Gary Anderson, Author at The Defense Post https://thedefensepost.com/author/gary-anderson/ Your Gateway to Defense News Fri, 26 Jul 2024 10:07:09 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.6.1 https://thedefensepost.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/cropped-defense-post-roundel-temp-32x32.png Gary Anderson, Author at The Defense Post https://thedefensepost.com/author/gary-anderson/ 32 32 Non-Lethal Weapons Could Help Israel and the US in Future Urban Combat https://thedefensepost.com/2024/07/26/non-lethal-weapons-urban-combat/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=non-lethal-weapons-urban-combat Fri, 26 Jul 2024 10:05:33 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=81746 Hamas’ practice of holding hostages in hospitals and schools has highlighted the need for Israel and other Western militaries to develop advanced non-lethal weapons.

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Israel is in a pickle. Hamas’ October 7 attacks left over 1,000 dead and hundreds were subsequently held hostage in Gaza Strip buildings. The barbarous practice of holding the hostages in hospitals and schools has apparently worked.

Deliberately using civilians as shields for fighters has been a tactic that has worked since the 1990s, and Western militaries have not come up with an effective counter.

In the future, the Israelis should consider the development of advanced non-lethal weapons — and so should we.

X Unit

Those of us who fought in Somalia in 1993 saw the first deliberate use of civilians to mask and protect armed gunmen. The movie Black Hawk Down effectively shows this tactic.

As the Marine Corps studied the lessons learned from the conflict, we determined that non-lethal weapons should be part of our tool kit. As the director of our newly-formed Experimental Unit (X Unit), one of my jobs was to explore the possibility of using such arms.

The task became more immediate when the UN asked for help in evacuating the remaining UN forces from the failed mission in Somalia. General Tony Zinni (then a Lieutenant General) was tasked with using his First Marine Expeditionary Force staff as the nucleus of the Joint Task Force designated to accomplish the evacuation.

As a veteran of the first Somali incursion, Zinni asked the X-Unit to look into using some developmental experimental systems. This led me on a coast-to-coast search of government labs to see what was available.

If I found something the general deemed interesting, he would send a Marine Corps transport aircraft to the lab to pick it up, to include whatever scientist who knew how it worked.

If the system seemed potentially useful, we did cultural war games to determine how the Somalis might react. Zinni picked a few of the systems and trained his troops on them.

None of the selected systems were particularly decisive, but he made excellent use of psychological warfare in BBC radio interviews, which the Somalis avidly followed, portraying them as exotic and potentially very dangerous.

The ploy worked and Somali crowds and gunmen were much more reluctant to interfere with the subsequent evacuation. This contributed to the relatively bloodless success of what came to be known as Operation United Shield.

Hamas militants
(Representative image only.) Members of the Ezzedine Al Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the Hamas movement. Photo: AFP

Non-Lethal Weapon Development

After Somalia, the Marine Corps lobbied for more effective non-lethal weapons. Congress eventually funded a Joint Non-Lethal Weapons Directorate (JNLWD) at Quantico, Virginia.

The JLNWD developed a directed energy weapon, the Active Denial System (ADS), which is designed to keep crowds away from US troops by making them feel searing heat without actually harming them.

If you stay behind a clearly designated line, the system will not be used. Those who cross the line will suffer the consequences. The rest should get the picture. ADS has never been used militarily because the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq did not require its use.

However, those of us in the X-Unit continued to work on using non-lethal weapons to clear buildings in urban combat where fighters and civilians were intermixed. We thought we found a technology in ultrasound, but it was omni directional; this would require us to deliver it to the target location by a robot.

The project was given impetus when UN peacekeepers in former the Yugoslavia were taken hostage by insurgents in a mountain ski chalet in Sarajevo. We tested candidate robots at the ski resort of Whiteface Mountain in the Adirondacks (site of the 1980 Winter Olympics). While we found an acceptable robot, unfortunately the ultrasound non-lethal device proved to be insufficient.

Animal testing showed that it merely irritated rather than incapacitated the monkeys. We deemed it unsatisfactory for military or law enforcement use. This appears to be the technology that the Russians are using to harass US diplomats and intelligence officials.

Future Combat

In actuality, there is a potential technology that can cause fighters and non-combatants to be incapacitated in buildings so that armed fighters can be sorted out.

It is a variation on the ADS system that can cause the immediate incapacitating effect of heat prostration. The technology’s current state requires the power source to be carried on a tractor-trailer sized platform, but reducing it is a mere technical challenge.

There may be an eventual truce in Gaza, but it will not last forever. In addition, we Americans will likely face similar urban warfare problems in the future. We could help the Israelis and ourselves by developing non-lethal weapons.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area. He was the Director of the X Unit, which evolved into the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab. When he retired, he was the Lab’s Chief of Staff.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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A Relatively Inexpensive Way to Help Ukraine https://thedefensepost.com/2024/06/20/help-ukraine-inexpensive/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=help-ukraine-inexpensive Thu, 20 Jun 2024 12:55:54 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=79361 The US should help Ukraine develop asymmetrical approaches to warfare, specifically by leveraging technology such as the Reconnaissance, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition Grid.

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When last year’s vaunted Ukrainian summer counteroffensive bogged down, it allowed Vladimir Putin‘s Russia to switch to a war of attrition, which favors the Russian advantage in men and material.

If the United States wants to assist Ukraine offset this dilemma, we should help them think outside the box by working with Kyiv’s forces to develop asymmetrical approaches that will conserve Ukrainian lives while better targeting Russian forces as they mass.

There is a relatively inexpensive and effective way to do it.

The US has the technology to implement it, but military leaders have not felt the need for it due to our overwhelming superiority in air and fire power. Reformers such as Navy Captain Jerry Hendrix have urged the Pentagon for years to leverage artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies to create cheaper approaches to replace some of the more expensive manned systems.

Although the Pentagon has been slow to grasp this concept, the Ukrainians seem to be adopting it out of necessity by building things like “garage drones.”

Reconnaissance, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition

In the late 1990s, the Marine Corps experimented with a theoretical concept called the Reconnaissance, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition (RSTA) Grid. Although the concept included the potential use of unmanned aircraft, there was a realization that drones can be spoofed by camouflage and other deceptive means.

We realized that we needed eyes on the ground — and lots of them. The theory was to flood the battle space with hundreds if not thousands of autonomous small-micro robotic sensors, which would have the ability to watch an area of interest and send a visual signal to human operators. We also postulated that the robots could laser-designate targets.

However, the system was not designed purely as a target designation system. As the name implies, it was designed to aid maneuver warfare by identifying surfaces and gaps in enemy defenses to expedite the kind of maneuver approach we wanted to wage.

Ukrainian SpyGun drone
Ukrainian SpyGun drone. Image: Defence Intelligence of Ukraine

Technological Advancements

The basic concept was to insert the robots by air into key road intersections, bridges, choke points, and tunnels. The system was designed to be decentralized enough to be accessed by maneuver units down to the company level as well as to the overall commander who would manage fire support and coordination.

We envisioned the robots being mobile enough to move into hiding positions and camouflaged to fit in with their surroundings. We did not have the technology to implement it then, but we believed that we would by 2020.

War games and force-on-force field experiments convinced us the concept was sound. Because of the immature technology, we had to use surrogates to replicate the sensors that we did not yet have.

Those requisite technologies now exist. Today’s smartphones contain the capabilities we were looking for then. The RSTA robot would essentially be a self-mobile smartphone. Once a production line is started, an entire RSTA Grid constellation could be produced for less than the cost of a Patriot missile.

The RSTA Grid concept was designed to facilitate offensive maneuver ashore as part of the Marine Corps’ Operational Maneuver From the Sea (OMFTS) concept, but it would work equally well in facilitating defensive operations in Ukraine.

It could identify Russian build-ups not only to break them up with fire but also to find gaps that could be used to launch counter-offensives.

Russian soldier
A Russian soldier patrolling Mariupol. Photo: Alexander Nemenov/AFP

Experiments

Two of the force-on-force experiments that we conducted in the 1990s were potentially informative to the situation in Ukraine. In the first, the Blue Force, simulating a mobile armored battalion, was tasked with defending a 100-mile (62-kilometer) front along the North and Middle Neck peninsulas in Northern Virginia. We used what would now be called a meshed civil-military sensor net in that we included local civilians in the RSTA Grid.

The Ukrainians today are doing something like it. Wanted posters picturing enemy light armored vehicles were posted in the region with a 911-like number to call. The Red Force was of similar size and composition, but the meshed civilian-surrogate RSTA Grid system picked it up early and gave the Blue Force the ability to maneuver into position and conduct a decisive ambush.

The second experiment with Ukrainian implications involved a simulated Scud hunt in which a mock-up missile launcher attempted to travel from the Harper’s Ferry area to the I-95 line in Virginia.

The surrogate RSTA Grid picked it up fairly early and tracked it to the I-95 corridor. In this experiment, no surrogate overhead drones were used. This was primarily a targeting exercise, but the concept would likely be useful in assisting the Ukrainians in deep battle operations against Russian launchers even if Moscow’s troops can spoof overhead assets.

Operational Environment in Ukraine

The Marines stopped concentrating on OMFTS after 9/11 led us into Iraq and Afghanistan. The Marines are unlikely to pursue the RSTA Grid because, now that those wars are behind us, they have adopted a defensive, maritime doctrine based on anti-ship missiles.

However, the operational environment in Ukraine would give Kyiv a valuable new tool at a very reasonable cost.

The Russians could, of course, develop a similar capability; the technology is not rocket science. But their top-down command and control system would probably not allow them to use it to its full potential.

The Ukrainians are much more apt to make use of the RSTA Grid in the decentralized manner for which it was intended and in which the Marine Corps previously excelled: they are innovative and might find ways to use the system in ways we never envisioned.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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When Marines Reach Their ‘Sell By’ Date https://thedefensepost.com/2024/05/22/us-marines-sell-by-date/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=us-marines-sell-by-date Wed, 22 May 2024 10:54:01 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=77501 The US Marine Corps' shift from traditional combat roles to a focus on technology and data represents a significant cultural change that may affect recruitment and leadership dynamics.

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All old soldiers, sailors, and marines eventually reach a “sell by” date, and I think I recently reached mine. A quarter of a century after retirement, the culture of active duty has changed beyond my recognition.

This realization struck me as I read the statements of some senior Marine Corps generals at the Modern Day Marine Exposition and their subsequent testimony before the House Armed Services Committee.

Lieutenant General Karsten Heckl, the Deputy Commandant for Development and Integration, recently touted the deployment of a new Marine Corps radar system as part of the new Force Design doctrine. He emphasized that Marines are shifting focus from traditional combat roles to specializing in “sensing and passing data.”

That is certainly a modern notion, but it leads me to wonder what kind of recruits the modern Marine Corps will be looking for.

Recruiting Marines

When I graduated high school nearly 60 years ago, I thought I wanted to be a pilot. However, as I pursued my dream, I realized that I lacked the persistent attention to detail needed on long cross-country flights and that, as a passenger, I would probably not want the likes of me piloting the airplane.

I had joined the Marines as an officer candidate with the original intention of being a Marine aviator. While at the Officer Candidates School, I ran into some exceptional Marine Corps ground combat officers who introduced me to a whole new world.

I realized that you could actually blow stuff up and set fire to things without getting thrown into jail. I was hooked; I had found my niche.

Most of my fellow ground combat officers had been high school jocks, farm boys who grew up hunting and fishing, or had relatives in the Corps. They appreciated the culture and ethos.

A majority of the best enlisted Marines we led came from similar backgrounds. I am not sure that many of them would respond to recruiting slogans such as “we’re looking for a few good sensors” or “if everyone could sense and pass on data, we wouldn’t be the Marines.”

However, our modern generals are closer in age to today’s demographic and may understand the recruiting pool better than I do. I wish Lieutenant General Heckl good luck in this endeavor.

US Marine Corps Lance Cpl. fires an M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle during a live-fire deck shoot
US Marine Corps Lance Cpl. fires an M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle during a live-fire deck shoot aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Boxer (LHD 4) in the Pacific Ocean April 6, 2024. Photo: Cpl. Joseph Helms/US Marine Corps

Barracks Crisis

Another revelation came from Major General James Adams of Requirements and Programs. The general was addressing the recent crisis in Marine Corps barracks housing and trying to explain how the debacle occurred. He believes that, under the former commandant, the Marine Corps had over-invested in equipment for Force Design and under-invested in quality of life.

Deputy Commandant for Installations and Logistics, Major General David Maxwell, would have none of it. He manned up and took full responsibility for not having communicated the seriousness of the barracks situation to the commandant.

He promised to rectify it by hiring civilian dorm managers to square things away. Presumably, there will be a computer system to report problems in Installations and Logistics so he and his successors can keep the commandant informed.

Management and Leadership Philosophy

This marks a sea change in the Corps’ management and leadership philosophy. Back in the day, every Marine Corps leader, from squad leader to division commander, was responsible for the maintenance of their barracks as well as the rest of the care and feeding of their Marines.

Colonels and general officers frequently toured the spaces and asked questions like, “how’s your chow?” and “are the heads (latrines) working?” The Marines I remember were not shy about letting them know when things were fouled up.

However, all was not beer and skittles. In the post-Vietnam budget cutbacks, we were often forced to buy ammunition rather than toilet paper and paint, but at least everyone in the chain of command knew what the problems were.

Shortly after his inauguration, President Ronald Reagan asked sitting commandant General Robert Barrow how the Marine Corps was doing. The general told him in no uncertain terms, and things changed immediately.

When retired Marines complain about the current direction of the Corps, the leadership is not shy about reminding us that they now have the reins and responsibility for the future.

They are also not shy about reminding active duty Marines that the leadership knows best. Consequently, there is no one left to tell them how things really are in “no uncertain terms.”


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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Why We Can’t Beat the Houthis https://thedefensepost.com/2024/03/25/beat-yemen-houthis/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=beat-yemen-houthis Mon, 25 Mar 2024 13:00:41 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=73851 The US has lost control of the Red Sea due to its reliance on remote warfare tactics, like missiles and drones, which are ineffective against opponents who hide among civilians.

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The US Navy has effectively lost control of the Red Sea because the current American way of war involving missiles and drones launched from remote locations has its limitations.

Complete air supremacy does not equate to victory on the ground or at sea, and our enemies quickly figure out our political and moral limitations.

Vietnam is a good example.

By the early 1970s, the US had nearly complete air supremacy over North Vietnam. However, because the North Vietnamese embedded critical military infrastructure among civilians, American air strikes only made minimal strategic difference. In a time of domestic dissidence, the US could not decisively impact the war with air power alone.

Amphibious Raid

In 1972, I was a Marine Corps Second Lieutenant. I wrote an article for the Marine Corps Gazette suggesting we could break the stalemate with a massive amphibious raid into North Vietnam.

I proposed a 60 to 90-day incursion that would destroy their standing army, military infrastructure, and ports. I advocated a sea-based option because the Vietnamese insurgents would be less likely to disrupt our lines of communications and would never know where we would strike next.

It was the Cold War, and most American policymakers feared a large-scale incursion would bring intervention by the Soviet Union or China. I argued that by the time either of those could effectively intervene the Marines would be gone and that it would take Hanoi years before it would be able to launch a successful invasion of South Vietnam.

I believed this would give the South time to build an effective, productive, and Western-oriented democracy such as South Korea was becoming.

Not surprisingly, the administration was unwilling to take strategic advice from a Second Lieutenant and the country’s mood would not have supported major military action. By 1975, South Vietnam had collapsed under a Northern invasion.

Many Americans who did not live through that period (and some who did) believe Saigon fell to Viet Cong peasants armed only with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades. In actuality, the South was overrun by a modern combined arms North Vietnamese army using tanks, artillery, and Soviet-built anti-aircraft missiles — exactly the army that my concept would have killed in the cradle.

It would have worked then, and it would work now in Yemen if we still had the Navy and Marine Corps to accomplish it.

A US soldier reader strikes against the Houthi rebels in Yemen
A US soldier reader strikes against the Houthi rebels in Yemen. Photo: US Central Command via X

Lacking Capabilities

For a smart opponent, hiding missile and drone launchers in civilian areas is an effective strategy when we limit ourselves to attacks by air. It gets much harder when units are on the ground and capable of hunting down the sites without killing civilians.

In the early 1970s, the US Navy was capable of landing two full Marine Corps divisions armed with tanks and the bridging capability to cross any river in Vietnam while destroying its entire capability to project power into the South.

Today, the Navy would be hard-pressed to land a single Marine Expeditionary Brigade. The Marine Corps no longer has tanks or the assault bridging and breaching capability to project and sustain military operations much beyond a narrow beachhead.

The Marines did this to themselves under the direction of a commandant who misinterpreted the emerging nature of war, and the Navy went along with it.

‘Send in the Marines’

There should be a lesson here for the Biden administration. If things continue the way they are, the only way the Houthi missile and drone threat in the Red Sea can be halted is if the Iranians can convince their surrogates to stop.

The US Navy has not reached that level of humiliation since the early days of the war on the Barbary pirates in the 19th century. The US Navy/Marine Corps power projection capability is at its lowest since December 7, 1941.

This is the second time in the last four years that we have had to hope that our enemies would get us out of a situation that we ourselves created through our own ineptitude.

When America used to get itself in difficulty overseas, presidents could say “send in the Marines.” Biden has been reduced to sending in the Iranians… or appealing to the Taliban.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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How to Ruin the Marine Corps https://thedefensepost.com/2024/02/23/ruin-us-marine-corps/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=ruin-us-marine-corps Fri, 23 Feb 2024 13:39:15 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=72220 Force Design 2030 transformed the US Marine Corps from a worldwide force in readiness to a service primarily aimed at deterring fighting a war against China in the South China Sea.

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Few would ever consider how to completely neutralize a truly iconic fighting force like the US Marine Corps.

However, for whatever reason, if one were motivated to do so, I would recommend the following strategy.

The Plan in Theory

First, I would not reveal my plans during my confirmation hearing as Commandant of the Marine Corps. That would alert the traditionalists among the retired Marines and friends of Marines who might oppose my appointment. Once confirmed and installed, I would present my real plan, proceeding confidently and decisively.

Let’s say my concept would involve a radical transformation of the Marine Corps from a worldwide force in readiness into a service primarily focused on deterring or fighting a war with China. I would issue my Commandant’s Planning Guidance to that effect and direct my combat development command to set up a series of war games that would support my plan.

I would use a small group of trusted agents to run the games and make sure that they supported the concept. I would ensure that anyone participating in the games signed non-disclosure agreements, and I would classify the process so that no dissenting opinions would be let loose. I would then declare that the results validated my concept.

Next, I would divest the Marine Corps of what I considered to be legacy capabilities no longer needed for the implementation of my plan. These divestitures would include all tanks, all its heavy engineer and assault breaching capabilities, much of the conventional artillery, its vaunted snipers, and about a third of the aviation assets.

Knowing that many retired Marines and friends of Marines would object to this radical departure from the Marine Corps’ traditional force-in-readiness posture, I would direct my public affairs people to dismiss them as hopeless reactionaries.

US Marines and Georgian Army soldiers run to the extraction point
US Marines and Georgian Army soldiers run to an extraction point. Photo: US Marine Corps

I would be confident that I was hitting all the right political bases. The administration has identified China as the nation’s pacing threat. I would be saving Congress billions by divesting unneeded capabilities.

There would be a few potential obstacles. The combatant commanders of global theaters might object to my taking away capabilities that they need in their war plans. More embarrassingly, the commander of the Indo-Pacific theater might object that he or she did not need my concept. However, I could be fairly confident that the “general officers’ protective association” would prevent them from airing this dirty laundry in public.

Finally, I would have my director of combat development designated as my preferred replacement. Because of his complicity in my approach, he would look foolish trying to reverse it.

My legacy would be ensured.

How It Has Played Out

Fortunately, I never became Commandant of the Marine Corps. Unfortunately, General David Berger did. With his concept, dubbed Force Design (FD) 2030, he transformed the Marine Corps from a worldwide force in readiness to a service primarily aimed at deterring, or if necessary, fighting a war against China in the South China Sea.

Since his concept did not require large-scale amphibious landings, General Berger released the navy from its requirement to provide the Marine Corps with a division’s worth (two Expeditionary Brigades) of amphibious shipping. This was a savvy move as it got buy-in from the navy’s carrier and submarine admirals.

To give Berger credit, this was a brilliant political approach. The Biden administration has identified China as the pacing threat to national security.

Berger’s plan to “divest to invest” to procure the anti-ship missiles needed to implement FD 2030 would save the nation billions in the short run. Although the divestiture was done without any guaranteed quid pro quo, General Berger apparently believed a grateful nation would reward the Marine Corps for its generosity.

NMESIS
A Naval Strike Missile streaks out to sea before striking a naval target ship on August 15, 2021. Photo: Lance Cpl. Dillon Buck/US Marines

The Results

Things have not gone well for FD 2030 in the past year. Before he left office, General Berger was forced to admit that the Navy-Marine Corps team could not respond to contingencies in Sudan and Turkey due to a lack of amphibious shipping.

Congress has belatedly realized something may be wrong, and the current Defense Authorization Act has mandated a second look at FD 2030.

An exhaustive study by a group of retired senior Marine Corps generals revealed the war games justifying FD 2030 were manipulated to produce positive results. General Berger’s concept was built on a house of cards. He reduced the Marine Corps to something between coastal artillery and naval infantry.

General Eric Smith, Berger’s chosen successor, has obviously felt the heat and recently changed the name to “Force Design,” but this is like changing the name of the Titanic after it hit the iceberg.

If the congressional study confirms what the retired generals suspect, several things should be done. General Smith is not a well man and should be medically retired. One of the recently retired general officers who objected to FD 2030 should be returned to active duty and appointed as commandant to sort out the mess. That will be difficult; Berger left chaos in his wake.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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Forget China, We Can’t Even Beat the Houthis https://thedefensepost.com/2024/02/01/us-cant-beat-houthis/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=us-cant-beat-houthis Thu, 01 Feb 2024 14:57:03 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=71003 Striking Houthi missile and drone launch sites seems like a relatively bloodless way to wage war but it is increasingly ineffective.

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Forget China, the new American way of war isn’t working against Yemen’s Houthis.

Striking missile and killer drone launching sites as well as terrorist headquarters with our own missiles and drones seems like a relatively bloodless way to wage war — at least on the part of the shooter — but it is increasingly ineffective.

American presidents love such approaches. It makes them look decisive without endangering their troops’ lives. However, the world’s bad guys quickly figured out that war from thousands of feet up can be countered.

Yemen’s Houthis have been the latest to make American-style push-button war look ineffectual. Western shipping is increasingly being routed away from the Red Sea and Suez Canal, and prices in the US and Europe are already rising.

The US Navy used to have a solution for this kind of dilemma called amphibious warfare, but our admirals, aided by a wrong-headed Marine Corps commandant, walked away from that capability.

Amphibious Capabilities

It would take the equivalent of a Marine Corps division to conduct a large-scale raid in southwestern Yemen capable of cleansing the area of the missile and drone launch sites that have made the Bab-el-Mandeb a shooting gallery.

Such an operation would require two Marine Expeditionary Brigades’ worth of military transport ships. For years, the Marine Corps insisted that figure was necessary to conduct a large-scale amphibious operation such as Inchon in Korea or Guadalcanal in World War II.

The Navy no longer has that capability, as Marine Corps Lieutenant General Karsten Heckl recently pointed out.

What Heckl did not say was that General David Berger, the former Commandant of the Marine Corps, released the Navy from that long-standing two Marine Expeditionary Brigade requirement in 2019.

The aircraft carrier and submarine admirals who compete to run the Navy happily complied. By late in his tenure, even Berger was forced to admit that the Navy/Marine Corps team could not even do an evacuation mission in Sudan or a humanitarian mission in Turkey due to lack of adequate shipping in those vicinities.

Super Garuda Shield
US Marines participate in the Super Garuda Shield exercise. Photo: Sgt. Andrew King/US Marine Corps

Eliminating the Houthi Threat

Eliminating the Houthi threat of missiles and drones would require ground assault troops to locate the underground sanctuaries that allow the launchers to be rolled out, fired quickly, and re-hidden just as quickly.

A large-scale amphibious raid to methodically find and eliminate these facilities would likely mean at least two months of sustained combat by a division-sized force.

Aside from the shipping required to land and maintain such a force, the troops involved would need assault bridging, tanks, and volumes of artillery that the Marine Corps no longer has.

It has taken a few years for the chickens to come home to roost, but the bottom line is that the US no longer has the capability or credibility to conduct large-scale amphibious operations.

Rebuilding the Marine Corps Combat Capability

The Houthis are the first to benefit from this windfall, but others are sure to follow.

The Iranians can use the tactics of the Houthis to close the Strait of Hormuz with relative impunity, and now any malign actor can close a critical sea lane such as the Malacca Strait at the cost of relatively cheap missiles and drones.

As General Heckl points out, it will take a major shipbuilding effort to repair the amphibious ships we still have, let alone build new ones. That is exacerbated by the ground combat capabilities that Berger threw away to buy anti-ship missiles.

This has reduced the US Marine Corps’ combat capability to the level of the Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hamas. If we ever decide to close the Caribbean Sea or the Saint Lawrence Seaway to international shipping, we will be all set.

Otherwise, Janis Joplin was right: “You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.”


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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Does the Marine Corps Need Course Correction? Congress Wants to Know https://thedefensepost.com/2024/01/12/marine-corps-fd-2030-study/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=marine-corps-fd-2030-study Fri, 12 Jan 2024 08:23:44 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=69775 Force Design 2030 needs a comprehensive evaluation to determine whether the Marine Corps is headed in the right direction.

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Where does the Marine Corps go from here? This critical question has pitted retired Marines and the existing senior leadership for the last four years.

Force Design (FD) 2030, the brainchild of the former commandant General David Berger, has been loudly and persistently challenged by many senior retired general officers, former defense officials, and friends of the Corps.

Congress somewhat belatedly woke up to this intellectual civil war with this year’s National Defense Authorization Act, which mandates a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) independently evaluate FD 2030.

Candidates to Evaluate FD 2030

That is all well and good, but the question of which FFRDC will do the study is critical. There are three leading candidates: the Center for Naval Analysis (CNA), the Institute for Defense Analysis (IDA), and RAND Corporation.

CNA’s primary funding comes from the Department of the Navy, meaning the Navy and Marine Corps. The Department also contributes directly to RAND, but not to the extent of CNA.

Of the candidates, only IDA appears to receive no direct Navy funding. It has no dog in the fight. CNA has never questioned the need for large amphibious ships, nor has RAND. It is probably unfair to ask either to take sides in this issue as it is a lose-lose proposition.

Super Garuda Shield
US Marines participate in the Super Garuda Shield exercise. Photo: Sgt. Andrew King/US Marine Corps

Heavily Invested

Let me be clear: I have no current affiliation with any of the candidates. I have collaborated with all in past studies and have the greatest respect for all three — but I did not fall off the turnip truck yesterday.

The Navy and the current Marine Corps senior leadership is heavily invested in FD 2030. The Marine Corps has divested billions of the assets that made the Corps a balanced, combined arms team to buy anti-ship capabilities primarily devoted to deterring or fighting a war with China.

Many in the Navy support FD 2030 because the service does not have to buy the large amphibious ships that would support the expansive landing operations the current Marine Corps leadership is trying to walk away from.

Anyone who believes they will not work hard to influence the FD 2030 study probably also believes in Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy.

Unbiased and Free of Influence

In addition to the Marine Corps divestments in capabilities once considered critical to its worldwide force in readiness mission, the Navy has radically scaled back on its amphibious ship building program. All of this has been done without serious congressional oversight.

The current National Defense Authorization Act attempts to rectify that, but it can only be done properly if the mandated study is unbiased and free of influence by the existing leadership of the two naval services.

Of the three candidates, only IDA receives no major funding from the naval services. Consequently, it is the most logical organization to take on the mission.

No matter which organization receives the task to conduct the study, it should contain three major elements to be considered legitimate.

US and Philippine Marines conduct a raid rehearsal during Balikatan 22
US and Philippine Marines conduct a raid rehearsal during Balikatan 22. Photo: Cpl. Jackson Dukes/US Marine Corps

Independent War Games

The first would be a series of independent war games to determine the real issues surrounding FD 2030. General Berger and the current commandant, whose Quantico command conducted the original games, claimed that they validated FD 2030.

However, I always tell the students in my red teaming classes that wargames don’t validate anything. At best, they can identify potential problems with a plan and its assumptions. This is one of the bedrocks of war gaming theory.

If one red team playing in a single game ignores (or tries to ignore) the Marine Corps’ contribution as irrelevant to Chinese operations, it is merely a data point. If three of four red teams consider the concept irrelevant, it represents a serious issue. USMC and Navy FD 2030 advocates should play as the blue (US) team in these war games. If anyone can make the concept work, it should be them.

Anonymous Survey

Second, the input from serving Marines, particularly the field grade ranks, should be solicited. One of the primary criticisms of FD 2030 is that a cabal of very senior officers, their trusted subordinates, and selected contractors created it without significant input from the field.

Those of us who have worked on the issue for the past few years have heard anecdotal evidence that no such input was solicited, and that Marines who voice criticism do so at risk to their careers.

An anonymous survey of those expected to implement FD 2030 would reveal whether the Corps’ future leaders believe it is a good idea.

Force-Wide Analysis

Finally, an honest analysis from the combatant commanders in each theater should be required to determine whether the degree to which the divested USMC capabilities have impacted their combat readiness.

If these things can be accomplished competently within the study’s scope, it can be determined whether the Marine Corps is headed in the right direction. If not, both the administration and Congress should give the Marine Corps marching order to change direction as well as funding to restore lost capabilities now deemed necessary.

If not, it will draw cobwebs in a safe with so many other congressionally mandated studies.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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Lessons the US Marine Corps Should Learn From Gaza and Ukraine https://thedefensepost.com/2023/11/29/marine-corps-lessons-gaza-ukraine/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=marine-corps-lessons-gaza-ukraine Wed, 29 Nov 2023 11:08:10 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=67309 The elimination of the Marine Corps tank force and reduction in infantry battalions have left the service ill-prepared for conflicts like those in Ukraine or Gaza.

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At the beginning of the Ukraine war, Marine Corps Commandant General David Berger confidently predicted the disastrous rout of Russian armored columns and Ukraine’s successful use of Hellfire missiles, justifying his having done away with the Marine Corps tank force.

The Ukrainians would disagree.

Tanks are the number one item on the Ukrainian military aid wish list. Not much further down is heavy engineer assault breaching capabilities against Russian fortifications — another aspect General Berger eliminated.

The Ukrainians also make skilled use of medium-range general artillery to enable ground maneuver. The only thing the Ukrainians don’t like about artillery is that they don’t have enough ammo at any given time. Again, although not eliminating conventional artillery, Berger drastically reduced the Corps’ inventory.

Tanks and Urban Warfare

As the Israeli ground incursion into Gaza generates analysis, the Marines might relearn some lessons from their 1990s urban warfare experiments in cities such as Fallujah and Ramadi in Iraq.

In Iraq, Marines made skillful use of tanks and Heavy Engineers in the urban canyons of the infamous Sunni Triangle in combined arms operations. The tanks had two uses.

They enabled urban maneuver from street to street by providing shelter for the infantry, and their armor-protected .50 caliber machine guns provided invaluable counter-sniper capability.

Meanwhile, Heavy Engineers provided rubble clearing and large-scale breaching that enabled the riflemen to move from building to building without exposing themselves.

An M1A1 Abrams tank provides area security alongside a street intersection beside Marines during a 2005 operation in Fallujah, Iraq
An M1A1 Abrams tank provides area security alongside a street intersection beside Marines during a 2005 operation in Fallujah, Iraq. Photo: Cpl Mike Escobar/US Marine Corps

Troop Numbers

Technology has not changed so much that Napoleon’s maxim “God is on the side of the big battalions” has become irrelevant. This is particularly true in the trenches along the Eastern Front in Ukraine and urban combat in Gaza.

So far, the Israelis have apparently not suffered heavy infantry casualties, but if they make good on their intention to reoccupy the Strip, they will face an urban insurgency requiring large numbers of troops.

The Marine Corps has reduced the number and size of its infantry battalions. Urban combat is casualty intense, although there is a limit to the number of troops that can be put on an urban street at one time. A place like Gaza could easily take three divisions to maintain an occupation.

These critical capabilities were given up to buy anti-ship missiles and other sea control capabilities to implement the Force Design (FD) 2030 concept, meant to deter or defeat Chinese aggression as a “stand-in” naval capability.

The question that has never adequately been answered is what will happen if a major conflict occurs somewhere outside the Western Pacific or South China Sea? Would the Marine Corps be prepared to play a significant role in a war such as in Ukraine or a major urban conflict such as Gaza, having given up the capabilities listed above?

I sincerely hope we don’t have to answer that question in the near term.

Super Garuda Shield
US Marines participate in the Super Garuda Shield exercise. Photo: Sgt. Andrew King/US Marine Corps

FD 2030

Many FD 2030 critics have noted that the classified war games used to “validate” the concept were a mile wide and an inch deep. The question of how the FD 2030 Marine Corps would support a major conflict in Europe or the Middle East was apparently never seriously considered.

Worse, the theater commanders of Central Command and the European Command were seemingly asleep at the wheel while the Marine Corps headed down the road to irrelevance.

This is not an academic matter. As this is being written, the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit is operating near the Israel/Gaza region. The Americans in Gaza are begging for some sort of evacuation. If the administration is so foolish as to attempt to work with Hamas to try a Non-combatant Evacuation Operation, this would likely be another debacle.

As with throwing a football, three things could happen; two of them are bad.

First, Hamas can hold a perimeter and allow US citizens to be evacuated. This happy outcome is extremely unlikely considering the chaotic situation on the ground.

Second, thousands of Gazans will likely swarm the Marine perimeter, trying desperately to get on a ship, any ship, to get away. Imagine the CNN footage of Americans having to withdraw or risk being overwhelmed by the crowds, leaving the stranded American expats to watch US forces sail over the horizon.

Third – and worst – Islamic extremists not under Hamas control take the opportunity to mingle with said crowd and use suicide bombers and snipers to do what their counterparts did in Kabul (Oh, by the way, the Corps’ counter-sniper capability was also reduced under FD 2030).

In that case, the Marines would face the lose-lose situation of firing into the crowd and being accused of war crimes against civilians or of being overrun. I have been in that situation and would not wish it on anyone.

In 1995, the Marine Corps formed the core of a task force to evacuate UN personnel from Somalia. That was an undertaking similar in scope and scale to the situation in Gaza. It quickly assembled a brigade-sized force to do the job. That is three times the size of the force in the Mediterranean today. Due to deal-making with the Navy, the Marines could not put an amphibious force similar to that to sea today in anything like a timely manner.

The Marine Corps always prided itself on being ready to quickly put together a task-organized force to deal with any contingency anywhere in the world, at any time.

The FD 2030 Corps may have to deal with General Berger’s legacy sooner rather than later.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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How to End the US Marine Corps’ Intellectual Civil War https://thedefensepost.com/2023/10/27/us-marine-corps-strife/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=us-marine-corps-strife Fri, 27 Oct 2023 08:57:29 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=65349 An independent organization must evaluate the US Marine Corps’ strategic plan, Force Design 2030, to help resolve internal strife about its effectiveness.

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When the former Commandant of the Marine Corps introduced his new strategic approach, dubbed Force Design (FD) 2030, many in the administration and Congress applauded it as a forward-thinking, innovation-based approach based on emerging technologies.

They were subsequently puzzled when many senior retired marines, including virtually all the living former commandants, expressed dismay.

The resulting intellectual civil war has been unprecedented in the history of the corps.

Battle of Poitiers: Not All Innovation Is Good

Those who think FD 2030 is a disaster waiting to happen point out that not all innovation is necessarily good.

During the 1356 Battle of Poitiers, French knights were ordered to dismount and attack the army of the English Black Prince on foot. The rationale for this was that the English had defeated a similar French force 10 years earlier with an army made up overwhelmingly of infantry. It was a disastrous French innovation.

The French king failed to realize that the English victory at Crécy a decade earlier came about due to the range and killing power of English longbows, not the fact that they were fighting as infantry.

The flower of French chivalry was again slaughtered, and the king was captured. It would take decades and one more disastrous battle (Agincourt in 1415) before the French developed a combined arms approach to negate the longbow.

Focus on China

FD 2030 is designed to help gain naval superiority in the South China Sea in a potential war with China. The concept calls for the Marine Corps to acquire anti-ship missiles and other equipment to deny Chinese naval superiority in the region.

To accomplish this new mission, the former commandant divested the Marine Corps of all its tanks, much of its cannon artillery, its heavy engineer capability, and a significant portion of its manned aviation. In addition, several infantry battalions were discarded along with a reduction in strength of the remaining battalions.

Politicians love it for two reasons. First, it focuses on China, which is the primary threat of the moment identified by the National Command Authority. Second, it is the first time a service has voluntarily divested itself of capabilities without a guarantee of a return on investment.

The Chinese flag is raised during a military parade at the Zhurihe training base
The Chinese flag is raised during a military parade at the Zhurihe training base in China’s northern Inner Mongolia region in 2017. Photo: AFP

FD 2030 Criticism

We retired marine critics of FD 2030 do not like it for several reasons; the most important of them is that we don’t believe it will work. We see it as a maritime Maginot Line.

Second, the lost capabilities were critical to what has made the Marine Corps the nation’s global 911 force because they could respond to any type of crisis ranging from a local natural disaster to a major regional conflict.

Finally, it is redundant with capabilities that exist within other services. Even if the theory behind the concept proved useful, it could be done just as well with a joint task force made up of capabilities that reside in other services. It is wasteful duplication.

More disturbing is the feeling of many retired and some active marines that the results of the war games that “validated” FD 2030 were manipulated to get the right results. My sources include several participants who believe the original analysis was edited to make the outcome more favorable to the concept than was the case. Since the final report is classified, no one can prove that assertion.

Investigation

Billions of dollars in capabilities were discarded to buy the new equipment that FD 2030 requires. If the games were manipulated, an investigation is in order.

Quite frankly, both the Defense Department Inspector General and the Congressional Research Office have been asleep at the switch. They both have the capability to look at the classified report and determine what happened. I am loath to use the word fraud, but I firmly believe that waste and abuse are afoot here.

The former commandant made it clear that FD2030 was not a subject of internal debate. Active-duty marines who argue against it in blogs do so using pseudonyms out of fear of official retaliation, and debate at the Marine Corps University has been stifled.

Commandant of the Marine Corps General Eric M. Smith
Commandant of the Marine Corps General Eric M. Smith. Photo: US Marine Corps

Ending Internal Strife

The new Commandant of the Marine Corps has a way out of ending this intellectual civil war among marines. He could sponsor a new series of games run by an independent organization, such as the National Defense University using a red team that is familiar with Chinese doctrine and tactics and an unbiased analysis team.

If the game results indicate FD 2030 appears to be an operable concept, the Marine Corps can continue to march in the current direction, and we critics will be silenced. If not, the commandant can call a time-out and reevaluate the organization’s strategic direction. I am confident that the second case would prevail.

Such a move would go a long way toward restoring faith in the Marine Corps senior leadership among the retired community as well as active duty dissidents who are quietly waging an insurgency in the ranks.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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Sinophobia Can Be a Dangerous Disease for the Marine Corps https://thedefensepost.com/2023/01/12/sinophobia-us-marine-corps/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=sinophobia-us-marine-corps Thu, 12 Jan 2023 10:03:26 +0000 https://www.thedefensepost.com/?p=49255 Policymakers need to ask themselves whether it is wise to allow the US Marine Corps to concentrate on a Sino-American conflict -- a threat that may be more myth than reality.

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Sinophobia has recently gripped much of Washington and the Pentagon in particular. While strategic planning must consider all scenarios, an overemphasis on China — while potentially giving short shrift to other threats — is not healthy for a world power.

China’s military capability is growing proportionate with its economic rise. That, combined with its increasingly authoritarian leader Xi Jinping’s hostility toward Taiwan, has convinced political leaders from both parties that a new Cold War aimed at containing Beijing’s ambitions is needed and that China remains the most likely adversary in the next conflict.

In turn, this is driving military force structure and planning increasingly toward the Indo-Pacific. The civilian and uniformed bureaucrats in the Pentagon are good at sensing where the money is flowing, and China is now the flavor of the decade.

Nowhere is this truer than in the Marine Corps, where much of its worldwide fighting capability has been traded in for equipment specialized for a Sino-American conflict. Humanitarian aid capabilities have also been sacrificed.

New ‘Great Game’ but No Existential Threat

A limited war with China over Taiwan is possible, particularly since President Joe Biden has assured Taipei that we will defend it if China attacks.

Any attempt by the Taiwanese to declare independence would almost certainly lead to belligerent actions by Beijing. However, that scenario is different from a Chinese attempt to sweep the Americans and their allies out of the Indo-Pacific area, as the Japanese undertook in 1941.

Despite that, the Marine Corps is staking its future on deterring or fighting a specific threat that may not exist.

Certainly, a new “Great Game” for influence is going on in the Indo-Pacific. The US has strengthened its ties with Japan, India, and Australia, while China has made inroads into places such as Myanmar and the Solomon Islands.

There is no existential threat to either the United States or China. The competition remains primarily diplomatic and economic. China’s Belt Road initiative is seen as exploitive in much of Southwest Asia and Africa, and the United States seems to be viewed favorably in most nations we covet as allies. None of this justifies a Cold War mentality.

If Washington desires to increase its military presence in the Indo-Pacific region, it should reinforce existing assets. Major changes to force structure based on a single threat is overhyped and unwise.

US Marines conduct an amphibious exercise with service members of the Philippine Marine Corps, 2016. Photo: Lance Cpl. Carl King Jr/US Navy

Regional Disaster Relief

China has nothing to gain from a prolonged naval war in the region and everything to lose. It is an export-driven economy, and a conflict at sea would be disastrous.

The current Marine Corps approach is based on a Chinese break-out from the First Island Chain in the East and South China Seas, like the Japanese naval blitzkrieg of 1941-42.

The Marine Corps has divested itself of tanks, tubed artillery, and heavy engineering assets that might be critical in fighting a real Chinese military threat in the region to buy anti-ship missiles.

If China is a potential adversary, nature also remains real and imminent. Volcanoes, earthquakes, massive tropical storms, and tsunamis are part of the Indo-Pacific life cycle.

For decades, the Marine Corps has been a key to regional disaster relief. Operation Sea Angel in Bangladesh in 1991 was a Marine Corps-led humanitarian/disaster relief operation that saved hundreds and thousands of lives.

Operation Unified Assistance in the wake of the devastating 2004 earthquake/tsunami that ravaged the Indo-Pacific area helped millions. A Marine commanded the operation.

Much of the vital equipment that was key to those successes is now gone from the inventory of the Corps.

Force in Readiness

In the Indo-Pacific Great Game, China is much more likely to use irregular warfare by sponsoring pro-Chinese insurgent movements against West-leaning governments in countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Vietnam rather than a direct naval assault.

In the Solomon’s, it is likely that the pro-Chinese government of Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare will be overthrown by a popular uprising or direct ballot if one is ever held. In that case, a Chinese-sponsored insurgency to put Sogavare back in power is not only possible but likely.

The equipment the Marines have divested would be critical in such a prolonged counterguerrilla campaign.

The Marine Corps has been a worldwide resource for nearly two and a half centuries. Washington’s policymakers need to ask themselves whether it is wise to allow the nation’s force-in-readiness to concentrate on a threat that may be more myth than reality.


Headshot Gary AndersonGary Anderson served as the Chief of Plans (G-5) of the Marine Corps Expeditionary Force responsible for the Indo-Pacific area.

He lectures on Alternative Analysis at the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.


The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Defense Post.

The Defense Post aims to publish a wide range of high-quality opinion and analysis from a diverse array of people – do you want to send us yours? Click here to submit an op-ed.

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