The previous post about landing craft was informative and
somewhat disappointing as far as the comments are concerned. Too many people want to ignore the lessons
that we paid in blood to learn in WWII.
People want to acquire large landing craft outfitted with all manner of
sensors and weapons and then cram dozens/hundreds of troops and vehicles on the
craft while completely ignoring the lessons of dispersal of risk, efficiency of
unloading, procurement cost, and ease of production.
Similarly, many people are ignoring the lessons about how to
conduct an amphibious assault. What is
the proper role of a carrier group? What
is the role of aircraft? What is the job
of the escorts? What is the expenditure
rate of munitions in an assault? How
much weight of munitions do we need for fire support and how can we delivery
the required volume? We’re also ignoring
the history of helo survivability over a battlefield. And so on.
All good discussions must begin with a
consideration of history and its lessons.
Before we even begin to contemplate changing doctrine and
tactics, we’d better be absolutely certain we understand why the doctrine and
tactics exist instead of whatever it is we’re thinking about doing. We learned our lessons in WWII and paid the
blood bill for the learning. That doesn’t
mean we can never change anything but it does mean we’d better be awfully sure
we’re making a change for the better and, again, that means thoroughly
understanding what already exists and why.
LCIs carried 180-210 troops and participated in several initial landings. The smaller boats also carried 36 as that was the army platoon size at the time. Today, a Marine Infantry platoon isn't riding in a single ground vehicle and at best can hitch a ride in the CH-53 with several sitting on the floor. Again, these boats will have a longer trip to the beach and need to do so in the same amount of time. Look around for other clues. Cutter boats and navy RHIBs are between 7-11m because they are doing VBSS and get only so much space on a smaller ship and are generally at close range when being placed in the water. The Seals have their CCA sized to drop out a C-130 or 2 out a C-17, the CCM to fit a C-17, and the Sea Lion which fits a C-5 and may even fit a C-17 with a special trailer system. Those requirements to fit in plane limit their box and their boats are still all as large or larger than what is being discussed here. Yes, those boats are faster, and stealthier. They also carry a smaller team that is being suggested here and certainly didn't prioritize an easy ramp function over other qualities needed to make it to the beach.
ReplyDeleteWell, do keep in mind that the Coast Guard, Navy RHIBS, and SEALS aren't really relevant to this conversation since the missions of those folks do not include opposed landings against capable militaries who are shooting at you. Just sayin ....
DeleteYou're drifting way off topic. That's okay, the information is interesting even if not relevant.
DeleteWhile I'm sure the LCI participated in some initial landing somewhere in WWII, that was not the common usage. They were commonly used as follow on transports and were fine in that role. Many/most seem to have been converted into specialty craft (smoke laying, raids, mines, surveillance, and whatnot).
Bob, I can't speak for the Coast Guard, but I think they plan for the possibility they might get shot at. The Seals certainly do. CCA is too small for an M2 CROWS but CCM has one. They all have armor protection and we know they have plans to add loitering munitions in 8 round launchers similar to LRUSV to CCM and likely CCH.
DeleteAndyM, of course they plan on the possibility being shot at. But they don't plan on storming a beach defended by a substantial military force that is shooting at them, potentially with artillery, rockets, missiles, and whatnot.
DeleteI'm not a SEAL expert, of course, but my understanding is that their ideal mission is to quietly infiltrate, either past (under the noses of) a thin security force (most likely at night) or by landing in a place that's undefended. While they certainly allow for the possibility of encountering some fire, if they get into a large scale firefight similar to what the Marines would face during a contested landing, they've probably already lost.
Obviously when the SEALs get to their ultimate goal, there may be an assault then (as with OBL) but they don't expect to fight a whole battalion or brigade there, right?
DeleteThe British seemed to have forgotten a lot of lessons by the time of the Falklands war (which was pretty much a peer war) like getting troops dispersed and ashore as quickly as possible. They dithered about disembarking troops from Sir Galahad until she was hit by an air strike.
ReplyDeleteWell the KISS principle pretty much defined the main amphibious assault vessel of the war, the Higgins boat. Used by Army and Marines, they set the standards of shallow draft, and easy and cheap to mass produce.
ReplyDeleteAs the US military industrial complex has forgotten to do anything cheap and mass produced, perhaps we need to look elsewhere. There are still plenty of smaller ship/boat manufacturers out there. The Higgins boat was the ancestor of other shallow draft boats that Andrew Higgins designed and built for the lumber industry, and (according to Wikipedia) rum runners during prohibition. Here we have a large boating sector for high speed sports fishing and yachting, and a well proven larger vessel production for the oil and gas industry. Perhaps we should turn to them instead of the same people who brought us the LCS.
The Spec Ops folks turned to
AdmiralObvious
DeleteYou are on the right track. Our small boat, yacht and offshore builders are the missing link in fleet expansion.
DeleteSorry, network went wonky for a bit. What I started to say is that the Spec Ops folks turned to the guys building sport 4-wheelers when they needed lightweight scouting vehicles and chose a COIN plane recently that was from a company that modified a crop dusting aircraft design to a poor man's A-10.
ReplyDeleteThe Marines are using a Polaris atv for lmadis that is essentially the reincarnation of the jeep.
DeleteThe saying that those who forget history are condemned to relive it is mostly true. But it shouldn't stop us looking for things that have changed since the Pacific war. I agree with you that there is no point in stuffing whatever platform with sensors there are still a lot of differences between the sensors that were in use in 1945 and what is installed today. It is also true that most warships and aircraft have a lot more sensing abilities now (anything remotely close to a sophisticated RWR or a digital camera on an Hellcat or an Iowa class ?). Since it can be assumed that the potential enemies will use them don't you think that it would be worthwhile to think about how to use them and mitigate the problems they generate (data overload, maintenance issues, software reliability, hallucinations ... etc) while taking advantage of they can bring to the fight ? That would be a nice subject I think.
ReplyDeleteThe Jacques Cassard fan club.
"don't you think that it would be worthwhile to think about how to use them"
DeleteOf course it would! What idiot would say otherwise?
As you know from your careful reading of the comments, the anti-sensor/weapons/etc. sentiment is being applied ONLY to landing craft whose purpose does not require sensors, weapons, and whatever else anyone can imagine.
Escorts, whose JOB it is to protect against threats to the landing craft, certainly need sensors and weapons.
"That would be a nice subject I think."
This entire blog has been about the dangers of overly complex technology and how to work around them as well as describing how to EFFECTIVELY integrate required technology into tactics, doctrine, and operations.
Royal Marines use LCVP Mk5 and LCU Mk10, analogous to WW2 landing craft. They are fine but issues that you have identified several times cannot be taken out of the equation
ReplyDeleteMass - without critical mass where losses are expected, and factored in then contested landings are not happening.
Support - naval gunfire, CAS, etc etc etc. Without it any landing craft is just a water borne coffin. You have made the point that 5inch guns are severely deficient in terms of capability. Current NATO vessels have no way of replicating the level of gunfire support available at Normandy or in the Pacific and I believe in the flying pig version of whatever plane we have being able to dominate the beaches and beyond with enough accuracy to permit a successful landing.
Even if we had enough landing craft, how are they going to get there. I'm sure the USN/RN are going to want their very expensive LPDs to be in such a contested environment.
Unless governments are serious about having assets that they are comfortable about losing then give up the pretence.
Fundamentally you're asking us to read more, and exercise critical thinking, to gain knowledge. That notion applies to lots more than just responding to your posts in today's age.
ReplyDeleteYep! You got it!
DeleteMy KISS idea involves port seizures. Buy a couple small, used common looking merchant ships with cranes and flag them Panamanian or Liberian as is common. They can support peacetime ops, but will be used by Marines to practice surprise port seizures.
ReplyDeleteAll ports are defended especially in wartime. There are always security infantrymen around and a back up force nearby with regular military units in the area. So this merchant ship simply sails up to dock at the port, then suddenly hundreds of Marines start running off, maybe some swinging from the ships. Ship cranes start swinging LAVs to the pier, as confused locals just watch the show. The Marines quickly push into the port, exchange some gunfire and prepare to repel the local military forces while Navy destroyers show up for fire support and other cargo ships arrive.
I realize a prepared enemy will intercept such ships with boats and ask questions, but most ports have lots of traffic and local military officers who would never think a bold port seizure may be attempted
"So this merchant ship simply sails up to dock"
DeleteIn a war, with the threat of biological, nuclear, and chemical weapons, to say nothing of massive conventional weapons or, simply, the age old practice of sinking a ship in a channel to render the port useless, no country is going to allow an unidentified ship within two hundred miles of a port. ANY unidentified ship will be sunk as a matter of course, hundreds of miles from port.
I mean, come on, put yourself in a commander's shoes. You're charged with defending a port. Are you going to take the slightest chance of allowing an unidentified ship, quite possibly an enemy ship, to get anywhere near your port? Of course not! You'll do what any sane commander would do and assume it's an enemy ship and sink it.
I hear a lot of these ideas about disguising weapons on merchant ships because the enemy won't know if they're friendly or not and they'll be confused. They won't be confused! They'll just sink anything they can't positively identify. This has been the way of war since ships were invented.
"I realize a prepared enemy will intercept such ships with boats and ask questions"
No they won't! They'll sink it and ask questions after the war, if they happen to remember.
This is analogous to a carrier group allowing an unidentified boat to approach the carrier because they don't know for sure if it's friendly or not. THAT WON'T HAPPEN. The boat will be sunk a hundred miles out as a matter of routine.
War zones are so named because there is no quarter given or expected. You kill anything that you can't quickly and positively identify.
In WWII, our carrier pilots were told in no uncertain terms that if they failed to follow the proper 'safe' flight paths while returning to the carrier, the escorts would instantly open fire on them without bothering to try to get an ID. No one is going to risk a carrier on a 'maybe' or 'I'm not sure'. The same would apply to a port.
If a ship can't be identified on the port's expected shipping list, it gets sunk.
We currently track thousands of ships every minute of every day. That tracking will only intensify in a war. There won't be merchant ships just sailing randomly around. Every ship will be making every effort to be known to the destination port. If a ship is unidentified, it's pretty safe to assume it's an enemy.
I can't emphasize this enough.