thedrifter
07-29-08, 07:25 AM
Commandant unveils Corps’ Vision and Strategy for future
7/28/2008 By By 1st Lt. Patrick Boyce, Press Officer , Marine Corps Base Quantico
MARINE CORPS BASE QUANTICO, Va — —
As the first decade of the 21st Century draws to a close, the United States faces a new myriad of threats and challenges in which both the landscape and operating environment of the world continues to undergo dynamic and dramatic upheavals, claims Marine Corps Vision and Strategy 2025. How the Marine Corps can best be employed and the Corps' contributions to national defense in the coming years and decades is outlined in the Vision and Strategy document, which was signed June 18 by Gen. James T. Conway, commandant of the Marine Corps. Important as well is The Capstone Operational Concept, signed June 25, which will act as the first chapter in the forthcoming Marine Corps Operating Concept for a Changing Security Environment, 3rd Edition, scheduled to be published early next year, which serves as a bridge from vision and strategy to operating concepts and capabilities.
According to Col. Steve Zotti, director, Strategic Vision Group, Headquarters Marine Corps, both these documents should be read by every Marine in order to understand the future of the Marine Corps and how it will maintain its role as our nation’s expeditionary force-in-readiness.
“This is who we are and where we’re going to be in 2025 in order to meet the country’s expectations,” explained Zotti. “The difference in this vision as compared to previous Marine Corps statements – is that it calls for a more multi-capable, expeditionary and culturally adept Marine Air Ground Task Force. It reaffirms the nation’s need for an expeditionary force able to operate from the sea.”
The Vision and Strategy document has been in development since the fall of 2007 and used, according to Zotti, “Lessons learned, intelligence estimates, experts assessments and numerous detailed studies” to craft an assessment of potential future conflicts and how the Marine Corps can best counter and diffuse conflicts. It will further communicate what the special core competencies of the Marine Corps are to the American public, whom Zotti described as the ultimate shapers of foreign policy.
“We can better serve the nation by clearly communicating who we are, what we believe, what we do, and what our role is in addressing the challenges of the future security environment” Zotti said.
According to both the Marine Corps Vision and Strategy 2025 and The Capstone Operational Concept, global changes, especially within the “Arc of Instability” – an area including parts of South America, Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, where weaker states are vulnerable to extremist dominance – will blur notions of conflict between state and non-state actors, conventional and irregular forms of war, and combatants and non-combatants, into what could be termed hybrid conflicts that will not be easily solved by conventional military power alone.
“In order to understand how valuable we (the Marine Corps) are to the nation’s defense,” Zotti explained, “we have to define the future: Who are the potential adversaries and competitors? What are the challenges?”
Challenges, according to Vision and Strategy, will include global changes brought upon by population shifts to urban areas, globalization and increased competition for resources, climate change, terrorism, the increased speed of communication, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
Zotti referred to these as the conditions wherein extremist ideologies are allowed to flourish, especially within nations that have weak internal security. The global strategy described in both Vision and Strategy and The Capstone Operational Concept involves denying extremist agents this ability to flourish.
While the Marine Corps has always excelled in conventional maneuver warfare, it is clear that hybrid forms of conflict will require a more hybrid approach to operations across a spectrum of military operations, from training host nation soldiers, to support of civil authorities, to noncombatant evacuations, to prolonged counterinsurgency operations. These concepts embody the “no better friend, no worse enemy” approach, which will serve, according to The Capstone Operational Concept, to ideologically defeat our nation’s enemies, deny them the hearts and minds of susceptible populations, and prevent conflicts before they happen.
“This long war will be a generational one that requires fostering relationships and rooting out extremists,” said Col. Doug King, Capstone Concept author and director of Marine Corps Combat Development Command. “We need to be in a position where we can help build partners’ capacities in order to enable them to better prevent regional conflict. This is done by increasing our forward presence in vulnerable places.”
The forward projection of U.S. power to provide both military assistance and humanitarian aid will be accomplished most directly through the use of Seabasing, which ties directly to the Marine Corps’ maritime and expeditionary nature and abilities, abilities that haven’t seen much demonstration recently due to the protracted ground war in Iraq. Most of the world’s hotspots within the “Arc of Instability” are accessible from the sea, the Marine Corps’ backyard.
“Seabasing enables regional partnership, both political and military, a port and airfield at sea,” King said. “This enabling concept will allow us to close, assemble, employ, sustain and redeploy joint forces from a protected, highly maneuverable sea base thereby giving us tremendous advantage when responding to crisis, alleviating suffering, or defeating adversaries.”
According to The Capstone Operational Concept, being supplied and being based from the sea will keep the Corps flexible and decrease it’s heavy footprint onshore, while still providing a persistent presence to deter extremist enemies from operating within the range of the Corps’ projected power.
This projected power ashore would include not only the ability to conduct major combat operations if needed, but also civil affairs and humanitarian missions to improve the quality of life for allied or host-nation populations.
“In order to help nations prevent problems in their own back yard before they occur, we have to go out and help these people,” King said. “Helping other nations provide better security and infrastructure to their people will take a bite out of the extremists’ ability to set up shop and spread their radical influence.”
Assisting in these humanitarian efforts would potentially be several new units called Security Cooperation MAGTFs, which would build partnerships with host nations, through military to military training, include native-language speakers, and conduct civil affairs operations, such as improving host nation agriculture and access to water and electrical power. It is the intent of these units to increase both the security and domestic strengths of their host nations, creating better economic and social opportunities for the indigenous population so they would be less prone to either support or join extremist groups.
Indeed, all units, not only the special Security Cooperation MAGTFs, must be prepared to embrace the flexibility inherent in Seabasing and being multi-capable across the range of conflict down to the smallest unit level. Therefore, force structure implications will stress decentralized operations, adaptability to more austere environmental conditions, and the establishment of compact and separate command elements with their own geographic focus. This increased flexibility will be designed allow units to respond quicker and with more initiative to regionalized threats and activities.
It is through these improved flexibilities and capabilities that the Marine Corps is planning to ideologically defeat our enemies in the Long War by denying them both harbor nations or civilian populations from which to draw either security or comfort. As vulnerable nations that are partners with the U.S. improve their security and stability, extremist groups will continue to lose support and credibility. At the same time, the Corps will continue to do what it does best by focusing on the individual Marine and improving hard and realistic training that will prepare Marines for often uncertain conditions.
While the publications of the Vision and Strategy 2025 document and The Capstone Operational Concept document are only the opening salvo in the transformation of the Marine Corps into an even more adept and adaptable fighting force, as guidance ultimately begets implementation, it is worth every Marine’s time to review these documents to get a heads-up in how the Corps will counter the many challenges of the Long War.
The Vision and Strategy 2025 document can be viewed at:
http://www.marines.mil/units/hqmc/cmc/Documents/MCVS2025%2030%20June.pdf
The Capstone Concept can be viewed at:
http://www.quantico.usmc.mil//seabasing/references/reference_material.htm
Ellie
7/28/2008 By By 1st Lt. Patrick Boyce, Press Officer , Marine Corps Base Quantico
MARINE CORPS BASE QUANTICO, Va — —
As the first decade of the 21st Century draws to a close, the United States faces a new myriad of threats and challenges in which both the landscape and operating environment of the world continues to undergo dynamic and dramatic upheavals, claims Marine Corps Vision and Strategy 2025. How the Marine Corps can best be employed and the Corps' contributions to national defense in the coming years and decades is outlined in the Vision and Strategy document, which was signed June 18 by Gen. James T. Conway, commandant of the Marine Corps. Important as well is The Capstone Operational Concept, signed June 25, which will act as the first chapter in the forthcoming Marine Corps Operating Concept for a Changing Security Environment, 3rd Edition, scheduled to be published early next year, which serves as a bridge from vision and strategy to operating concepts and capabilities.
According to Col. Steve Zotti, director, Strategic Vision Group, Headquarters Marine Corps, both these documents should be read by every Marine in order to understand the future of the Marine Corps and how it will maintain its role as our nation’s expeditionary force-in-readiness.
“This is who we are and where we’re going to be in 2025 in order to meet the country’s expectations,” explained Zotti. “The difference in this vision as compared to previous Marine Corps statements – is that it calls for a more multi-capable, expeditionary and culturally adept Marine Air Ground Task Force. It reaffirms the nation’s need for an expeditionary force able to operate from the sea.”
The Vision and Strategy document has been in development since the fall of 2007 and used, according to Zotti, “Lessons learned, intelligence estimates, experts assessments and numerous detailed studies” to craft an assessment of potential future conflicts and how the Marine Corps can best counter and diffuse conflicts. It will further communicate what the special core competencies of the Marine Corps are to the American public, whom Zotti described as the ultimate shapers of foreign policy.
“We can better serve the nation by clearly communicating who we are, what we believe, what we do, and what our role is in addressing the challenges of the future security environment” Zotti said.
According to both the Marine Corps Vision and Strategy 2025 and The Capstone Operational Concept, global changes, especially within the “Arc of Instability” – an area including parts of South America, Africa, the Middle East and South Asia, where weaker states are vulnerable to extremist dominance – will blur notions of conflict between state and non-state actors, conventional and irregular forms of war, and combatants and non-combatants, into what could be termed hybrid conflicts that will not be easily solved by conventional military power alone.
“In order to understand how valuable we (the Marine Corps) are to the nation’s defense,” Zotti explained, “we have to define the future: Who are the potential adversaries and competitors? What are the challenges?”
Challenges, according to Vision and Strategy, will include global changes brought upon by population shifts to urban areas, globalization and increased competition for resources, climate change, terrorism, the increased speed of communication, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
Zotti referred to these as the conditions wherein extremist ideologies are allowed to flourish, especially within nations that have weak internal security. The global strategy described in both Vision and Strategy and The Capstone Operational Concept involves denying extremist agents this ability to flourish.
While the Marine Corps has always excelled in conventional maneuver warfare, it is clear that hybrid forms of conflict will require a more hybrid approach to operations across a spectrum of military operations, from training host nation soldiers, to support of civil authorities, to noncombatant evacuations, to prolonged counterinsurgency operations. These concepts embody the “no better friend, no worse enemy” approach, which will serve, according to The Capstone Operational Concept, to ideologically defeat our nation’s enemies, deny them the hearts and minds of susceptible populations, and prevent conflicts before they happen.
“This long war will be a generational one that requires fostering relationships and rooting out extremists,” said Col. Doug King, Capstone Concept author and director of Marine Corps Combat Development Command. “We need to be in a position where we can help build partners’ capacities in order to enable them to better prevent regional conflict. This is done by increasing our forward presence in vulnerable places.”
The forward projection of U.S. power to provide both military assistance and humanitarian aid will be accomplished most directly through the use of Seabasing, which ties directly to the Marine Corps’ maritime and expeditionary nature and abilities, abilities that haven’t seen much demonstration recently due to the protracted ground war in Iraq. Most of the world’s hotspots within the “Arc of Instability” are accessible from the sea, the Marine Corps’ backyard.
“Seabasing enables regional partnership, both political and military, a port and airfield at sea,” King said. “This enabling concept will allow us to close, assemble, employ, sustain and redeploy joint forces from a protected, highly maneuverable sea base thereby giving us tremendous advantage when responding to crisis, alleviating suffering, or defeating adversaries.”
According to The Capstone Operational Concept, being supplied and being based from the sea will keep the Corps flexible and decrease it’s heavy footprint onshore, while still providing a persistent presence to deter extremist enemies from operating within the range of the Corps’ projected power.
This projected power ashore would include not only the ability to conduct major combat operations if needed, but also civil affairs and humanitarian missions to improve the quality of life for allied or host-nation populations.
“In order to help nations prevent problems in their own back yard before they occur, we have to go out and help these people,” King said. “Helping other nations provide better security and infrastructure to their people will take a bite out of the extremists’ ability to set up shop and spread their radical influence.”
Assisting in these humanitarian efforts would potentially be several new units called Security Cooperation MAGTFs, which would build partnerships with host nations, through military to military training, include native-language speakers, and conduct civil affairs operations, such as improving host nation agriculture and access to water and electrical power. It is the intent of these units to increase both the security and domestic strengths of their host nations, creating better economic and social opportunities for the indigenous population so they would be less prone to either support or join extremist groups.
Indeed, all units, not only the special Security Cooperation MAGTFs, must be prepared to embrace the flexibility inherent in Seabasing and being multi-capable across the range of conflict down to the smallest unit level. Therefore, force structure implications will stress decentralized operations, adaptability to more austere environmental conditions, and the establishment of compact and separate command elements with their own geographic focus. This increased flexibility will be designed allow units to respond quicker and with more initiative to regionalized threats and activities.
It is through these improved flexibilities and capabilities that the Marine Corps is planning to ideologically defeat our enemies in the Long War by denying them both harbor nations or civilian populations from which to draw either security or comfort. As vulnerable nations that are partners with the U.S. improve their security and stability, extremist groups will continue to lose support and credibility. At the same time, the Corps will continue to do what it does best by focusing on the individual Marine and improving hard and realistic training that will prepare Marines for often uncertain conditions.
While the publications of the Vision and Strategy 2025 document and The Capstone Operational Concept document are only the opening salvo in the transformation of the Marine Corps into an even more adept and adaptable fighting force, as guidance ultimately begets implementation, it is worth every Marine’s time to review these documents to get a heads-up in how the Corps will counter the many challenges of the Long War.
The Vision and Strategy 2025 document can be viewed at:
http://www.marines.mil/units/hqmc/cmc/Documents/MCVS2025%2030%20June.pdf
The Capstone Concept can be viewed at:
http://www.quantico.usmc.mil//seabasing/references/reference_material.htm
Ellie