Reader AndyM had recently offered an absolutely masterful
summation of Marine Corps acquisition programs.
He is dead on. Indeed, this thought can be expanded to the entire Navy! Consider some recent Navy acquisition programs:
Granted, each has incorporated some technology improvements
but none have been clean sheet, unconstrained, new designs with future combat
in mind. This blog has proposed many
platforms that are designed with future combat requirements in mind and none
bear any resemblance to the Navy’s tired repeats. Future combat will require entirely new ways
of approaching stealth, armor, firepower, surveillance, sensors, ship design,
and doctrine/tactics. None of that has
been incorporated into recent acquisition programs.
Not only have these platforms remained almost unchanged,
unbelievably, some have been downgraded in order to keep them the same! For example, the new Burkes have had their
critical radars downsized in order to fit into the same platform. The future war requirements have changed but
the Navy has proudly demonstrated that the Burke will not change, by God! The Navy wants no part of a new ship when
they can keep making the same old one!
Where are the stealthy carriers with long range fighter air
wings? Where are the Visby-like stealth
ships? Where are the UAV carriers? Where are the pure passive platforms, ship
and aircraft? Where are the dedicated
ASW corvettes? And so on.
As AndyM observed, this pattern of repeats clearly
demonstrates an organization bereft of ideas which, in turn, denotes an
organization bereft of professional warriors capable of analyzing combat and
correctly predicting future needs. Even
the Marines didn’t analyze future combat in making their idiotic and useless
shift to being pointless missile shooters;
they analyzed future budget share and changed to preserve their slice of
the pie.
We must break the cycle of repeats whose main justification
is that they’re viewed as “safe” acquisition programs.
__________________________
Nothing says dead on ideas like just making a new repeat, LCAC, H-53 and LCU.[1]
He is dead on. Indeed, this thought can be expanded to the entire Navy! Consider some recent Navy acquisition programs:
- LCU-1700 – nearly an exact duplicate of the previous LCU class
- H-53 – in production since the 1960’s
- SSC (Ship to Shore Connector) – nearly an exact duplicate of the original LCAC
- Burke – rapidly approaching its centennial year of production
- Constellation (mini-Burke) – just a scaled down Burke
- Virginia – an upgraded Los Angeles class submarine
- F-18 Super Hornet – a little bigger regular Hornet
- Ford – a bigger repeat of the Nimitz with some [thus far] failed technological gimmicks thrown in
- E-2D – repeat of the E-2C with the next higher letter; 22 more versions to go before a new aircraft design is needed
- ACV – repeat of the AAV
This is symptomatic of a deeper root cause, which is that ever since the Cold War ended, we've no longer been maintaining rapid designing and fielding cycles. Almost all our equipment today was essentially designed during the Carter administration, 50 years ago.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, the problem is also that new developmental programs take so long to come to fruition, and have a good chance of never panning out. The Army has been using Abrams for the last 40 years because every single Abrams replacement program has failed miserably (although, to be fair, it also bears pointing out that tanks are one aspect where it's a lot easier to update them to remain relevant, because the changes are internal to the hullform - new armor arrays, new ammunition, new optics and systems).
I'm reminded of the time when the Army was trying to field the bleeding edge Cheyenne attack helicopter, and then eventually gave up on the program, because in the time and money they'd spent to put together 6 R&D airframes, they'd also bought 1100 Cobras that were actively serving in Vietnam.
"we've no longer been maintaining rapid designing and fielding cycles"
DeleteDuring WWII, designers quite rightly sacrificed bleeding edge advancement for rapid fielding. Today, the military has become infatuated with bleeding edge and have sacrificed rapid fielding. Our priorities are out of whack and must change.
"On the other hand, the problem is also that new developmental programs take so long to come to fruition, and have a good chance of never panning out. "
The answer is the same as above.
" tanks are one aspect where it's a lot easier to update them to remain relevant"
Is that true? If you were designing a new tank for future combat and were unconstrained by previous designs, would you produce a bigger, heavier Abrams or would your design be entirely different with, say, anti-drone sensors/weapons built in, a visible and IR stealth design, much reduced weight for transportability and poor surface movement, perhaps a scaled down rail gun, integrated active protection (as opposed to add-ons), a different power plant, 360 deg passive sensors, perhaps an integrated mini-drone for scouting and targeting, etc.? I'm 100% sure that an unconstrained new design wouldn't turn out to be an Abrams with a new paint job.
When I'm talking about keeping relevant, what I mean is upgrading older tanks, as opposed to a clean sheet new design. It has to do with the nature of ground combat, and how tanks fight: in direct line of sight.
DeleteWhen you fight in visual range, there's not really a lot that technology can do to cover you, because visual range, within 1000 yards, that does a lot to equalise technological advantages. It all comes down to who sees first, who aims first, who shoots first.
It's much cheaper to make updated tank shells to keep tanks relevant. I'll give you a historical example - after the fall of the Cold War, the Army got to see samples of Kontakt-5 ERA the Soviets were using, and got to do destructive test fires against Soviet tanks mounting Kontakt-5. They found an unwelcome surprise - it could actually defeat our M829 kinetic penetrators from front and side hits. The solution was the crash program to develop new long rod kinetic penetrators, which we're currently on the 5th iteration of, the M829A4.
Hell, the updating of old tanks is currently what we're doing. We built so many basic Abrams in the Cold War that we still have over 11,000 tanks in deep storage out in the desert, which are the hulls we use for producing new Abrams. Bring them into the depot, remove the old armor arrays, install the new passive armor, install ERA, install new optics, and send them to unit where they get the newest ammo.
Ground combat really is one aspect where you wouldn't see as much pronounced technological progression compared to fighters or warships, because fundamentally, the role and employment of tanks hasn't really changed that much over the last century. Tanks are the breakthrough element smashing through defenses, tanks provide direct fire support to the infantry, tanks close with and defeat the enemy's tanks. I'd argue the last major revolution in tank doctrine happened in the 50s with the Centurion and the T-54 bringing forth the main battle tank: a tank that had the firepower and armor of a heavy tank with the mobility and production numbers of a medium tank, the roles consolidated onto one platform.
"Is that true? If you were designing a new tank for future combat and were unconstrained by previous designs, would you produce a bigger, heavier Abrams or would your design be entirely different with"
DeleteThis is a separate thing from updating older tanks to remain relevant. That said, it's worth noting that the weight growth of the later Abrams over the early tanks is because there is so much shit that got bolted on that needs a counterweight added. The Abrams is the right size for what it needs to do (carrying armor, 40 rounds of gun ammo, crew, and keeping enough space so that it's comfortable enough for the crew to fight in it buttoned up for weeks). We can combat the weight growth by a more holistic redesign of the systems, fitting them in from the start instead of things getting bolted on as needed (such as the multiple CROWS and their counterweights). There's also weight savings we can get by transitioning certain hydraulic systems to electrical motors, as well as rewiring efforts - the Abrams uses 2.5 tons of copper wire, which is weight we can drastically save by going to fiber optic wiring.
IR and visual stealthing measures already exist for tanks, it's called camo nets and foliage. The problem for tanks is that they're fighting in visual range of other tanks, and so there's not really much that you can do for visual stealth. IR reduction measures on the Abrams are already quite good, the problem is that there is no IR stealth that exists in the world that can defeat thermal imagers - the Javelin's handheld thermal imager only needs a temperature difference of 1 degree celsius to give it enough contrast to form a clear image, and that's one of the weaker imagers out there.
Testing has been done with carrying organic mini drones for scouting, but that's run into a certain psychological problem, which is that now that they have the drone, it's made tankers ever more cautious and hesitent, causing decision paralysis as they wait for scouting and more information. I just don't think that's a good idea, propogating the decision paralysis of the higher levels down to the tanks.
I do agree that we need anti drone weapons, although I don't agree that these should be on the tank, because these are going to be expensive sensitive antennas and sensors that are going to be exposed to fire. My preferred approach would be for several dedicated Anti-UAS/CRAM vehicles attached to the tank company, so that you'd have 1 vic with every platoon to cover them.
"keeping relevant"
DeleteWe're talking about two different things. "Keeping relevant", as you put it, is just incremental upgrades to a perfectly adequate item. Nothing wrong with that. That's just normal throughout the life of an item. I'm talking about when the time comes for a wholesale replacement such as the ACV for the AAV. At some point, the Abrams will need a wholesale replacement and, at that point, it should be a new design, unconstrained by the previous Abrams instead of yet another Abrams. Another example is the Navy's Burke. It is long past time for a brand new design warship for the modern naval battlefield and I've described many times what a modern ship should be and do. Instead, the Navy replaced the Burke with yet another badly compromised Burke that is obsolete from the start.
Totally agree.
ReplyDeleteBeyond that, what’s to say…?
For all the ACV's flaws as a repeat of the AAV, at some point, the replacement for a metal box is just another metal box. It bears noting that the ACV entrants were all chosen from existing COTS designs as a risk mitigation measure, after the failure of the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle.
ReplyDeleteWe can observe that the Chinese, too, are under similar constraints, given that the PLAN Marines are apparently doing a joint buy of the PLA Ground Forces' new 8x8 APC, instead of a clean sheet sucessor to the ZBD-05 and ZTD-05 (or even a technology refresh).
"the replacement for a metal box is just another metal box."
DeleteSo, you're suggesting that the replacement for the wood and fabric WWI Sopwith Camel is an endless string of wood and fabric aircrafts? The replacement for sailing warships was more sailing warships? Come on, now. If you were designing a clean sheet amphibious landing craft, unconstrained by anything that came before, are you sure you'd wind up with the ACV? I wouldn't!
"ACV entrants were all chosen from existing COTS designs as a risk mitigation measure"
This is what our military acquisition efforts have largely become: safe choices whose main feature is avoidance of programmatic risk. The Constellation is a mini-Burke. The Burke Flt III is a near identical copy of the previous Burke. And so on.
There's nothing wrong with wringing the most you can out of a design and building a few subsequent iterations that incorporate the lessons from the previous. The "D" model of the P-51 Mustang was the improved version of the "A", for example. But, at some point, you have to advance to a new design. Jet engines instead of radial, missiles instead of guns (but don't totally abandon guns!), back slanted wings instead of straight, stealth, radar instead of eyeballs, etc.
China's new amphibious assault vehicle features unmanned turret. Likely, it is still under development as it has not shown in last September's military parade. China then emphasized all displayed were then active duty equipment.
Deletehttps://www.armyrecognition.com/news/army-news/2025/china-tests-new-family-of-amphibious-infantry-fighting-vehicles-to-replace-the-type-05
"So, you're suggesting that the replacement for the wood and fabric WWI Sopwith Camel is an endless string of wood and fabric aircrafts? The replacement for sailing warships was more sailing warships? Come on, now. If you were designing a clean sheet amphibious landing craft, unconstrained by anything that came before, are you sure you'd wind up with the ACV? I wouldn't!"
DeleteIn the 60 years since Vietnam, the role, function and employment of the AAV as an amphibious armored personnel carrier has not appreciably changed. It is an infantry transport. It swims from the landing ship, it lands on the beach, it carries its troops on land providing them a measure of protected transport. It is a troop transport. It does not need to be anything more than that.
Sometimes, we pursue the bleeding edge where it's not needed, and we overcomplicate things.
Anyway, the Marines did try to do a clean sheet amphibious landing craft, unconstrained by anything that came before, and they ended up with the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, which they cancelled over a decade ago, and which you've criticised in the past. The Japanese are making their own EFV project, and I wish them all the best, but I can't help but think that they're going to run into the same problems as before.
Meanwhile, the Chinese, who're facing the prospect of invading Taiwan, seem to have decided that having the PLA Army and Marine Corps use the same amphibious 8x8 APC is good enough for their purposes.
"But, at some point, you have to advance to a new design. Jet engines instead of radial, missiles instead of guns (but don't totally abandon guns!), back slanted wings instead of straight, stealth, radar instead of eyeballs, etc."
While that's true, fundamentally the paradigms of ground combat haven't really been changed that much by technology. The improvements have really been more incremental and evolutionary rather than revolutionary. Our vehicles have better guns, better armor, better optics, better comms, better sensors, but fundamentally they're still fighting in the same way. This is just a consequence of how ground combat is fought, in direct line of sight.
The biggest revolutions in ground combat, in my opinion, have been the introduction of GPS navigation, improved C3 systems (Blue Force Tracker), and propagating night vision right down to the infantry. The biggest improvements that a present day force has over its WW2 counterparts are the superior navigation, command and control, and the ability to fight equally capably in the day and the night, wereas a WW2 force is severely limited in a night engagement.
"So, you're suggesting that the replacement for the wood and fabric WWI Sopwith Camel is an endless string of wood and fabric aircrafts? The replacement for sailing warships was more sailing warships? Come on, now. If you were designing a clean sheet amphibious landing craft, unconstrained by anything that came before, are you sure you'd wind up with the ACV? I wouldn't!"
DeleteIn the 60 years since Vietnam, the role, function and employment of the AAV as an amphibious armored personnel carrier has not appreciably changed. It is an infantry transport. It swims from the landing ship, it lands on the beach, it carries its troops on land providing them a measure of protected transport. It is a troop transport. It does not need to be anything more than that.
Sometimes, we pursue the bleeding edge where it's not needed, and we overcomplicate things.
Anyway, the Marines did try to do a clean sheet amphibious landing craft, unconstrained by anything that came before, and they ended up with the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, which they cancelled over a decade ago, and which you've criticised in the past. The Japanese are making their own EFV project, and I wish them all the best, but I can't help but think that they're going to run into the same problems as before.
Meanwhile, the Chinese, who're facing the prospect of invading Taiwan, seem to have decided that having the PLA Army and Marine Corps use the same amphibious 8x8 APC is good enough for their purposes.
"But, at some point, you have to advance to a new design. Jet engines instead of radial, missiles instead of guns (but don't totally abandon guns!), back slanted wings instead of straight, stealth, radar instead of eyeballs, etc."
While that's true, fundamentally the paradigms of ground combat haven't really been changed that much by technology. The improvements have really been more incremental and evolutionary rather than revolutionary. Our vehicles have better guns, better armor, better optics, better comms, better sensors, but fundamentally they're still fighting in the same way. This is just a consequence of how ground combat is fought, in direct line of sight.
The biggest revolutions in ground combat, in my opinion, have been the introduction of GPS navigation, improved C3 systems (Blue Force Tracker), and propagating night vision right down to the infantry. The biggest improvements that a present day force has over its WW2 counterparts are the superior navigation, command and control, and the ability to fight equally capably in the day and the night, wereas a WW2 force is severely limited in a night engagement.
"For all the ACV's flaws as a repeat of the AAV, at some point, the replacement for a metal box is just another metal box."
DeleteYou deserve a better answer than I gave you because, in some cases, you're correct. However, your statement is incorrect as a general matter. It's important to understand and recognize the difference and here it is ...
For a perfectly good piece of equipment that meets all current task requirements, the replacement just needs to be a slightly modernized but otherwise more or less identical version.
However, and this is the difference, if the piece of equipment does not (or never has!) adequately met the task requirements then the replacement should NOT be a repeat. It should be a new design.
For example, modern rifles are perfectly adequate for their task. They don't need a new design replacement. Upgrade whatever minor improvements you can, if any, and call it a day. The replacement for a rifle is a rifle (a metal box for a metal box, as you put it). HOWEVER, the AAV does not and never has adequately met its task requirements. It is too slow in the water, lacks reserve buoyancy for safe operations, is unsuited for use in any but very calm seas, is too lightly protected to be the frontal assault vehicle once on land, offers no effective firepower, has no effective means of egress at sea in the event of sinking, etc. In short, it's a poor landing craft and a poor APC for frontal assault which is what an opposed landing is. Therefore, replacing the AAV with the EFV/ACV or yet another essentially duplicate metal box is just propagating a failure. In this case, the replacement for a metal box is NOT a metal box; it is a new design.
Do you see the difference and see why your statement is sometimes correct and appropriate and sometimes not?
"is too lightly protected to be the frontal assault vehicle once on land"
DeleteThe problem here is that you're conflating two things: protected transport and an assault vehicle.
As a protected transport, the ACV is fine. It has .50cal HMG protection, the exact same protection the ZBD-05 has, the exact same protection other swimming APCs in the world share. In terms of anti personnel firepower, it has a .50 HMG and a 40mm automatic grenade launcher. A regular infantry _platoon_ would have only ONE of these crew served support weapons; the ACV effectively gives each _squad_ TWO crew served support weapons. Again, this is on par with other 8x8 offerings across the world - even our adversaries have settled on .50 HMG/40mm AGL as the APC weapon, with 30mm autocannon as the 8x8 IFV weapon.
APCs do not have significant anti-fortification capability because they are doctrinally intended to work in concert with tanks, which are the breakthrough element that has the anti-fortification capability to smash through enemy defenses. Historically, that was the mission of the Marines' M1A1 tanks, but we all know they went and got rid of all their tanks. The tanks, delivered by LCAC, were supposed to be the breakthrough element to get past the beach defenses and continue being the frontal assault vehicle on land.
This is like marking down the Flower-class corvettes for not having torpedoes for ASuW, or complaining a tack hammer can't break things like a sledgehammer. That's unfair to them because it's not their job; likewise, anti-fortification work is not the job of an APC. It's the job of the tanks, and the assault gun.
Note that I am not saying that the ACV is the right choice, or how I would have run this program. All I'm saying is that ON LAND, in the role of a protected infantry transport, the ACV is fine. It is on par with other offerings worldwide. It fulfils its role within the paradigms of ground combat. The problem is that as an _amphibious assault_ APC, it spends a not-insignificant amount of its time in the water, and it has to assault through the water to get to the beach, whereas on land, you can just go flat out pedal to the metal on the ground.
The Chinese looked at this problem, and they decided that rather than try to combine the assault gun and the infantry transport into one platform, they were going to have the ZTD-05 assault gun and the ZBD-05 infantry fighting vehicle to complement each other. I think that is the way to go here - a SEPARATE purpose designed assault vehicle, carrying a 105mm gun to destroy fortifications and provide direct fire support to the existing APCs, designed off a common hull for logistics consolidation.
"As a protected transport, the ACV is fine"
DeleteThat, however, is not it's job in the context of an amphibious assault. There is no use for protected transport in an amphibious assault. In an amphibious assault, you are, almost by definition, already at your objective. It's just a matter of securing it. For that, you need an anti-fortification/anti-personnel vehicle, not a light APC.
Now, one might be tempted to make the argument that once off the beach and past the initial resistance, the Marines WILL need an APC. However, again, that is not the Marine's job. The follow on push inland is the job of the Army with their own tanks, artillery, APCs, etc.
"That, however, is not it's job in the context of an amphibious assault. There is no use for protected transport in an amphibious assault. "
DeleteBy that logic, there is no use for an APC in a land assault. Trucks could just bring the troops to the objective and then they march the rest of the way. That is not the case!
My friend, the ACV's role has not changed at all. It is still a protected transport that is bringing troops to the objective. That is, in fact, the role of the APC in land combat. You need your troops to be protected against enemy fire until they get to the objective.
Look at Saving Private Ryan's opening scene, with how they got cut down on the beach with no cover, how machinegunners were lighting ip Higgins boats. That's gnarly.
The HMG/AGL combo is an effective anti personnel weapons fit. It is not an effective anti fortification weapon because on land, that's what you have tanks for. The tanks are your anti fortification weapon, your armored fist that smashes through the defenses.
The problem is that the Marines don't have tanks anymore. So now they're trying to assault with just APCs, hoping that gunships and F-35s and the air wing will compensate for that.
Like I said earlier, fellas. Maybe we're looking at this the wrong way. Maybe the answer is a better, cheaper, faster landing craft to get the vehicles on to the show.
DeleteOr follow the Chinese and build a swimming assault gun, like their ZTD-05.
"By that logic, there is no use for an APC in a land assault."
DeleteNo ... You're missing the difference between an amphibious assault and an inland maneuver. In an amphibious assault, the troops are ALREADY at the target. The landing craft drops them onto the target. In an inland battle, the troops must be transported to the battle site and an APC IS required. To use your example of Normandy, had their been APCs there, they would have been bogged down on the beach, static targets with a life expectancy of minutes.
Think about it, what does an APC do? It delivers troops to a point near the battle AT WHICH POINT THEY DISEMBARK. Well, in an amphibious assault, they're already at the target and, doctrinally, they would dismount at the beach so, again, no use for an APC!
You seem to think I'm arguing against APCs, in general. I'm not. They're vital ... but not in an amphibious assault. As the Marines found in WWII, what was needed was an anti-fortification/anti-personnel vehicle which was the LVT(A). We need a modern version of that, not an APC.
"Maybe the answer is a better, cheaper, faster landing craft to get the vehicles"
DeleteYou're half right. Yes, we need better landing craft but we also need lighter, cheaper, more specialized vehicles. There's just no way an Abrams, even if you could somehow magically transport it to a beach, is going to be able to effectively traverse a beach and all the obstacles, both natural and enemy-made, to get off the beach.
So, landing craft is half the equation but the other half is the vehicle itself. China addressed this by producing swimming, specialized, light vehicles. Is this the best approach? I don't know but it's far better than our approach!
There's also the Mulberry Harbor analogues that China's building. Sure, they're going to be vulnerable, no doubt, but it provides a means of rapid reinforcement once the initial fight for the beach has been won.
DeleteYou've managed to highlight what's collegially called bureaucratic inertia.
ReplyDeleteIt's more than that. It's fear. Fear of yet another programmatic failure. Thus, the desire to build something that is already not a failure instead of building what we really need. The Burke Flt III is not what we really need, it's what's safe because we're already building them. Sure, the Flt III is obsolete and unsuited for future naval combat but we can build it without too much fear of program failure.
DeleteWe have a lot of what I think of as "Irish Elk" evolution going on. Other species fade away and what's left grows and has lost its resilience for swings in their environment. Big deck amphibs with a well deck that can only launch 2 LCAC, 1 LCU, and associated ACVs at close range. We can't even nest smaller connectors side by side usefully as the ramp into the well is only in the well's centerline now for LCAC ramp width. I really look at the LCU replacement as a miss as we could work with the Army MSVL team to design a version that fits a well deck, ideally 4 per well and still keep the LCACs load so we are doubling the load per well should we displace the LCACs for another platform.
ReplyDeleteThink about that from an operational risk/attrition perspective. Are four landing craft per transport vessel really a combat resilient load? Do we really think we won't suffer casualties to landing craft in an opposed landing? Or, just simple mechanical failure? Also, consider the concentration of troops in each landing craft when we lose one. Is it really wise to concentrate that many troops in one large target? We've forgotten the combat lessons of WWII.
DeleteConcentration of troops in one large target. Agree, go back to using APA's for troop landing, larger number of smaller landing craft with smaller number of troops embarked. Use the large deck amphibs for heavy equipment. One of the ships I served on was LKA 113 (Charleston), which was an assault cargo ship. Normal connectors were 4 LCM(8) and several LCVP. You could usually off load the entire vehicle cargo at anchor in less than a day. Off loading personel only should go way quicker. I would think it would not be that hard to come up with a new fast attack transport design.
Delete"4 LCM(8) and several LCVP."
DeleteA vast improvement but still woefully inadequate for combat. WWII APA's carried some 2 dozen+ landing craft of various types for dispersal of risk and mitigation of attrition.
I think we need to know why we cut down well deck length for one. I know the sloshing can be a problem, but 3 LCAC 6 LCM is an improvement. Then the challenge is when you get so small you can't move what you need to move or lack seakeeping. We really should look at placing an LSMR into an MEU as it could deck carry landing craft like it does the lighterage system. Heck, even LHAs used to carry LCMs con the flight deck. Just hunt history for good ideas we got away from. Find out why we got away from it.
DeletePerhaps the ESD/ESB could be a tag along that carries a gaggle of pre-loaded landing craft to the fight... They're probably more useful as medium lift ships than helo bases, especially in a port seizure situation!
Delete( might as well find a use for them, the Navy is ditching them fast as they can build them!)
Also in that vein... I wonder if the EPFs might be useful as connectors?
Perhaps in decent seas they could use that stern ramp for offloading LH platforms? If not vehicles ( which could be their first preloaded load) then surely troops...
"Perhaps the ESD/ESB could be a tag along that carries a gaggle of pre-loaded landing craft to the fight.."
DeleteWell, that would be better than the complete absence of purpose they now serve! Of course, if that vessel were sunk prior to arrival at the assault site, the entire assault would be halted! WWII APA's each carried some two dozen+ landing craft. The loss of any one APA, while serious, would not cripple the assault itself.
There's no getting around it. The Navy designed and built an entire class of ships that had no purpose (no CONOPS prior to design) and are now useless. To be fair, they did the same for the LCS, Zumwalt and, to a large extent, the Ford.
"Of course, if that vessel were sunk prior to arrival at the assault site, the entire assault would be halted! "
DeleteId envisioned the extra landing craft, and whatever vehicles we preload them with as supplements to what the L-ships currently carry. Replacements or reinforcements for the landing craft/LCACs already carried, as well as potentially more cargo/vehicles. Just a way to utilize what's already lying around seemingly without purpose.
"Replacements or reinforcements for the landing craft/LCACs already carried"
DeleteYou recognize that the current amphib ship's load of landing craft is woefully insufficient, right? So, a few more "replacements or reinforcements", while welcome, is still inadequate!
One of the major problems is that the Marine's use the AAV/ACV as a one-time transport instead of a reusable landing craft. If you do the arithmetic, you quickly realize that the AAV/ACVs can only land a small portion of the assault force. It's hard to imagine who thought this was a good idea.
It seems to me that the Marines were thinking that their helos, primarily the CH-46 Sea Knight and the CH-53 Sea Stallion, would be the main conveyance of the assault force. The AAV doesn't need to quickly return to the ship to embark more troops when the Sea Knight and Sea Stallion fly an order of magnitude faster than an AAV swims, or so they thought.
DeleteOf course, what the Marines neglected to consider was that air assault by helo as part of a landing operation is only really viable now against a third world nation, and is a non-starter against a peer opponent.
The last time the Navy tried something completely different, we ended up with not one, but two LCSs. It's the culture that has to change.
ReplyDeleteOur acquisition programs either overreach and fail (LCS, Zumwalt, etc.) or underreach and gain us nothing (Burke Flt III, Constellation, E-2D, etc.).
DeleteI think a significant problem that we have is actually our obsession with technology.
ReplyDeleteInstead of developing continuously improving designs, we spend our focus and resources on weapon systems for fighting the space alien invasion of 2047.
As we wait for the endless development process for weapons that are trying to skip a generation in technology, we only do minimal improvements to our existing force.
We are so terrified of not being technologically dominant that we are throwing hail mary passes to try and stay ahead.
The modern military seems to expect to still have the technological advantage that we had over the Iraqis in 1992.
We have forgotten how competent the cold war era units pulled out of Germany were when they deployed to Desert Shield, and how decisive that competency advantage was.
All we think about is having a technological advantage.
In our desperation to have a massive advantage in technology, we have forgotten to create a competent and well-equipped force for the here and now.
Lutefisk
Sometimes we pursue the bleeding edge when it's not necessary. Sometimes, the replacement for a metal box is just another metal box, not a gold plated 3d printed CAD designed next generation disruptive technology new development AI-powered storage container.
DeleteComNavOps' opinion is a really weird position to take when he's argued before that the M1 Carbine is good enough for today's warfighting and there's no appreciable benefit in going to the M4 carbine.
DeleteThat's even more so the case for the AAV and the ACV, but here he is, trying to argue for a gold plated complicated solution where it's not needed.
"really weird position"
DeleteAside from a basic disrespect in your comment, you've also failed to grasp the point of the post or of my previous comments.
The post addresses "repeat" programs whereas your comment seems to address quality of upgrades. So, you either missed the point of the post or have opted to go off topic.
To address your point, I have argued against so called upgrades that provide no real world, significant improvement such as the case of rifle upgrades. In the case of the AAV/EFV/ACV, all are failures and need to be replaced with new designs. The same would be true for rifles if the "base" model was a failure which it was not. So, you failed to grasp the difference between unnecessary upgrades versus new designs for failed equipment.
All in all, a worthless, ignorant comment and I'll remove it shortly.
"Sometimes we pursue the bleeding edge when it's not necessary."
DeleteTrue, but not inclusive enough. It is NEVER appropriate to pursue bleeding edge for a production program. By definition, It NEVER SUCCEEDS. Bleeding edge is for the R&D lab, not production.
I think, before anyone gets their panties all twisted any further, we need to stop and consider what it is that we need to pursue in the design, and what do we need to optimise towards.
DeleteFor the sake of the discussion, I'm going to call these the Marine APC and the Army APC so that we can be a little clearer in our minds.
If we look at the current Army APCs on the market of the 8x8 variety, all of them are amphibious. All of them swim. But that swimming is just a means to an end. It's for crossing rivers, not wide stretches of ocean. The Terrex, for example, swims at 6 miles per hour - pretty bad, but when you only have to cross half a mile of river, that's not TOO bad.
A Marine APC, on the other hand, needs to be swimming a further distance. It's going to be self deploying from a landing ship. Which means that ideally, we need it to be designed to have a higher speed in the water than the 6mph of a Terrex or the 8mph of the AAV-7. It has to get in the water and get on the deck as fast as possible.
As mismanaged as the program was, the EFV was a clear attempt at making a Marine IFV. It had a 30mm gun, which could carry VT-fused HE-frag rounds and DU sabot rounds, giving it better suppressive effect against bunkers, dug in troops in trenches, and enemy IFVs. It had a water speed of 28 miles per hour, just under 4 times the speed of the AAV. And it had transport parity with the AAV.
And of course, as mentioned, we have the Chinese ZBD-05 and ZTD-05, which do 18 miles per hour in the water, and have hullforms specifically designed for cutting though the water.
So it's clearly possible to build a Marine APC - the question is merely a matter of program management, and whether the political and military leadership is willing to stomach the costs of a bespoke program with lower procurement numbers that will incur higher costs due to optimising for its flight regime in the water.
It's true that once they hit the beach and get onto dry land, there's no real appreciable difference between an Army APC and a Marine APC. Both are going to have identical protection levels, both are going to be serving the exact same roles and performing the exact same missions, and are going to be used in the exact same way. Other posters are correct that the mission on LAND of an APC has not changed that much in the last 60 years, and that once an ACV gets on land, it will be used in the exact same way as a Stryker APC. F-14 Tomcat Lover isn't wrong to imply that the ACV on land isn't going to behave any different from the Italian Army's SuperAV APC.
From that perspective, the idea of replacing the AAV with a COTS Army 8x8 APC is understandable. It's maintaining the status quo, and there's no operational difference on land. But that's the part that I think people are forgetting. They're focusing wholly on LAND, and forgetting the SEA aspect. Yes, a Marine APC and an Army APC, on land, are the exact same thing, but you can't just use an Army APC to replace a Marine APC, because the Marine APC needs to swim further, it needs to swim faster, it's spending a not insignificant amount of time in the water.
20 years ago, the Chinese Navy, who were in a worse position to invade Taiwan than they are today, decided that they needed purpose designed Marine IFVs and Marine assault guns, and designed the Type-05 family with swimming hullforms so they could swim faster and hit the beach quicker.
Rifles and upgrades are a really thorny issue that have to be approached on a case by case basis and viewed holistically. There are cases where the upgrades are beneficial, and where the upgrades are less so.
DeleteComparing the M4 carbine and the M1 carbine isn't quite apples to apples because what really happened with is that the M4 is the carbine variant of the M16 rifle, which was the doctrinal replacement for the M1 Garand rifle, which is just the start of a very, very long article going through doctrine and historical usage.
Suffice to say that compared to the M1 Garand and the M4 Carbine, the M4 carbine is an effective weapon that has replaced both weapons and consolidated them, offering clear advantages to both weapons, while remaining cheap enough to serve as a mass issue rifle, with a government unit cost of 740 dollars per weapon.
The major upgrades to the M4 have been the mass issue of combat optics and the improved lethality M855A1 round, which have proven their worth over the last 2 decades of use. The modular nature of the M16/M4/AR15 platform also means that it's easy and fairly cheap to take a basic M4 and upgrade it to a more effective, more capable version of itself that can be assigned to elite troops who can make the most of these upgrades. A SOPMOD Block 2 does nothing for a random 18 year old buck private, but it's a hella accurate death dealing weapon in the hands of an experienced Ranger.
On the other hand, the army's new M7 rifle is clearly an answer in search of a problem, an upgrade for upgrade's sake that is being driven by political reasons - Afghanistan trauma and the Cult of the Rifleman - and divorced from real world usage.
(I expect the Army will have to quietly withdraw the M7 within the next few years, and we'll remain using the M4 for the next several decades, as it's one of the platonic ideals of assault rifle.)
I assume the previous two comments are both from the same anon user. So ... the comments are interesting partial summaries of a couple of topics but neither really addresses the premise of the post. There's nothing wrong with periodic, incremental improvements to extract the most performance from a piece of equipment. That's good! The P-51D extracted the best performance from the original P-51A. There comes a time, however, when a wholesale replacement is required and that's the subject of the post. At that point, simply putting a slightly more efficient engine into the P-51D to make it the P-51E or whatever is NOT the solution. Instead, the P-51 gave way to a completely new design - the jet aircraft. In contrast, the Navy's surface warship replacement for the Burke is ... another Burke! The Navy's brand new design frigate is ... a mini-Burke! The LCAC replacement is ... a nearly identical LCAC! And so on.
DeleteTo be specific, what anon has missed in his analysis of the AAV and replacements is a failure to recognize the phenomenon of status quo versus a significant new design with new capabilities. Yes, the ACV meets all the requirements of the AAV ... but offers nothing new even while the battlefield requirements ARE NEW! Even if the ACV was perfect and had no problems whatsoever, it would still be a failure because it is just a spiffed up AAV. It is not suited for the modern battlefield, in particular, the sea side of the requirements. The Navy doctrine is to stand off beyond the horizon in an amphibious assault and that, alone, renders the AVC a total failure. A brand new design, potentially with nothing in common with the AAV, was required and we failed to even consider that.
A final flaw in anon's analysis is that he completely fails to consider any other approach except the identical one that the AAV was built for: a combined sea/land vehicle. A rigorous analysis of the sea and land requirements would likely show that the two sets of requirements are mutually exclusive and that the AAV replacement quite possibly should have been a dedicated, reusable (think Higgins boat), pure landing craft of some sort, totally optimized for a modern sea landing PLUS a land APC (if an APC is even required - I have doubts about that) totally optimized not just for generic (Army) land combat but for amphibious assault requirements (anti-fortification and anti-personnel). So, the proper replacement for the AAV should, perhaps, have been TWO vehicles! That's almost beside the point. The point is that, just like the Navy, anon has ONLY considered more of the same rather than a new design - hence, the subject of the post!
Regarding rifles, specifically, the point that everyone misses and that anon almost got was that the average rifle is not wielded by a sniper quality, superbly trained specialist carefully sighting individual shots but by a frightened grunt who is spraying bullets downrange, usually with no specific target in sight. ANY rifle that spits out bullets and is easy to carry and maintain is sufficient. Sure, give the specialists the ultimate rifle. They can make use of it. The average grunt cannot. THAT'S what needs to be considered when contemplating rifle upgrades. Beyond that, I cannot comment as I am not a land combat expert.
DeleteI mean, that is what I was saying with regard to the M4. The basic M4 is fine as a mass issue rifle. It's accurate enough, shooting 4 MOA, same as the Garand. It's got good range and lethality, generating consistent lethal woubda out to 550 yards. It's cheap enough at 740 dollars.* The ACOG is the platonic ideal of pf the mass issue combat optic and is only 1500 dollars. And I did say:
Delete" modular nature of the M16/M4/AR15 platform also means that it's easy and fairly cheap to take a basic M4 and upgrade it to a more effective, more capable version of itself that can be assigned to elite troops who can make the most of these upgrades."
Meanwhile.with the M7, the Army has given everyone a heavy battle rifle sniper with less ammo, expectinf thay the new NGSW-FC smart scope will instantly turn them into marlsmen. Which is just wishful thinking.
"A brand new design, potentially with nothing in common with the AAV, was required and we failed to even consider that."
DeleteBut we did, and I did mention the failed EFV, which on paper is a lot closer to your intended Marine IFV than the AAV.
While not ideal, 30mm HE-frag rounds can be used for anti fortification work, although it'a true that it is possible to make fortifications that can withstand autocannon fire. The prior doctrinal supplier of fortification breaking firepower was the M1A1 tank but we don't have those anymore in the Marines, and anyway these were expected.to be delivered by LCAC.
I have chosen against a modern higgins boat because I really don't want to unass from the front, giving enemy machinegunners a clear shot at the platoon inside. I've explored trying to make a side or rear deploy higgins boat, but that just means troops jump in the sea and have to slowly wade ashore.
At the end of the day there's only really two ways for a vehicle to get from a ship to the beach:
Delete1. It swims to the beach.
2. A landing craft carries it to the beach.
At some point, given all the compromises involved in making an amphibious vehicle that swims to the beach, we really need to study and think about what our requirements are, and how best we're going to achieve that.
Speed, Armor, Swimming, pick 2 out of three. We can't really have it all.
The Army and Air Force have talked about how they want a heavy variant of Future Vertical Lift to be a C-130-plus sized aircraft, which would theoretically allow it to carry two 8x8 APCs, but given how hilariously vulnerable helicopters and the Osprey are, I just don't think that's going to be a viable option.
Maybe the answer isn't a swimming APC. Maybe, instead, we need to consider refreshing our landing craft. And maybe the landing craft doesn't have to get you all the way to the beach - maybe it just needs to get you close enough. 6 miles per hour swimming time means that if you drop ramp and launch half a mile out, your APCs are only spending 5 minutes in the water.
DeleteWhy does the initial assault wave even have to be mechanized. Traditionally most of the amphib ops in WW2 were infantry first, followed by mechanized units. Have a TOE for the initial assault force that's heavy with machine guns, grenade launchers and ATRL (Carl Gustav/RPG), attached engineers with specialist weapons ( thermobaric rocket launchers like the Russians). At this point all you need develop is a protected fast assault landing craft (boat) for getting personnel only on to the beachhead. The mech support units come in with the heavy connector (LCU/LCM/LCAC), LST. No specialist vehicles needed you can use whatever ground assets the Army uses.
DeleteI don't understand what is wrong with the current AAV, I think it just needs to be used within its capabilities.
DeleteIt should be used as a conveyor of the initial assault waves for an amphibious landing.
It should NOT be used as an IFV.
The amphibious assault and infantry fighting vehicle roles are different enough that they should be performed by separate vehicles.
In my Marine Corps, one brigade of a Marine division is light infantry. Those are the guys that ride the AAV into the beach or assault by helicopter.
After the assault, they move by helicopter or truck or they walk.
The other two brigades would be stryker equipped and arrive to the beach via traditional landing craft.
The Marine division's battalion of M10 Booker-like tanks, artillery, etc., would also arrive by landing craft.
If the AAVs need a job after the landing they can be used to provide shrapnel protected logistics like ambulances and movement of supplies.
Lutefisk
"Traditionally most of the amphib ops in WW2 were infantry first, followed by mechanized units."
DeleteYes and no. The entire Pacific war was a continuous effort to develop anti-fortification/anti-personnel "tanks" to go ashore with the first wave. Hence, the LVT(A). The follow on forces could then bring heavy tanks, artillery, etc. AFTER the beach was secured.
"I don't understand what is wrong with the current AAV, I think it just needs to be used within its capabilities.
DeleteIt should be used as a conveyor of the initial assault waves for an amphibious landing.
If the AAVs need a job after the landing they can be used to provide shrapnel protected logistics like ambulances and movement of supplies."
You come close to the proper use of an AAV while skipping over the fact that the AAV is unsuited for the task, at all.
As you note, if the proper role is to transport the troops ashore and then unload, the WWII Higgins boat is better suited to do that! The AAV/ACV lacks water survivability (troops cannot egress in time to avoid drowning, as we saw with the ACV accidents), is easily swamped in any but very calm seas, lacks water speed, enhances seasickness by being sealed, lacks any sort of stealth, is far too expensive to acquire in sufficient numbers, is far too complex for combat operations and maintenance, and cannot carry cargo. Again, compare it to the cheap, simple, expendable, plentiful, wooden, Higgins boat. A simple modernized Higgins boat would be far better suited.
CNO, you make a strong case against the AAV.
DeleteNot being a marine or navy veteran, some of the shortcomings you listed I was not aware of.
I like the Higgins boat style landing craft. It has some significant advantages over the AAV. The biggest positive would seem to be its speed in getting from the transport to shore, and back for the next wave. The Higgins boat is, after all, a boat. And a boat is going to do much better than an armored personnel carrier in the water.
That is not a throw-away attribute. The faster you can get those men and supplies across that danger area, the more successful you are likely to be in your amphibious landing.
Follow-on waves would certainly use Higgins boat types of landing craft, primarily because I would have strykers and tanks in those waves and those traditional landing craft seem to be the best method of conveyance for that equipment.
There are two areas in the initial assaults, however, that concern me with the Higgins boat.
The first is its open top.
Airburst artillery is much more prevalent and effective than it was in earlier eras. It would be nice to have overhead shrapnel protection for the initial wave(s) as they transit to the beach.
Another area of vulnerability due to the open top would be from cheap drones.
I am not one to assign mythical and magical abilities to drones. But this is a circumstance where a cheap drone with a hand grenade attached could play heck on the Higgins boats by skimming across the water and dropping into the open top amongst the infantry packed in there.
The other area where the AAV type of vehicle would have an advantage is with its tracks.
In WW2, the Marines and navy had success with the Amtrac, especially at Tarawa when crossing the coral reefs. I'm not sure how much it would come into play, but the tracked assault vehicles might be a capability that we want to retain.
Of course, those concerns might be completely eclipsed by the sheer efficiency and speed of delivery of the Higgins boats.
In my Marine Corps I had stated that I would use modified AAVs to suppress light opposition with 20mm Vulcan guns and recoilless rifles.
Without the use of AAVs, the larger Higgins boats would need to be used immediately to get armored vehicles ashore to assist in neutralizing enemy strong points, which can be problematic and time-consuming to reduce with lightly armed infantry.
Lutefisk
"The first is its open top."
DeleteBe wary of falling into the trap of evaluating a weapon in a one versus everything scenario, as so many are wont to do. Yes, the classic Higgins boat had vulnerabilities and if it's job was to assault an entire enemy force all by itself, it would be in trouble. Fortunately, however, it has help that mitigates its vulnerabilities. Naval gunfire suppresses enemy artillery during the actual landing. Ships provide anti-drone defense, both kinetic and EW. MCM removes the mine threat. And so on. EVERY piece of equipment has weaknesses but that's why we fight as a complementary, joint force (joint in the sense of supporting assets not joint forces).
Also, no one, myself included, would advocate an exact duplicate of the Higgins boat for today. Perhaps we'd add an overhead Kevlar screen. Perhaps we'd add some type of anti-drone defense. Perhaps we'd shape it differently for better speed and maneuverability. Perhaps we'd ... whatever. The point was that the basic Higgins boat was better than what we have currently, for the specific task, and could serve as the conceptual starting point for a modern version.
"Naval gunfire suppresses enemy artillery during the actual landing."
DeleteThis is a bit of a challenge at present, because our existing 5" naval guns lack the range to suppress enemy artillery. The Mark 45 gun has an effective range of 20 miles; meanwhile most land-based 6" artillery guns shoot out to 31 miles. Assuming a 5 mile standoff from the beach, this means that our DDs can only shoot 15 miles inland; meanwhile, the opposing artillery can be positioned 30 miles inland, completely out of range of our guns to counterbattery and suppress.
I know you're not in favor of helicopter gunships, and their survivability over the peer battlefield is going to be measured in minutes, but lacking long range naval gunfire options of our own, they're the next best tool we have to suppress enemy artillery. I'd personally argue that the LHD carry less transport helos, and instead carry more Cobras so we can surge a bigger wave of firepower.
We're struggling with repeats, failed programs, overcost/delayed programs being normalized etc, for many reasons. But I think besides/including the ineptitude, the biggest reason for it all is a lack of urgency.
ReplyDeleteUrgency to hurry up and get it done and
Urgency to get it done right.
We used to crank out 6+ Spruances a year. A woman designed the OHP all by herself, overnight. Until 30 years ago when the Cold War led us into this mess, the yards turned out DDs, frigates, and SSNs at speeds that today are almost unbelievable.
We used to have a sense of urgency- whether ingrained or forced on everyone from above... or probably both. But we still have plenty of brilliant minds. So tell me why we couldn't get a bunch of them together, and get a full complete set of plans for DDG(X)... or anything else, in a week or two?? Use the carrot or the stick, I don't care... but get it done. Trying to build the Connies and not even having concrete plans is retarded. Then... put similar people on build processes, the supply chain, and do whatever it takes to get the yard staffing rebuilt. And hurry. I don't believe any of this is somthing that's unrealistic... if we just TRIED, and stopped accepting mediocrity and years of delay as the standard.
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