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Marine Corps, Navy Remain Split Over Design, Number of Future Light Amphibious Warship, Divide Risks Stalling Program


Singapore is a good place to look for locally appropriate engineering solutions.
 
At 1:50 mark you will see a Spearhead/JHSV/EPF twinhull catamaran backed down onto a sand beach with in reach of its stern RoRo ramp.

 
The Marines seem to have been captured by the Australian shipping industry.

Could they end up following the example of De Meuron's and De Watteville's Regiments?












The USMC seems to be finding ships that they want operating in the waters they want to operate in.

Easier to marry a local duckbilled platypus than get the USN to spec one.


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Kidding aside part of the advantage of the design may be in that very long bifold ramp

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If you haven't already read it you might want to look at the report that CSIS published about the wargaming it did on a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. In the wargames they found the new Marine Littoral Regiments of limited usefulness. Politics didn't generally allow them to be forward deployed before the conflict started (deemed too provocative?). Once hostilities began, resupply proved extremely difficult due to Chinese air power.

I'm not sure what the solution is for the Pacific theatre. Ships...even small, fast ships that can't defend themselves are probably not very survivable if they attempt to get within useful range of Chinese forces. Adding escorts defeats the purpose of dispersed operations by making the flotillas larger and making them more easily detected through their EM signatures. We're nowhere near the point that troop carrying submarines are economically feasible.

I think at this point long-range aircraft carrying long range missiles, theatre range ground-launched missiles and submarines are likely the most effective types of assets that we could use in a war with China. The "new" Marine Corps structure is likely better suited than the old one, but probably only marginally so.
 
If you haven't already read it you might want to look at the report that CSIS published about the wargaming it did on a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. In the wargames they found the new Marine Littoral Regiments of limited usefulness. Politics didn't generally allow them to be forward deployed before the conflict started (deemed too provocative?). Once hostilities began, resupply proved extremely difficult due to Chinese air power.

I'm not sure what the solution is for the Pacific theatre. Ships...even small, fast ships that can't defend themselves are probably not very survivable if they attempt to get within useful range of Chinese forces. Adding escorts defeats the purpose of dispersed operations by making the flotillas larger and making them more easily detected through their EM signatures. We're nowhere near the point that troop carrying submarines are economically feasible.

I think at this point long-range aircraft carrying long range missiles, theatre range ground-launched missiles and submarines are likely the most effective types of assets that we could use in a war with China. The "new" Marine Corps structure is likely better suited than the old one, but probably only marginally so.

Small ships may not be survivable individually but I doubt the survivability of big ships with large numbers of bodies on board - regardless of how many of them are running around with duct tape and mattresses plugging holes.

As to opinions - even professional ones - well even professionals have their preferred opinions.

Politics is always going to be an issue. And they are going to vary over time.

I will continue to favour the Marine Littoral Regiment as a useful addition to the tool kit that makes the opposition think about other things the Americans might be able to do to them. And cause them to stretch their resources.
 
Number of islands in the First Island Chain (Plus Indonesia)

Japan - 14,125 islands
Philippines - 7,100 islands
Indonesia - 18,110 islands

That is 40,000 places to put firing points or 40,000 hills to hide ships behind. The USMC wants to hide 32 ships.

And there are a lot more islands in the vicinity.


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Add in these


And you are now playing Battleship on a grand scale.

Even moreso when you add in the submarine fleet.


China is building new missile silos as it expands its nuclear capabilities.

Except that it is relatively cheap to dig a hole in the ground which may or may not contain a missile, which may or may not be a new missile, which may or may not have a warhead, which may or may not be a MIRV.

Lots of uncertainty there. Which plays to China's advantage.

Any uncertainty the US can create on the First Island Chain plays to the advantage of the US and its local allies.

 
Thinking more like oil rig platforms, along with some infilling.


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As part of the uncertainty game - Long Range Unmanned Surface Vessels. Originally sold as ISR asset - OPs and LPs. Then armed with the Hero-120 system


Hero-120 60 km in 60 minutes with a 4.5 kg warhead and a camera to keep the man in the loop.


So what would it take to make the LRUSVs appear like Carriers, Destroyers and Amphibs - and then disappear?


 
So if you put the pieces of the puzzle together you end up with a sea full of islands with lots of people making their livings in boats in amongst those islands. In that cluster the USMC and the USN propose to launch a swarm of unmanned fast boats capable of gathering intelligence, spoofing enemy sensors and launching swarms of loitering attack missiles that can imperil small targets ashore and afloat - such as sensors and the fishing boats of the Peoples Militia.

In this mess the USN then has avaialable unmanned autonomous EPF fast cats and Off Shore Supply Vessels from which the USMC can discharge unmanned JLTVs carrying pairs of unmanned NSMs with ranges against sea and land targets of over 185 km. The NSM was developed by Norway explicitly to be effective manoeuvering in the clutter of skerries an islands that surround Scandinavia.

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So how many Marines does the USMC have to invest to cause the Peoples Republic of China to have a case of the vapours?
 
You still need bases on those islands as a political statement. Just as the Chinese have done.
 
You still need bases on those islands as a political statement. Just as the Chinese have done.

Do you need a political statement that creates physical targets with a population that has mixed feelings about the presence of "outsiders"? Or is it enough that the local government declares its willingness to permit the deployment of "allied" forces should the situation require it?

China just has to believe that the US threat is a real one that could have a real impact on China's real plans.

The Americans can deploy from Japan to Taiwan and from Australia, Micronesia and Polynesia to the Phillipines and Indonesia.

The are always adding to their bag of tricks - like the one I mentioned the Aussies want to emulate

 
Do you need a political statement that creates physical targets with a population that has mixed feelings about the presence of "outsiders"? Or is it enough that the local government declares its willingness to permit the deployment of "allied" forces should the situation require it?

China just has to believe that the US threat is a real one that could have a real impact on China's real plans.

The Americans can deploy from Japan to Taiwan and from Australia, Micronesia and Polynesia to the Phillipines and Indonesia.

The are always adding to their bag of tricks - like the one I mentioned the Aussies want to emulate

Yes you do, because the most of the islands are uninhabited and there presence and ownership dictates oil, mineral and fishing rights. china's policy is to use a "all of government and industry approach to gaining the islands" Failure to preempt them has led to China claiming several important islands, which will have severe implications for generations to come.
 
If you haven't already read it you might want to look at the report that CSIS published about the wargaming it did on a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. In the wargames they found the new Marine Littoral Regiments of limited usefulness. Politics didn't generally allow them to be forward deployed before the conflict started (deemed too provocative?). Once hostilities began, resupply proved extremely difficult due to Chinese air power.

I'm not sure what the solution is for the Pacific theatre. Ships...even small, fast ships that can't defend themselves are probably not very survivable if they attempt to get within useful range of Chinese forces. Adding escorts defeats the purpose of dispersed operations by making the flotillas larger and making them more easily detected through their EM signatures. We're nowhere near the point that troop carrying submarines are economically feasible.

I think at this point long-range aircraft carrying long range missiles, theatre range ground-launched missiles and submarines are likely the most effective types of assets that we could use in a war with China. The "new" Marine Corps structure is likely better suited than the old one, but probably only marginally so.
In the case of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan, the USMC and America will commit more than a single littoral regiment. If America commits to Taiwan, it will be several carrier strike groups, to protect the big ships full of bodies. Bodies will be army, marines, and navy, likely combined with a coalition of Japanese, and South Korean forces.

The whole point of the littoral regiments is to put marines into places the PLA isn't, to prevent the PLAN from maneuvering how they want to.
 
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Yes you do, because the most of the islands are uninhabited and there presence and ownership dictates oil, mineral and fishing rights. china's policy is to use a "all of government and industry approach to gaining the islands" Failure to preempt them has led to China claiming several important islands, which will have severe implications for generations to come.

Understood. If we're talking about the uninhabited islands. I doubt that would present the same problems as, for example, Clark AFB


In June 2012, the Philippine government, under pressure from Chinese claims to their seas, agreed to the return of American military forces to Clark.
 
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Marines plan to test a new ship this spring that they see as the answer to fighting in littorals with new formations.

The landing ship medium, formerly known as the light amphibious warship, is the service’s first modern stern-landing vessel. Marines will test out the shore-to-shore connector at the Army’s Project Convergence event in early 2024, Defense News reported.

The USMC test vessel derived from a Hornbeck Offshore Supply Vessel.

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The Marine Corps will use one HOS Resolution offshore supply vessel by Hornbeck Offshore Services as a light amphibious warship surrogate for experimentation and operations. (Hornbeck Offshore Services photo)



Also

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The Offshore Supply Vessel type seems to becoming popular in a variety of roles.

Especially if you are not overly worried about crewing them.
 
But it’s just not unmanned ground and aerial vehicles being demoed this year: Rainey said the Army is eager to evaluate an unspecified Marine Corps’ autonomous watercraft.

“We said, ‘Hey, make sure you bring that out to Project Convergence,’” he said.

The Army’s newly established logistics cross-functional team, Rainey explained, will be on site to collect data about that watercraft’s performance which it could potentially use to avoid conducting a timely watercraft study and find ways to save dollars.

“It’s not a total solution. They have a different problem but there’s a lot of overlap,” Rainey said of the Marines.

I wonder if that Hornbeck OSV is outfitted with the same autonomous controls as the Ranger, Nomad and Mariner.


But it could also be this

 
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