Our Second Land Army
In Part 1 of this series, I demonstrated that Chinese Anti-Access/Area Denial (A2/AD) systems currently outfox our naval carrier groups. Readers of last week’s article can now understand the importance of the Economist graphic below.
To counter China we need a force that can upend the current naval chessboard. For nearly two decades the US Marine Corp focused time, energy, and resources into the land-locked countries of Iraq and Afghanistan. This transformed the US Marine Corp into the second land army of the United States. The US Marine Corp can upend the current chessboard, but it needs to rediscover its marine roots. This process began on July 11, 2019 when General David Berger became the 38th Commandant of the Marine Corp.
Defining EABO
In February 2021, the US Marine Corp released a document called the Tentative Manual for Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations. This document revolves around a concept called Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO).
Definition: EABO are a form of expeditionary warfare that involves the employment of mobile, low signature, persistent, and relatively easy to maintain and sustain naval expeditionary forces from a series of austere, temporary locations ashore or inshore within a contested or potentially contested maritime area in order to conduct sea denial, support sea control, or enable fleet sustainment.
General Berger understands that Chinese A2/AD systems threaten his troops in an unprecedented manner. To respond to this new environment, Berger’s marines will employ smaller, more mobile equipment. With this lighter load they can move quickly from base to base, many of which will be located in austere locations like remote islands.
Last week I stated that China may attempt to control the South China Sea and invade Taiwan. EABO tasks the US Marine Corp with ensuring that China cannot achieve these maritime goals. In order to complete this mission, the US Marine Corp must retool for the fight.
Retooling for EABO
On March 23, 2020 WSJ reported on Berger’s plans to revolutionize the US Marine Corp’s arsenal. The Marines plan on tripling the amount of missile batteries used by the corp while eliminating tanks and decreasing canon batteries (artillery) from 21 to 5.
Why does the Marine Corp want to divest its tanks and artillery? As General Berger stated
It is very difficult for them [China] to counter a distributed naval expeditionary force that is small, that is mobile, but has the capability to reach out and touch you
Tanks and artillery lack mobility, but they can “reach out and touch you“ very effectively. If we won’t touch the enemy with our tanks and artillery, what will the Marine Corp use? They will use the previously mentioned missile batteries.
China’s NMESIS
The Chinese Navy currently operates more ships than the US Navy, although the median US ship displaces twice as much tonnage compared to the median Chinese ship. Despite the smaller size of Chinese ships, US forces still need missiles, preferably anti-ship cruise missiles, to sink them. Unfortunately for China, they may have found their nemesis.
The Navy Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS) contains two parts, an unmanned land vehicle and the missiles it fires. The unmanned vehicle called the Remotely Operated Ground Unit Expeditionary-Fires (ROGUE-Fires) will fire anti-ship cruise missiles called Naval Strike Missile (NSM). On January 3, 2022 the 1st Battalion, 12th Marine Regiment of the US Marine Corp began its two years of testing of the NMESIS.
Pouring HIRAIN
What types of tactics will the 1st Battalion, 12th Marine Regiment test? I assume they will steal a page from the US Army which developed HIMARS Rapid Infiltration (HIRAIN). This tactic involves loading a High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) onto a transport plane like the C-130, unloading the HIMARS to strike a target, then loading the HIMARS back onto the transport plane to leave the area. The video below shows this tactic, adorably named Shoot-and-Scoot, in action.
In this video we see a Russian Slava-class cruiser and Russian S-400 anti-air systems preventing the entry of US fighter aircraft into a contested area. We then see two C-130s fly to an austere, remote base. Two vehicles exit the C-130, the manned HIMARS and the unmanned Autonomous Multi-Domain Launcher (AML). The vehicles travel to their destination and fire their missiles (Shoot) then travel back to the C-130 to leave (Scoot) as their missiles hit the targets. The demonstration portion of the video ends by stating that US fighter jets, 4th generation F-16s, can now engage the enemy because the US Army defeated the adversary’s A2/AD strategy.
Rediscovering Roots
In Part 1 of this series I showed how China’s various A2/AD systems can preclude the US from intervening against a Chinese takeover of the South China Sea and Taiwan. The video you just watched shows how the US Marine Corp can hamper China’s strategy. By immobilizing China’s A2/AD systems American aircraft can freely engage Chinese forces and turn the tide of the battle. In an article describing further changes put in place by General Berger, The Warzone states
What General Berger is proposing is that the Marine Corps return to a more maritime-centric focus
This is why I fully support the General. One can quibble with his plan, but the strategy remains sound. America’s continued dominance in the 21st century depends on the US Marine Corp rediscovering their marine roots.