the problem?
So now we have a LITTORAL Combat Force-24 (LCF-24) based on an LPD. The word “LITTORAL” is not going to solve the US Navy’s short term amphibious ship building and maintenance problem. What is wrong with using the ESB and EPF idea that CP proposes?
The LPD is a great and capable Amphibious Ship but it is three amphibious ships short of a full ARG. The LPD can billet about 600 Marines, with two helo/V-22 spots, and a well deck for three LCACs. I imagine the Marine F-35s will be stationed in Porta Rico along with the heavy and medium lifters. The LPD will have room for a Marine Command Group and probably a reinforced rifle company. There is not going to be a lot of room left for the usual MAGTF task organization.
The USMC use to be very good at merging ARGs at sea after using their strategic mobility to respond to a crisis hot spot. The Marine Corps needs to be careful of these ”modified” MAGTF ideas. I also remember the post Viet Nam war operation to free and siege the Mayaguez (1975).
A Marine rifle company seized the Mayaguez by “going over the side” of a US Navy destroyer. In addition to a Marine Battalion (forming in Okinawa) conducting a helo-assault in US Air Force rescue helicopter’s that went very badly. When a full operational and trained ARG sat in Subic Bay MAU camp.
The US Navy has been looking for an EPF mission since its initial concept. Starting with theater support for special operations support, humanitarian assistance and disasters relief, counter-drug operations, counter piracy patrols, limited amphibious logistic support, and (the latest) expeditionary medical support. Here an EPF would be turned into a floating medical emergency room with forward surgical and resuscitation capability. Please understand I hate saying this because I am not a fan of the MLR, but the MLR needs small amphibious ships that are currently years out in the US Navy’s ship building plan. I would think a couple of EPF’s stationed in the Philippines might help with the current MLR mobility and support problem.
Has the US Navy forgotten that Amphibious Warfare is their mission? During WW2 Admirals were responsible for amphibious operations in the Pacific, the Atlantic, and the Mediterranean Sea. Admirals became experts at not only amphibious operations but also transferring command and control to the Landing Force Commander.
The US Navy Leadership is missing the point that ARG’s (USMC MAGTFs) are the basic building blocks for responding to global crises because of their strategic mobility.
CNO’s are usually carrier guys when was the last time the CNO or his Deputy was an Amphibious Warfare guy? S/F