Marine Amphibious Lift - Who Needs Gators?

Sometimes it's fun to take a break from LCS-bashing although the Navy makes it so darn easy.  Anyway, let's take a look at Marine Corp amphibious lift, today.  Now, I know that amphibious assault is an article of faith with many people but try to consider the following discussion with an open mind.

What is the purpose of amphibious lift?  Why, to put Marines ashore, of course.  We did it repeatedly in WWII and several times since.  And what is the amphibious lift capacity, currently?  Here are the recent lift requirements (1).

1980 = 1.15 MEF (66,252 Marines + equipment)
1991 = 2.5 MEB AE (33,793 Marines + equipment)
2006 = 2.0 MEB AE (23,016 Marines + equipment)

MEF = Marine Expeditionary Force
MEB AE = Marine Expeditionary Brigade, Assault Echelon, usually shortened to MEB
Note - Marine totals include some Navy support elements

So, we see a steady decline in the lift capacity requirement.  Most of the decline is associated with the simple reality imposed by budget limitations over the last several decades rather than absolute strategic and operational necessity.  Nonetheless, we see a steady decrease.  The current lift requirement is met by a goal of 33 amphibious ships (LHA, LPD, and so on).



Amphibious Lift - How Much is Too Much?

That much lift, 33 ships, is a significant chunk of the naval fleet both in terms of numbers and, more importantly, cost.  New build amphibious ships are running $1B-$3.5B and heading up all the time.

Let's go back to the seemingly simple question - What is the purpose of amphibious lift? - and look a bit closer.  There are two general applications for amphibious lift:  not surprisingly, during war and during peace.  Wartime lift would be associated with China, Iran, N. Korea, or various small Third World countries.  Peacetime lift would be associated with hostage rescue, embassy evacuation, localized stabilization operations, surgical strikes associated with terrorism or piracy, raids, Special Ops, and so on.  What are the likelihood of each of these?

1. I don't see any possibility of a land invasion of China under any circumstance. We'd have to be insane.  Thus, massive amphibious capability is not needed.

2. I don't see the likelihood of large scale amphibious invasions of Iran/N. Korea since each has neighboring "friendly" countries that we would use as overland invasion portals. I do see the possibility of small scale amphibious flanking attacks which would require company to regiment size amphibious capability.

3. I see very likely and fairly frequent need for "peacetime", short term, small scale amphibious ops in third world countries - putting out fires, so to speak. As stated these ops would be hostage rescue, raids, surgical strikes on specific and limited targets, and so on. These would require company size (200 Marines) or less amphibious capability.

With the above in mind, suggest that we don't need nearly as much large scale amphibious capability as we have. I do, however, see the need for more (we don't really have any, currently) small scale, company size amphibious ships.  Thus, our cursory thought exercise suggests that rather than needing a large lift capacity what we really need is 10-15 small, company sized ships for the far more common peacetime ops and a relatively small handful of larger ships for the Iran/N. Korea scenario.  So, instead of 33 large amphibious ships that we have now, 10-15 small ships plus 6 larger ships would suffice. 

Hmm... A redesigned LCS or JHSV would almost fit the bill for a Company size amphibious ship, wouldn't it?  But, I digress.



Company Size?

In fact, I see in the Feb '12 Naval Institute Proceedings (pg. 44) that the Marines are, indeed, experimenting with Company size landing forces, dubbed Company Landing Teams. Presumably, it's a recognition that, short of total war, the most common type of amphibious activity involves raids, hostage rescues, embassy protection/evacuation, etc. as we discussed.  To be fair, the author does not propose using the LCS as a mini-gator or constructing purpose-built mini-gators but, instead, suggests basing the Company and MV-22s on carriers. He notes that current carrier air wings are well under the carrier's designed capacity and, therefore, he suggests that the carriers have room. Undersized air wings? Stop me if this sounds familiar - it should since we discussed it here. 

This analysis has been a simple thought exercise in matching anticipated operations and requirements to our force structure.  What I see as our likely needs doesn't match our current structure.

As I stated at the outset, amphibious lift is an article of faith for many and I'm perfectly willing to be persuaded that we need more than I've just called for.  Feel free to explain why you think we need more but do it with facts, not just a vague statement that we might someday need more.  Using that reasoning, we should build 400 carriers, 1000 amphibious ships, and so on, because you just never know what might happen. 


(1)  Congressional Research Services, Navy LPD-17 Amphibious Ship Procurement: Background, Issues, and Options for Congress, Ronald O'Rourke, 16-Mar-11