“Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations EABO Concept Envisions Marine Corps Seizing/Establishing Persistent Presence on Islands/Chokepoints Terrain“

Commadant has unveiled a bold new plan for the Marine Corps that could put an end to swirling debate that the service is trying to be everything to everyone. Instead the guidance states "We will build one force -- optimized for naval expeditionary warfare in contested spaces, purpose-built to facilitate sea denial and assured access in support of the fleets.

"That single purpose-built future force will be applied against other challenges across the globe; however, we will not seek to hedge or balance our investments to account for those contingencies."

The coming decade, the guidance provides that the force, is going to be characterized by conflict, crisis and rapid change. The future operating environment will put "heavy demands" on the nation's sea services, and Marines need to be prepared for what's to come.

"Marines cannot be passive passengers en route to the amphibious objective area. As long-range precision stand-off weapons improve and diffuse along the world's littorals, Marines must contribute to the fight alongside our Navy shipmates from the moment we embark."

The fight alongside the Navy fleet will continue when Marines are ashore. And Marines are going to need to train up on how they can best support that kind of fight.

In new strategic guidance, the Commadant states “Together, the Navy-Marine Corps Team must enable the joint force to partner, persist, and operate forward wherever and whenever we are called to do so. To meet these requirements, we must redesign our force.

The new Marine Corps Commandant has issued a startlingly blunt new set of orders to his commanders in a new guidance document, calling for a complete overhaul of the core amphibious mission of the Marines and how they operate once they hit shore, setting a new course for the Corps, scrapping old capabilities.

The sweeping critique of the Marine amphibious strategy called the current approach of moving Marines ashore aboard slow, small amphibious vehicles and helicopters an “impractical and unreasonable” plan that has been wedged within a force that “is not organized, trained, or equipped to support the naval force” in high-end combat.

“The ability to project and maneuver from strategic distances will likely be detected and contested from the point of embarkation during a major contingency,” the new document states, while declaring the Corps must be able to quickly move and scatter forces ashore to avoid the proliferation of precision strike capabilities.

The document states“It would be illogical to continue to concentrate our forces on a few large ships. The adversary will quickly recognize that striking while concentrated aboard shis is the preferred option. We need to change this calculus with a new fleet design of smaller, more lethal, and more risk-worthy platforms.” 

The decades-old idea that Marines could punch their way ashore from amphibious ships parked dozens of miles offshore has been hijacked by reality. “We must change,” “we must divest of legacy capabilities that do not meet our future requirements, regardless of their past operational efficacy.”

The guidance states there is “no piece of equipment program that defines us. … Likewise, we are not defined by any particular organizing construct — the Marine Air-Ground Task Force cannot be our only solution for all crises.” 

In other words, it’s time to train and change.

The Marine Corps wants to completely rewrite the playbook when it comes to amphibious warfare. It seeks to counter the growing A2/AD threat by proliferating platforms and increasing reliance on long-range fires and unmanned systems to penetrate enemy defenses.

 Marine landing forces will employ a combination of extremely sophisticated air capabilities, centered on the F-35B and MV-22 and fast-moving ground units equipped with new platforms, like the Amphibious Combat Vehicle, to conduct long-range, mobile operations. 

 “We need a force capable of denying freedom of naval maneuver to deter our adversaries; or, as necessary, a Corps capable of exploiting, penetrating, and degrading advanced adversary defenses in all domains in support of Naval and Joint Force operations.

In what could follow from the Commadants, new guidance, a promising strategy is the concept of placing long range weapons systems within Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations EABO, Marines would create an anti-access envelope, within which enemy ships and aircraft would find it difficult and hopefully impossible to operate.  Many critics said “EABO,” was another of those ideas that “briefed well” but whose limitations would only be exposed in war.

For decades the Marine Corps has rightfully espoused maneuver warfare as the core of all of its warfighting concepts. Well, scattering battalions across thousands of miles of ocean appeared, on its face, to be the opposite of maneuver. 

Once placed, it would take a huge effort to reconsolidate all the separated pieces of a Marine expeditionary force into a formation with sufficient fire and maneuver capacity to win a stand-up fight with a peer-state military. Critics maintained EABO seemed to make a hash of Marine Corps claims to be a maneuver-based force. 
In short, by adopting EABO as its foundational warfighting, the Marine Corps was apparently turning its units into sitting ducks.

While the answer to the question – “What does the Navy provide the Marine Corps?” is readily identifiable – operational and strategic mobility, and assured access; the same cannot be said for the follow-on question, “What does the Marine Corps provide the Navy and the Joint Force?” 

Traditionally, the answer has been power projection forces from the sea, and/or forces for sustained operations ashore in support of a traditional naval campaign. We should ask ourselves – what do the Fleet Commanders want from the Marine Corps, and what does the Navy need from the Marine Corps?

.It seemed obvious to many that operational and strategic mobility throughout this vast expanses like the Pacific can only be accomplished by naval forces. Land mobility is of little value in a theater where all maneuver is held hostage to the Navy’s ability to control the sea lanes, and where land maneuver space is always at a premium. To grasp the vital core of EABO concept of maneuver must be expanded to encompass the entire joint force over the enormous expanses of the Pacific theater.

Navy’s sea-control task is hugely eased if Marine Corps is able to establish and defend key maritime terrain on which are emplaced fires-complexes capable of engaging ships and aircraft 500 or more miles away. Just one such location relieves the Navy of the responsibility of controlling a circle of the ocean with a diameter of 1,000 miles. Even as few as a half-dozen such locations could make large swathes of the Pacific Ocean off limits to adversaries serving as a huge deterrent effect on  strategic calculations.of adversaries. 

It is time for the United States to stop worrying about how to penetrate anti-access/area-denial systems, and force them to worry about how they will get past American systems. By adopting EABO as its foundational strategic concept in the Pacific, the U.S. Marine Corps could ensure that time would be on its side in any future conflict. 

Other strategists claim that we could forgo the uncertainties of an EABO concept, which would have to be implemented in the adversaries backyard, by implementing a strategy of horizontal escalation, which aims to geographically expand a conflict by attacking valuable targets that lie outside of the central theater. While such a strategic concept might have some deterrence value, it betrays a huge strategic naiveté if one supposes it will work once a conflict erupts. 

Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations EABO is not a stand-alone concept that would leave Marine units stranded and fighting for their lives on isolated islands. Rather, the Marine Corps and Navy are working to integrate their various weapons systems – existing and projected – into a  mutually supporting fires complex, employing missiles and long-range artillery fires to dominate the maritime domain. 

Under such a construct, a naval force would be able to conduct operations while sheltering under a land-based anti-access umbrella. That same naval force would also be able to add its defensive weaponry to help protect the Marine fires-complexes. This mutually supporting firepower would hugely increase the survivability of both land and naval forces.  

To accomplish all of this, the Marine Corps is resetting its mindset to better integrate itself with naval forces with the aim of truly becoming an extension of the Fleet. In doing so, the Marines will help ensure that the Navy retains its freedom of maneuver throughout the Pacific.

EABO is still only a concept, and much work needs to be done. For one, the Marine Corps still needs to develop and acquire the long-range missiles and other fire systems required to implement the concept. Also, as with any emerging operational concept, extensive experimentation is still required to refine the organizational structures, weapons systems, and logistics that will make EABO execution possible in contested spaces. 

As the Marine Corps continues to examine this concept, it should not ignore the fact that for EABO to be effective, most of the Corps forward fires-complexes will have to be established within or adjacent to regions in an enemy’s own backyard. As such, Marines will have to endure a vicious military reaction that could last days, weeks, or months. Surviving and operating in such an environment will challenge the Corps in ways it has not experienced in at least two generations.

Still, this not an insurmountable problem, and the Marine Corps is looking to accelerate EABO solutions for fighting on the doorstep of a peer competitor. No one expects any of this to be easy, and the commandant’s guidance recognizes that there are many challenges to overcome before this concept become doctrine.
​

​“Marines Leveraging Major Experiments to More Quickly Generate Capability Requirements”

Marine Corps leaders are directing commands to go faster and equip warfighters with the tools they require to fight and win in a more timely manner.

The Marines largely did away with large service-level experiments that focus on new ideas or concepts, but recently brought them back as a means of out innovating adversaries.

The acquisition community is now leveraging experiments such as Sea Dragon and the recent generate requirements and feed mature systems into programs of record.

Following the S2ME2 ANTX, Marines were able to put some contracts in place after identifying some systems worth pursuing. 

For other technologies and experiments, the service might be able to buy some systems that are ready for fielding or use what was learned through that experimentation to feed into requirements generation.

Marines are working to generate rapid requirements, then buy a few capabilities, put them in the experiment and then use that to take a concept of operations and inform requirements fed back into the process and eventually into a program of record.

Marines have opportunity for engineers to take technologies from mature experiments and put them in the hands of Marines.

“When we put it in their hands, they figure out how to use it and they come back and tell us this is how we need to use this thing, this is how we to develop the concepts of operations and the concepts of employment and the tactics, techniques and procedures to put it out there and field it.”

“It’s up to us as the headquarters to say OK, got it. We’re going to figure out how field it to you and get it to you.”


The Marine Corps is looking at ways to insert new technology into its forces earlier in order to prepare for future battles. Key to this effort is experimentation.

Last year, the service introduced a new operating concept called, “How an Expeditionary Force Operates in the 21st Century.” The document — which focused on how Marines will fight in 2025 — put an emphasis on the need for the service to return to its seafaring roots, conduct maneuver warfare and fight as a combined arms force.

“We have a campaign of Marine Corps Force 2025 and within that campaign we have a Sea Dragon 2025 experimental process.  The goal is “to get our force postured for 2025, to be agile, lethal, naval and expeditionary, and we found that as we go through the experiment process, we’re building closer and closer relationships with the research-and-development enterprises.”

Testing new technologies with Marines in live experiments allows the service to realistically see if a particular system is fit for the battlefield.

“We understand that warfare is inherently, despite all of the technologies, … a human endeavor.  “We want to recreate the uncertainty and fear and the danger associated with that so that we can get the best picture.”

The first phase of the experiment concluded in the fall of 2017 when the service took an infantry battalion and established it as an experimental force.

“We put them in the construct of a sea-based Marine Air Ground Task Force and we reorganised them, changed some of their training, their equipment, and over 18 months we conducted a series of operations and experiments before operationally deploying them in this configuration.

Much thought went into creating an adaptive enemy red team that reflected not what today’s threats look like, but what tomorrow’s would resemble based on how fast U.S. adversaries are adopting new technologies.

“Our experiment force could lose and could lose repeatedly during our experiments and we could learn from those losses.

The service looked at the size of squads, contemplated how to incorporate manned-unmanned teaming and examined mobility issues.

History shows that mobility often is key to determining whether a unit will accomplish their mission or not, he said. Forces with the greater tactical and operational capability have an advantage.

One of the biggest takeaways from the experiment was that the individual Marine is a “tremendous innovation engine.

“The creativity of our Marines and small teams gives us a significant advantage. 
“The Marine that grows up withaccess to the education we have, when compared to the rest of the world … is a factory for good ideas.”

When exposed to new tools developed by industry and other research-and-development partners, Marines often find unique ways to employ the technology in a way that has a strategic effect. 

Other efforts the service embarked on recently include its first advanced naval technical exercise experiment, where it asked industry to develop new ways to move Marines from the ship to the shore in contested environments.

How these innovations would be implemented was open for debate, he said. “We won’t necessarily do it the way we did it in the past. We’ll take your ideas and try them out.”

The service built a “playground,” where industry had access to sailors and Marines from the amphibious force.

“What we ended up having was a playground with young Marines, young officers and a lot of industry engineers and scientists … solving the problem.

The Marine Corps benefits from bringing warfighters and industry together.
“There’s something special when the engineer and the young Marine put their resouces together and come out with a better product right on the spot.

Defense Innovation Unit-Experimental, better known as DIUx, is pushing forward new technology that will give the service added capability by focusing on several technology areas including autonomy, artificial intelligence and machine learning, information technology and human systems. 

The unit is meant to cut through the Pentagon’s red tape and make it easier for firms in tech hubs to do business with the Mairnes. Officials hope the outfit will speed the acquisition of cutting-edge warfighting tools.

DIUx has been working on a number of technologies that can be used by the service, Swor said. 

“We’re really quite satisfied with what’s going on there for the Marine Corps. The service pushes for “projects that tend to be more practical, more physical. One promising program is known as the electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft, or EVOTL platform.

The platform will be able to travel 200 nautical miles at 200 knots and carry four passengers or 800 pounds of payload.  The system uses six rotors to fly. It takes off vertically and is able to immediately transition to forward flight and take a Marine company landing team and break them into smaller, four-man teams and put them ashore in separate aircraft.

“That enhances your mobility, it lets you surprise the enemy … and it really de-risks the force because instead of six aircraft you can now have 35 aircraft,” which makes the invading troops harder to target.

The organisation is also working on giving the system autonomous capabilities. “Initially it will be piloted, but we’re paying to get the autonomy developed.

For now, the company is “living on the DIUx dime” because it doesn’t have commercial customers. They will eventually, but this is a great example of someone who is reliant on us.”

The Marine Corps turns to its Warfighting Laboratory to help counter threats. The lab’s divisions—Futures Assessment, Concepts and Plans, Wargaming, S&T, and Experiment—all play a role in shaping future needs, trends and technologies as well as the operating environment the Marines will face. “We are the headlights of the Marine Corps modernisation effort. We are looking out a little further than other Marine Corps offices.”

The warfighting lab is currently looking into autonomous systems and robotics; artificial intelligence; counter-unmanned aerial system capabilities; lasers; electronic warfare; and systems coordination, among other technologies. The lab considers size, weight and power issues “in everything they do to support a mobile, agile Marine Corps.

The warfighting lab has been looking at autonomous systems and robotics for quite some time now. “We’ve always recognized that autonomous systems, whether they are in the air, on the ground or at the surface, are going to play a role in the future landscape and future warfighting environment.

The big question is how best to incorporate the technology so that it becomes a force multiplier rather than a burden. Naturally, the service wants to avoid robotic technologies without the capabilities it needs to perform specific missions.

Unlike robotics and autonomous systems, AI is an area the lab is just starting to explore. We don’t fully understand yet what AI could mean or what it will mean in the future. We do have smart people looking into it, and we do recognize it as an emerging capability that we need to take advantage of it.”

Technologies are especially needed to counter the proliferation of what the Marines are calling “U-Excess,” unmanned aerial, ground, surface and subsurface systems. “We now are living every day with the fact that unmanned aerial systems are flying pretty much everywhere. 

We are predicting a quick migration to enemy use of unmanned ground systems, surface systems and subsurface systems.

“Envision a future where you have a patrol that is looking for an aerial system, and instead a ground system comes up or is sitting along a trail. It could be in a sleep mode and camouflaged and then activates based on vibration or voices. Then it does what it is designed to do, which could be a collector to listen to discussions and stay quiet, or it could become basically an improvised weapon.
To combat this risk, the warfighting lab is broadening its work in unmanned systems. “Based on our experience from the counter-IED fight, we recognise that as we start to develop capabilities to counter air systems, it is only logical that the enemy will start to look at other capabilities. Our goal is to stay one step ahead and anticipate what is coming.”

New tech will allow the Marines, for example, to walk into a operational theatre and already know where the hot spots are, potentially shuting down these connections in advance and turn them back on when they leave. “It is important for that tactical unit to be able to have immediate effects as they are experiencing them. 

The warfighting lab will take fast growing technologies and put them to the test in several experiments throughout the fiscal year, including smaller events called “limited object assessments as well as larger events, giving Marines opportunities to put technologies into the hands of operators in the field, along with other lab partners, to gain a common understanding of potential capabilities and technologies.

“These experiments are crucial in sorting out useful technologies and capabilities.”

The technological renaissance is providing a lot of options, and with all the technologies you could make a case for each one. But they cannot all be pursued. “The problem is that we can’t afford to buy everything so we have to make an assessment of capabilities and to make recommendations on capabilities that will have the greatest return on our investments.”

The lab has developed processes that allow senior leaders to make smart decisions about the technologies they need for programs of record, the technologies they do not need and the technologies that may be obsolete in three to five years. But making choices can be challenging, he says, because people are swayed by technology and the “bright, shiny new object.

“The hardest part is trying to make sure that the people who are in love with their technologies understand what it is that they are in love with. It is difficult to convince people that, ‘Yes, it is a great capability, but is it greater than this other capability over here?’

“Everything we consider has to get a fair shake. There have been technologies that nobody liked that turned out to be pretty effective.” And at the end of the day, when the Marines are kicking in the door, those technologies could make all the difference.

​"Marine Air Ground Task Force Training Command Battle Simulation Center Providing Virtual Training Tools Prepare for Combat "
 
Marine Corps uses parts of kinetic and virtual training to enhance their readiness, the Battle Simulation Center is one of several virtual training facilities aboard the Combat Center.
 
The Battle Simulation Center supports the Corps by providing units with various training simulations that assist in individual, small unit and staff level operations. The technology available helps the Marines feel a sense of realism of their environment as well as provide communication with artillery units, aircrafts and other Marines.
 
The Battle Simulation Center trains approximately 15,000 Marines annually from units throughout the Marine Corps. They will continue to provide Marines the training they need in preparation for their field exercises and ultimately their deployments.
 
In constructive training the Marines can see what is supposed to be done in certain situations. Once the Marines understand what to do they move onto virtual training, where they can put their knowledge into action. The simulations allow the Marines to receive live feedback from their instructors, this allows the Marines to make mistakes and be corrected without risk of injury or loss of resources. After the Marines have had a chance to practice and be coached in a safe environment they can move on to live training.
 
“When we have to conduct certain exercises in which we believe the risk of injury is too high, so we practice in the simulations first. When the Marines go to do the live exercise then the risk is much lower since the Marines know how to react to each situation.”
 
The BSC provides training for any size unit from individual to regiment, for any warfighting discipline from infantry to logistics, and from all parts of the combat spectrum from full scale war to establishing local governance.
 
“We break up our training into live, virtual, and constructive training,” Live training consists of real people using real systems, virtual training is live people using virtual systems and constructive training is virtual people using virtual systems.”
 
“The different weapons the Marines train with in the simulation can range from the M9 service pistol to mortars, shot guns, and heavy machine guns,” The center also has different vehicle simulations where Marines can practice movement of troops dealing with enemy resistance, and many other situations where Marines would have to think on their feet.”
 
A simulation complex includes the large task trainers as well as a small simulation center. All of the vehicle and convoy simulators are housed at Camp Wilson. Camp Wilson offers a wide array of simulation opportunities for visiting units.
 
The BSC was stood up at the Combat Center in 1996 and originally offered only a couple of training simulations, the MAGTF Tactical Warfare Simulation and the Joint Conflict and Tactical Simulation.
 
MTWS focused primarily on larger-scale training, meaning the company, battalion and regimental levels, while JCATS was designed to train Marines at the fire team through platoon levels.
 
The Battle Simulation Center works closely with the MAGTF Integrated Systems Training Center, which focuses of command and control systems training. To date, the BSC offers 10 different training simulators and the MISTC hosts seven training programs.
 
In addition to the numerous simulators the BSC has to offer, it is also working on integrating simulations with live training exercises.“One of the things we’re looking at is the integration of live forces in the field with virtual and constructive simulation.
 
If a company is training in the field alone, we can simulate other units on the battlefield that don’t really exist, but are needed for staff planning purposes.”Constructive simulation is currently being used by the BSC and is fully operational.
 
CPX-2 is a two-part training event that focuses on training battalion staff and is a part of TALONEX 2-18, a pre-deployment training event that coincides with Weapons and Tactics Instructors Course.
 
Throughout CPX-2, Marines at the Battle Simulation Center utilized multiple simulations in conjunction with other units at Camp Wilson aboard the Combat Center, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Calif., and Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, Ariz. This is all part of an effort called Marine Air Ground Task Force Tactical Integrated Training Environment.
 
"The idea behind the MAGTF TITE effort is to create a persistent capability which permits collective training in a distributed and constructive environment in order to enhance integrated training," "During TALONEX 2-18, Marine pilots, Joint Terminal Attack Controllers, the Direct Air Support Center and Fire Support Coordination Center/Fire Direction Center will train in conjunction with battalion staff using distributed simulation."
 
CPX-2 utilized a constructive simulation called MAGTF Tactical Warfare Simulation, which served as the hub for the training. To run their high-fidelity cockpit trainers and to fly a virtual unmanned aircraft system, the Battle Simulation Center used a virtual simulation called Virtual Battle Space 3.
 
"Using multiple simulations together does create a lot of challenges and issues, such as making sure that one model that comes up in one simulation will appear the same way in another and making sure that the terrain is the same across all platforms,""We continue to work through these issues to try to refine the simulations and make them more realistic."
 
Another goal of the MAGTF TITE initiative is to provide more realistic training for Marines. According to the Ground Training Simulation Implementation Plan of June 2017, using simulations allows Marines and units to replicate situations and conditions that are more difficult to enact in certain on-the-ground training environments.
 
"This training helps to emphasise operational cohesion by providing more realism in an exercise where you're relying on the proficiency of other Marines, as well as the realistic nature of the uncertainty and miscommunication that can occur when it's real individuals participating instead of a role player," "It allows for more development on critical thinking and exposure to non-standard events and increased integration with external factors."
 
We are getting the support and flexibility from the Marines who are participating because they understand that there are challenges associated with experimental training exercises," "The feedback we get from them helps to shape the way we move forward with setting up future simulation-based exercises. This wouldn't be possible without the support of the Marines and agencies participating."
 
Virtual Battle Space 1 and 2:
 
VBS 1/2 are PC-based first-person viewpoints of a fully functional battlefield that focus on smaller-unit operations. VBS2 is currently more advanced and more prevalent than its older counterpart. Depending on the demands of the individual units, VBS can take the form of many different combat scenarios and environments, which can immerse between one and 100 Marines into a virtual world where small-unit leaders can test their standard operating procedures, as well as conduct rehearsals on the same terrain they will be likely walking to in the near future.
 
MAGTF Tactical Warfare Simulation:
 
MTWS is a “birds-eye-view” of a battlefield that allows unit commanders to practice command and control functions, and standard operating procedures. The simulation offers real-time engagement and movement, and mission recording for after-action review.
 
Commanders using MTWS can receive orders from their combat operations center for their units and carry out those orders through the simulation.
 
Forward Observer PC Simulation:
 
FOPCSim is another PC-based first-person viewpoint, similar to VBS, only focusing on a forward observer calling for artillery fire support. The purpose of the simulator is to hone the individual Marines’ call-for-fire skills on stationary and mobile targets. The program can be used by itself as well as integrated with other simulators, which make up the Combined Arms Network.
 
Combined Arms Planning Tool:
 
The CAPT program is designed to test the elements of a commander’s fire support plan. It is able to test a fire support plan and identify potential problems based on war fighting doctrine, which is incorporated into the program.
 
Virtual Combat Convoy Trainer:
 
This training simulator consists of four mock High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles with a 360-degree view. VCCT is designed to simulate convoy operations in a combat environment. It can be used alongside other simulations to familiarise Marines with how to use convoys in conjunction with other operations.
 
Operator Driver Simulator:
 
ODS is a training program used to teach Marines how to operate HMMWVs, Medium Tactical Vehicle Replacements, known as seven-ton trucks, and, coming soon, Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles. The system can simulate a number of driving conditions in most foreign areas of operation.
 
HMMWV Egress Assistance Trainer:
 
The purpose of HEAT is to simulate HMMWVs in rollover conditions. It teaches Marines the proper ways to exit a vehicle that is upside down and assist fellow Marines who were injured in the rollover. Marines are also required to transport injured Marines to safety and secure the simulated rollover site.
 
MISTC:
 
MISTC is designed to train MAGTF commanders and battle staffs in the art and science of command and control so they can better organise, deploy, fight and defeat the enemy.
 
 

Changes in Design of Marines Force Organisation for Combat, Equipment and Warfighting Capabilities
​
Based on a threat-informed, ten-year time horizon, we are designing a force for naval expeditionary warfare in actively contested spaces. It will be purpose-built to facilitate sea denial and assured access in support of fleet and joint operations.
As we continue to explore design options through wargames supported by independently verifiable analysis, now is a good time to share some of the initial observations and assumptions behind our efforts, the hypotheses we seek to validate, and the preliminary conclusions we have reached on investments and divestments.
Joint force must bend the character of future war such that we regain the competitive advantage. In order to do this, the naval services must innovate to generate favorable asymmetries which present adversaries with critical dilemmas.
This means new concepts and approaches to require the naval services to operate outside our traditional comfort zone and embrace a new cooperative mindset to maximize the reach of American seapower.
How can we integrate and leverage the authorities of the Navy and Marine Corps strategy afloat in partnership with our partners? How do we win the information battle?
Conditions have compelled the naval services to reexamine the fundamental assumptions upon which we have built the current force. Within the Marine Corps, existing processes for force development have too often led to unimaginative results, as we tend to become prisoners of platform-based thinking, seeking incremental improvements in current capabilities and methods.
We are under-invested in Expeditionary airfield capabilities and structure to support manned and unmanned aircraft and other systems from austere, minimally developed locations.
To regain the strategic initiative, the Marines needs new capabilities to fight in new ways to generate new strategic options for future decision-makers.
With this in mind, our force design team made the following assumptions:
First, forward bases and legacy infrastructure within the adversary’s weapons engagement zone are now extremely vulnerable.
Second, large ships and those with large electronic, acoustic, or optical signatures are highly vulnerable within the weapons engagement zone, and to an increasing degree, immediately outside it.
Third, adversary missile and air forces are optimized for the anti-ship fight.
Fourth, while sea control or denial has traditionally been the exclusive domain of afloat naval forces, ground based long-range precision fires and missiles are increasingly capable of affecting maritime operations.
Finally, sub-surface naval capabilities will continue to have a decisive advantage over surface capabilities.
While the Marine Corps must be prepared to operate across the entire spectrum of conflict, its first priority as a naval service ought to be deterrence.
To align the Marine Corps with the National Defense Strategy, we must be trained and equipped as a naval expeditionary force-in-readiness that is prepared to operate inside actively contested maritime spaces in support of fleet operations.
Both joint and initial service-level wargames support this hypothesis, and reinforce the conclusion that naval expeditionary stand-in forces can generate technically disruptive, tactical stand-in engagements that confront aggressor naval forces with an array of low signature, affordable, and risk-worthy platforms and payloads.
Our concepts of Stand-In Forces and Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations are the Marine Corps’ is primary ways to deliver long-range anti-ship fires, operate sensors to cue naval and joint kill-chains, and control key maritime terrain. In concert with naval and air forces operating outside of the weapons engagement zone, these stand-in forces significantly complicate any adversary’s decision-making calculus.
Building the naval expeditionary force of the future will require an honest assessment about the relevance of both current and planned capabilities, organizations, and equipment.
Undertaking such a bold endeavor will not be straightforward. But, the urgency of the challenge before us compels action. We will not allow a failure of imagination to define this period of our collective naval or Marine Corps history.
We will continue to challenge the status quo and continue to ask all the hard questions — regardless of the discomfort they produce. We will continue to rigorously wargame — and at a much-accelerated pace to facilitate learning. We cannot and will not get this wrong.
Initial findings from our force design-related wargames are sharpening our understanding of the investments and divestments required to align the force with the National Defense Strategy.
Marines over- invested in capabilities and capacities purpose-built for traditional sustained operations ashore, including:
1. Surge-layer capacity of reserve component and the current maritime prepositioning force
2. Manned anti-armor ground and aviation platforms
3. Manned ground transportation and associated movement capabilities
4. Traditional towed-artillery that cannot be modified for potential high-velocity projectile use
5. Manned ground reconnaissance
6. Short-range mortar systems lacking necessary precision, range, and lethality
7. Non-lethal small tactical unmanned aircraft systems
8. Excess equipment maintained in administrative storage
9. Exquisite platforms with unsustainable manpower/personnel requirements
10. Vehicles, aircraft, and systems that the service can neither afford to procure or afford to sustain over their anticipated lifespans
 
Marines Under-invested in naval expeditionary capabilities and capacities that support fleet operations, including:
1. Unmanned lethal, low-cost, long-endurance combat aerial vehicles
2. Unmanned lethal and non-lethal ground and amphibious vehicles
3. Unmanned aerial, ground, surface, and underwater logistics vehicles/vessels
4. Mobile and rapidly deployable rocket artillery and long-range precision-fires to include anti-ship missiles
5. Mobile air defense and counter-precision guided missile systems, to include directed energy systems
6. Loitering munitions
7. Signature management
8. Electronic warfare
9. Offensive mining capabilities
10. Lethal and risk-worthy surface vessels to include large undersea vessels
 
 

​“Marine Corps Embarking on Effort to Equip Infantrymen with Gear Based on New Tech”

As the military is undergoing probably the largest modernization in the infantry squad in the last 25 years, verything from optics to the weapons themselves are getting revamped.

The overhaul will significantly change how the Marine Corps fights and manoeuvres on the battlefield, as well as increase the lethality of infantrymen.

For example, the service is currently seeking a new rocket motor.. It is decreasing the number of tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided anti-tank missiles in the infantry battalion from eight to four and increasing the number of Javelins from eight to 12.

With that increase in the number of Javelins we need reliable motors that are low cost.”

Another area of interest is a new suppressor for rifles. “The intent is to suppress every M4, M4A1 and M27 in the infantry community. Our intent there is to move quickly and find the best possible suppressor we can that is good enough in order to move out in a quick enough fashion.”

Another top priority for the infantry weapon program office is the dual-tube, white phosphorus squad binocular night-vision goggle.

The service is also working on a new squad common optic that will be outfitted on the M27 to give Marines greater fidelity. The Marine Corps plans to field the optic to every infantry rifle platoon in order to give them an automatic capability.

The Service is also looking for a slew of new gear that Marines can wear.

“Part of our business in infantry combat equipment is outfitting Marines for battle with everything from uniforms to body armor to load-bearing equipment. making them look good, but also allowing them to operate safely and effectively” in any environment.

“Like everyone, we want it cheaper, better, faster. We also want something that’s scalable.” The service doesn’t want to have different sets of gear or armor for different missions, but rather modular pieces.

The current uniform is performing well, but the service wants to combine some capabilities. For example, the Marine Corps’ fire-resistant organizational gear, or FROG suits, work well in vehicles but are not well suited for walking through woods because they can give off short-wave infrared signatures that the enemy can spot.

“We stand out a lot and that’s kind of bad when you’re trying to camouflage someone. “We’re looking at bringing all of those things together — a lightweight, durable uniform that has FR and SWIR” concealment,

The service is also looking for a new lightweight tropical uniform that can be worn in hot and humid conditions. On the other side of the coin, the program office also wants new cold weather gear.

“If you look at where we’ve been for, say, the last 20 years, it’s kind of been hot and dry, but the service is now preparing for potential operations in environments that will have a very different climate.

A new intense cold weather boot is required.
“The seabag-issue boot works well down to 20 degrees” Fahrenheit. “The ‘Mickey Mouse’ boot — the big, rubber black one — works well, minus 20 or below. But it makes your foot really hot and sweaty in between so that’s not so good.”

To fill that gap, the service is looking for a boot that can be worn in temperatures between minus 20 to 20 degrees Fahrenheit. The Marine Corps recently conducted testing with new boots and found some that worked well. However, challenges still remain.

Because of suede material on the footwear, “once they get wet on the outside they stay wet, and that just transmits the cold to the Marine’s feet, so they don’t like it so much. “In the dry cold it works great, stays well insulated — so we’re looking for something that works a little bit better in those wet, slushy conditions.”

The service is also mulling over new general purpose boots. “We have some good boots, … but we’re always looking for better.”

Additionally, the Corps is considering a “grunt boot” that would be specifically crafted for Marines working in infantry operations.

“What we keep running into is, we’ll find a boot that works well in one circumstance, but maybe not so in another or the durability sufferers.”

Many of the Marine Corps requirements are still undefined.