September 24, 2018 | International, Naval
By: David B. Larter
WASHINGTON — The U.S. Marine Corps is facing the same issue as the rest of the armed forces: figuring out how to fight inside the envelope of Chinese long-range missiles in what is known as the anti-access, area denial environment of the South and East China seas.
As the Navy and Marine Corps seek to protect sea lanes, allies and U.S. interests, their solution to their shared problem is to spread out, cause chaos and put strain on China's ability to target U.S. forces and sustain operations on multiple fronts.
Defense News caught up with retired Marine Lt. Col. Dakota Wood, now an analyst with The Heritage Foundation, to see how the Corps is tackling the issue.
As the Marines confront the challenge of fighting in the Pacific again, what are the top priorities for modernization?
There are two parts to that. What are their priorities? Well the amphibious combat vehicle, unmanned capabilities overall and completing fielding of the F-35B. So that's the easy stuff: air, ground and unmanned. They are pursuing upgrades for infantrymen — rifles, optics and communications — but that is always ongoing.
What I think is more interesting is how do those relate to the unfolding vision of what future Marine Corps should be. I don't think we've figured that out yet.
Just as in World War II, the Navy and Marine Corps are uniquely set up for operations in the Pacific theater, but you have to get close to fight. What progress are the Marine Corps and Navy making in solving that problem?
The chief of naval operations has specifically stated the dependency the Navy has on the Marine Corps to create those opportunities. The question is: How do you disrupt the enemy's posture, present multiple dilemmas to the enemy?
A Marine landing force on an island or feature has to present a problem to the enemy that is credible — anti-ship cruise missiles, short-range air defense, a sensor node contributing to the air or surface picture. It has to be able to thin out the enemy's fire power, sensor grid and attention span to give the Navy the chance to get inside the envelope, close and have an impact.
So how does the Marine Corps get there?
It has huge implications for organizational design to get these smaller units where they need to be in a distributed environment. So it's about connectors and how do you resupply those forces. Unmanned systems? Are amphibious combat vehicles relevant in that environment?
It has an impact on ships as well. So far, the Navy has been building big ships. And in this budget environment, will they be able to build enough to support that kind of operation? How do you distribute a force to pose a dilemma for your adversary? There is a gap between current modernization efforts and what needs to be there.
What's the answer?
To get where you need to be requires extensive experimentation and trying new things. That's the critical shortfall for the Navy and the Marine Corps.
November 28, 2023 | International, Land
Elbit Systems DIRCM laser protection systems have accumulated hundreds of thousands of flight hours on dozens of platforms and provide advanced defensive technology solutions for aircraft operating in modern battlefields.
July 12, 2018 | International, C4ISR
By: Mark Pomerleau Dana Deasy, the Department of Defense's new CIO, said he sees four critical areas to support the national defense strategy and digital modernization: cloud, artificial intelligence, command, control and communications, and cyber. Speaking at an event hosted by Defense Systems in Arlington July 11, Deasy said those initiatives are listed not in order of importance, but rather in order of integration. Cloud is the foundation for many future warfighting capabilities as well as the other three priorities. As a result, the much anticipated Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure proposal is “not a longs ways off, [but] we have a bit more work to do before we release,” he said. Despite not committing to a specific release date for the multibillion dollar JEDI proposal, Deasy said he wants the overall JEDI effort to be comprehensive, clear and maximize responses. The proposal, he said, should be written in a way “that truly represents what any smart intelligence company in private industry would do in seeking to put an enterprise cloud in place.” Deasy, who has been on the job about two months, acknowledged the department doesn't have a true enterprise capability that will deliver the efficiencies on the scale it needs. Since taking over the JEDI acquisition, he said there is a top down, bottom up review of the effort. deally, an enterprise solution should allow for flexibility, management of classified and unclassified data, scalable in the form of both infrastructure as a service and platform as a service, have common governance and will eventually be a multi-cloud, multi-vendor environment. he said. In his remarks, Deasy also highlighted the recently established Joint Artificial Intelligence Center. The center, he said, will advance DoD's ability to organize AI capability delivery and technology understanding within DoD. The center will also help to attract and cultivate much needed talent in the AI space, he added, demonstrating successful intersection of human ingenuity and advanced computing to include ethics, humanitarian considerations and both short term and long term AI safety. https://www.c4isrnet.com/it-networks/2018/07/11/no-surprise-cloud-tops-new-defense-cios-priorities/
January 21, 2019 | International, Aerospace
SYLVAIN ARNULF Le drone Neuron en formation avec un avion de combat Rafale et un avion d'affaires Falcon 8X : voici l'étonnant ballet des trois avions phares de Dassault Aviation, capturé en une image. https://www.usinenouvelle.com/article/vu-du-ciel-rafale-neuron-falcon-la-famille-dassault-aviation-reunie.N790429