Jerry McAbee on Marine Corps Compass Points

An article published today in “Task and Purpose” provides an interesting summary of lessons the U.S. Army is learning from Russia in Ukraine. Two prominent lessons are titled: 1. “Drones are foundational… They have become central to nearly every part of the Russian way of war… Drones are now directly tied into command and control and fire support… Targets are passed to artillery batteries or FPV drone teams to engage the targets. Another drone confirms damage. In many cases, drones have replaced manned forward observers entirely.” 2. “Artillery is doing the heavy lifting. Russia has shifted decisively to an artillery-first doctrine, creating formations known as ‘army artillery groups.’ These units integrate with drone ISR to deliver massed fires against static defenses and troop concentrations.” There is really nothing new here. It’s essentially combined-arms and air-ground operations. The systems and TTPs (tactics, techniques, and procedures) may have changed but not the synergistic approach to create advantages over the enemy by applying complementary force to achieve a desired result. The Marines have been doing this for years. But in 2019, the Marines largely walked away from an effective and resilient combined arms capability. Investing in drones is essential, but drones are only part of a combined arms capability. Armor, cannon artillery, rockets, expeditionary engineers, and fixed and rotary wing aircraft (manned and unmanned) are also necessary. And missiles are increasingly relevant on the battlefield. The Marines would be well served to divest the Naval Strike Missile and invest instead in the Joint Strike Missile (JSM), the Long-Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM), and the Precision Strike Missile (PrSM). The JSM and LRASM are compatible with the F-35B/C and the PrSM with HIMARS. You can read the entire Task and Purpose article at: https://taskandpurpose.com/tech-tactics/army-russia-ukraine-lessons-learned/?mc_cid=5c07754b47&mc_eid=6f40c781cd