USMC M1150 Assault Breachers

Armor/AFV
21

Well, it still a gonna be a while til this transition is completed.
In the meantime there will be new Commandants, some new crisis, new threats etc. etc. … new ideas.
Interestingly … Australia being much closer to a potential “Pacific” scenario of conflict is actually modernizing and beefing up their forces with even more heavy assets … with a similar threat assesment in mind.
Or look at Taiwan …
The Canadians corrected their misjudgment just in time … Leo 2s all over the place. The Dutch did the same as the Corps now …getting rid of their Leo 2s and PzHb 2ooo’s … as fast as possible … and look at them now … a few years later … begging & borrowing.
Believing the Army could, might or will step in with their heavy assets if needed … in time … is wishful thinking.
Unless the whole idea is to the let the Marines handle the “Pacific” exclusively … and as Dan just noted … what about the rest of the world ?
A potential “Chinese Threat” is more to their immediate neighbors and in Afrika rather than “Island hopping” in the Pacific.

my 2 cents in addition …

Cheers
Christopher

22

Yes/No, tanks are all gone and lots of other changes have already been completed.

23

… so we will just have to wait until they change everything allover again :thinking:

24

I kinda hope your right but long before hand they have not upgraded versions. I have felt the M1A1 would be last heavy tank used by the MC. If they do go back it will be because the poop has really hit the fan and unless on our soil I don’t see us having the stomach for that kind of warfare as a nation.

25

Actually, the divestment of the USMC M1A1 tanks is a political and a budgetary decision. One has to read the Defense Blogs consistently to understand the reasons why.

General Berger, Commandant of the USMC, predicted that Congress would not increase the Corps budget for modernization, and in reality, the USMC didn’t ask for $10USD more to modernize, nor did Congress increase the Marine’s budget either. So the Corps had to divest in Legacy vehicles, artillery, and rotorcraft to save money, and General Berger did say that the Corps did indeed save money doing this, but he didn’t say how much, nor did he say where the saved money is going towards.

One funding area is building new US Navy Light Amphibious Warships (LAWs) that will cruise around INDO-PACOM with 75 Marines aboard and their JLTVs and light vehicles. There is controversy in this too as LAWs are only armed with a single 25mm Mk 38 Mod 2 autocannon and a few machine guns, and thus very light armament with no Anti-Air, Anti-Sub, and Anti-Surface missiles—Defense analysts were quick to call this out.

So the US Marine Corps wants to use ATGMs, HiMARS with Anti-ship missiles, drones, loitering munitions, and more armed UAVs to counter enemy armor from far away. If the concept will work is anyone’s guess as I can’t seem to fathom Marines lugging 100 loitering munitions onto an island to fire at 100 enemy vehicles. But loitering munitions can fly in from dozens of miles away so the concept might prove useful instead of getting tanks onto the islands and slugging it out with enemy armor—attack them from above with cheap drones and munitions.

Do I think that the USMC still needs tanks? Yes, I do, because like at Ft. Knox, the USMC have bases that require an armored vehicle to get in the way as a roadblock to any type of assault, both foreign and domestic. Tanks garner respect, and no one dares attack the Gold Repository at Ft. Knox because there are US Army M1A2s and AH-64s stationed nearby on call to help.

The USMC could benefit from buying the MPF Light Tanks with Active-Protection and ERA. Yes, it would be a very dark day if any CONUS USMC base gets attacked, but as the US Capitol Insurrection showed, sometimes a tank is definitely needed to defend a base and repel whatever invaders crash through.

26

One though comes to my mind while following recent developments, is making the Corps either a really independent Branch (from the Navy) and/or make a “split” and have the Army as a “Patron” as well.
The last 20 years did show that the Marines didn’t need to rely on the Navy to deploy in the Middle East. Once on the ground they turned more in to an Army (-like) ground combat asset / supplement.
Maybe the Army could also profit (and help fund) from a Marine element at their disposal in the Atlantic / EMEA regions.
The new doctrine is to “Pacific / Navy” orientated for my taste … narrowing the Marines down to a very specific task.
What happens if something with the North Stream project goes south ? The Russians enter the Baltic’s under some fony circumstance ?
The Army … and especially the rest of NATO would need far too long for an adequate rapid response to make an impact (although close by neighbors) , Germany being the first to chicken … then send Marines and Airborne units in to do exactly what ? The NATO Navy’s would be blown out of the East See and the “life line” the Scandinavia ruptured.
Maybe a reorientation / reorganization in an Atlantic and a Pacific (EMEA) force will be the solution in the long run.
Having my MOS now deleted and becoming history is more of a personal /sad thing … but never the less I still don’t get the strive for Anti-Ship capability instead.

Cheers
Christopher