Our friend BJ has a must read on a something that I have wanted to see us return to early and often. Sure it is a little Victorian/Edwardian in construct - but it has a fair history of Americana about it as well.
Some things are not worth years of American blood and treasure, but they do need killing and their stuff needs to be broken and there is a time proven way to do that and go home early - the Punitive Expedition.
That is one thing to call it - another is Maritime Raid. Read it all.
The Navy/Marine Corps team has a long and storied past, operating together in everything from ship versus ship combat in the Age of Sail to the mastery of small wars and the amphibious warfare that has become its staple over the past half century. Operationally, many of the successful missions conducted by the Navy/Marine Corps team have involved maritime raiding.He gives the historical context and then a good entering argument for the 21st Century version.
As the Navy welcomes the Marine Corps’ return to the sea in the 21st century following a decade of war ashore, the modern redevelopment of the historic maritime raiding capability is just as vital to the future of the Sea Services as sharpening the dulled skills needed for a full amphibious assault.
Today’s Nimitz-class aircraft carriers are not being used for maximum efficiency. While the “fighter gap” is not projected to hit the Navy for another couple of years, the reality is that today’s carrier air wing is smaller than the Nimitz class was designed to deploy. The Gerald R. Ford class will have even more room. The power of today’s super carriers comes from the precision fires that can be delivered more than the sheer number of airframes on the flight deck. This leaves room available for a few more airframes and a few more people, and the potential to increase the capability of the modern carrier strike group.... and we can do it now with what we have ... now.
The greatest strengths of the Osprey are its speed and range. The ability to get to targets over 1,000 miles away, while maintaining the element of surprise through speed far above that of an assault helicopter, can prove decisive when used for the right mission. One of the weaknesses identified of using the MV-22 in an ARG/MEU is the inability of current escort helicopters such as the AH-1 Cobra to keep up with the assault force. That isn’t a problem with the dozens of fixed-wing jet aircraft available from the deck of a carrier.
Recent interoperability training between Marines and Navy MH-60S helicopter detachments on board amphibious ships has demonstrated the ability of Navy helicopters to deliver Marine assault elements. For short distances, and missions that are better suited to assault helicopters than tilt-rotors, the helicopter sea combat and maritime strike squadrons that are part of today’s carrier air wings provide an established capability. Operating as a Navy/Marine Corps team, smaller assaults for missions to include non-compliant or opposed visit, board, search, and seize missions (such as the Magellan Star takedown) would be possible from the deck of the carrier.
The Marine Corps is already hard at work on developing smaller and more mobile combat units, as demonstrated by the exercises for Enhanced Company Operations, and the Company Landing Team. A great deal of experimentation has already been done, and exercises completed to develop the concept. A notional CSG Maritime Raid Force would be roughly the size of an embarked squadron, taking up the same number of racks and the same amount of space for equipment and aircraft.
Organized as a Marine Air-Ground Task Force in miniature, it would be made up of a CoLT, an MV-22 detachment, and a small logistical element. When not conducting raiding operations, the CSG MAGTF could provide expanded capabilities for theater security cooperation missions by the strike group. The size and shape of each element would require development by the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab and Navy Warfare Development Command and could be tailored for the maritime raiding capability desired and the space available.
30 comments:
Nuthin' New Under The Sun...
Meant to add this...
The average citizen is quite unaware of certain minor wars and activities in which his navy's part has yielded results beyond price or praise.
Rear Admiral Casper F. Goodrich, USN
Punitive Expedition.. I love it! Ala Pershing and Pancho Villa and Pershing and the Moro Uprising.. Sometimes people need a killing.... dont F(@*( with us...
i like the concept here.. too many rice bowls to break...
Just one thing though...
Such endeavors should NEVER be kept "Secret" from those who pay for them...
In dollars and blood.
Especially when waged by someone who has otherwise pacifist pretenses to keep up.
I've been an advocate of a "More Rubble, Less Trouble" foreign policy for the past decade. The Powell Doctrine (You break it, you bought it) is insane and stupid and mainly meant to discourage war by making it ruinously expensive.
More Rubble, Less Trouble. It's simple to understand. It's American and to the point. Rinse and Repeat as necessary.
I love this idea.
I thought your picture was going to be Mullen. :)
I thought your picture was going to be Mullen. :)
Nice mention of the MH-60S. Too bad the Navy doesn't fully realize that platform's capabilities...
The military version of "more cowbell" should be "more Pershing." As in, "You know what the Somali pirates need? More Pershing!"
Excellent and relevant post! Many thanks for sharing!
Sigh. I still have a weak spot for General Powel. I agree with you on the "you break it, you bought it" - and I am not happy with his cover of Armitage and his last minute endorsement of Obama ... but I still hold my fire on Powell. I still respect the man too much. I'd like to ping on him ... but I can't. A personality fault on my part I guess.
More Cowbell baby!
Yeah, it is a personality flaw, Sal.
"You break it, you bought it" is fine for an eight year old in Wal Mart.
More appropriate will be "Threaten us, and we will break and kill. Don't want to be dead, or have your stuff broken? Don't threaten us. We pay for nothing except the fuel and munitions."
<span>"Threaten us, and we will break and kill. Don't want to be dead, or have your stuff broken? Don't threaten us. We pay for nothing except the fuel and munitions." is good for a small-time street gangster, not for a nation that champions democracy and human rights...</span>
US greatest success of XX century, containment and eventual disappearance of Soviet Union was achieved with nation re-building - in both Europe and Asia, with Korea showing even a third world country with rampant coruption and lack of modern statehood tradition might eventually break out into successful democracy. I am pretty sure had US not abandoned S.Vietnam it would be well on its way to similar outcome.
Just remember, raids gone wrong = whole lotta casualties. Ask Custer...
AragornAnd yet less thanks have we than you. Travellers scowl at us, and countrymen give us scornful names. 'Strider' I am to one fat man who lives within a day's march of foes that would freeze his heart or lay his little town in ruin, if he were not guarded ceaselessly. Yet we would not have it otherwise. If simple folk are free from care and fear, simple they will be, and we must be kept secret to keep them so.
He didn't even bring up the most recent raid (granted labled under Tactical Recovery of Aircraft and Personnel aka TRAP) the recovering of the F-15 pilots in Libya... Use of MV-22, CH-53's, and AV-8's providing air support hundreds of miles inland in no mans land...all off the same amphib. Company of Recon Marines, few EOD Techs, a few DOCs, and a CCT's... put them on any bird and things will get done.
Yes, just think back 120 years or so. The Somalia piracy problem would have been ended quite early by a single armored cruiser from any Western Navy. Its numerous crew (with marine detachment and significant "infantry" training and equipment even for the sailors) would have surrounded and invaded one or two, or even half a dozen, "suspected pirate villages" which could have been the base for the pirates (for punitive purposes you don't need to be fuzzy with identification) in conjunction with a flattening artillery bombardment. Any "military age male" would have been a target and there wouldn't have been any "collateral damage" since any and all damage and even deaths among the targeted population would have been part of the punitive terror message.
Not I that would fully condone doing exactly the same today but in part we should. For instance, a fishing village from which pirates also operate should get a visit from attack helicopters, using cannons and FFAR's to shred any and all boats in the harbor or on the beach with no differentiation between "fishing" and "pirate" skiffs. Ports that are hotbeds of pirate activity should be the focus of targetted attacks upon any of its infrastructure that COULD be of use to pirates. If a community "harbors" pirates it should bear consequences.
I like the implied philosophy of "No Greater Friend, No Greater Enemy".
If you want to be our friend, excellent. We love selling levis, movies, and hamburgers to our friends.
On the other hand, if you want to threaten us, do not take our kindness and benevolent approach to life as weakness. We will F**K with you when sufficiently roused to anger.
Totally agree, but the 1st sentence of your second paragraph is negated by the last sentence.
This method has worked in the past, but we are too sensitive and evolved to use it now.
Funny thing is this appraoch leads to fewer casualties, despite the usual goo-goos getting the vapors.
Custer acted stupidly. If you don't act stupidly, even a raid gone wrong can come out okay. For example: Battle of the Black Sea. Raid went wrong, objective still achieved, massive casualties inflicted on the opposition. And if you're raiding from the sea with the major goal of simply breaking stuff and maybe grabbing some folks then you probably can dispense with much of the political crap that turned Mogadishu pyrrhic.
The problem with "nation re-building" is that you can't fix everybody. Some cultures just, well, suck. And they will continue to suck no matter how much we pour into it. Far easier to just punch them until they stop annoying us and go back to abusing their women and eating grass or whatever.
For example: pirates and related crap in Somalia. We're not going to fix that. Not without basically recolonizing the place permanently. Easier to apply enough naked force to make them go away, or at least become more cognizant of which flag a ship is flying before making a run at it.
Could be a selling point then for ships to fly a US flag again. "Sign up for our flag! People are afraid of us."
Let's not forget that it was Taft's role in creating a legitimate basis for government in the Philippines combined with Pershing/MacArthur's tactics that finally pacified that rebellion. There is a time and place for ruthlessness, but not in all circumstances.
Separately, I love URR's reference to Mattis' quote up there. Everything I've ever heard about Gen. Mattis is so awesome, it sometimes makes me wish I was a Jarhead too.
This one would have been more appropriate...
Such a quotable man, Chaos is. You should have brought the whole quote though, URR ... the rest of it is what makes that one so great.
Too bad the Marines didn't just buy the H-60 instead of the UH-1Y.
Juan,
IIRC, the Powell Doctrine is "Overwhelming force, overwhelmingly applied." If you roll in with such an overwhelming amount of everything, combat, and therefore your casualties and civilian losses, is over that much quicker. Something his successors and their civilian "less is more," "rightsizing" and "revolution in military affairs" masters completely disregarded at the peril of the troops in contact.
The Powell Doctrine was basically a response to Vietnam and the Gulf War. Bring enough guns, be prepared to kill, have an end state, get out. Unfortunately, he the the politicians did not let us kill more in GW1. They saw the pictures of the cars on the highway on CNN and got all soft and gooey inside. Worried about public opinion and let the Republican Guard stay in tact.
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