China Wants 100,000 Marines To Defend Its Expanding Global Interests

[Nan Yang]

I Hope you do not sincerely believe what you just said. Because for the same argument, I can say since USMC have inducted MV-22/SH-60/AH-1Z Zulu Cobra (Which PLAN Marine don't have its own Helicopter Branch) AV-8B/F-18F/F-35B/C (Which PLAN Marine don't have its own Fix Wing Aviation Branch) and M1A2 MBT (Which PLAN Marine don't have any Modern MBT inducted), then I can conclude USMC is a lot better than PLA Marine?

Equipment involve how you fight and the doctrine. USMC may induct any given equipment which suitable to fight with their own doctrine, PLA Marine does the same, you cannot be serious when you say since USMC does not have EFV or Amphibious Light Tank, they are far behind PLAN Marine in Capability.

For starter, USMC is a Combine Arms Forces (Which is the only CAF Marine unit in the world). The need for EFV and Amphibious Tank are in the last category because the USMC can just be as easy to Airdrop LAV Mobile Gun or Just as easy to deploy M1A2 MBT onshore, why would the USMC needed Amphibious Light Tank when they can fill that role with Abrams, Zulu cobra and F-35s?

USMC is a standalone force, with Combine Air/Sea/Land Arms, which mean EFV or AAV are last in their priority. On the other hand, PLAN Marine are a dependent force, which mean they needed support from Navy and Army to conduct Amphibious Operation.

Each force is different. USMC being a standalone force mean they can do more without other branches support. while PLAN Marine would have to completely depends on the Navy and Air Force in on/off shore combat operation. Otherwise there will not be any deliver method and air support provided to the PLAN Marine in operation threatre

Quote
Prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, U.S. ground forces still retained a robust conventional training focus and had a clear ground advantage over Russia and China. In the years since, however, a reorientation on becoming masters of counterinsurgency tactics has resulted in a significant deterioration in conventional fighting skills. More importantly, the United States lost a decade when it could have modernized, reorganized, and improved the army. The advantage America once had over Russia and China has been eroded. If changes are not made, the U.S. Army could soon fall behind them.

Source:
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-skeptics/the-us-army-may-have-prepared-the-wrong-war-19711

 

[jhungary]

Quote
Prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, U.S. ground forces still retained a robust conventional training focus and had a clear ground advantage over Russia and China. In the years since, however, a reorientation on becoming masters of counterinsurgency tactics has resulted in a significant deterioration in conventional fighting skills. More importantly, the United States lost a decade when it could have modernized, reorganized, and improved the army. The advantage America once had over Russia and China has been eroded. If changes are not made, the U.S. Army could soon fall behind them.

Source:
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/the-skeptics/the-us-army-may-have-prepared-the-wrong-war-19711

I have no idea how this is related to the Chinese wanted to expand to 100,000 Marine? But hey, I'll bite.

The Problem the article the LTC supposed is that the US Army was geared more toward counter-insurgency during the 2000s-2010s War in the middle east and ceased to train as a more conventional force. That is not true.

The US military operate as a modular units, which mean each Brigade Combat team is dynamic. And instead of deploying the whole Division or bigger units (like Field Army) the biggest singular deployment is Brigade Size unit.

What does it do? Take 82nd Airborne Division as an example (My old Division)

82 ABD are comprise of 4 Brigade (3 Combat and 1 Support), in a given year

1 brigade will be send to war in Iraq and Afghanistan for 12 months.
1 brigade will be send to COIN training in order to deploy to replace the brigade currently at theatre
2 brigades will be at home training in conventional warfare.

And this training regime will rotate every year when the singular brigade being rotate.

So, at all time, 1/2 of any given division would be in training in Conventional Warfare.

The US military does not train all their troop at once at all time to prepare for War fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. Yes, the conventional war strength will be cut in half, but for the US Army, that mean 550,000 soldier are still trained in conventional warfare, and for US Marine, that means 100,000 Marine are trained and deployed to conventional role. Also, since the training is rotational, the effect is actually minimized.

The article by the LTC is most likely a scare tactics for the top brass to put more resource by saying the US Military is going to behind Russia and China. I fought in the middle east twice, am I forgetting how to fight a conventional war? No.

 

[aryadravida_exmuslim]

These are glorified security guards for the companies in Chinese colonies as of now.
But maybe a formidable force in three decades that can finally take all the islands.

 

[samsara]

These are glorified security guards for the companies in Chinese colonies as of now.
But maybe a formidable force in three decades that can finally take all the islands.

What did you mean by the Chinese colonies?

Where are the location of the said colonies???

 

[Nan Yang]

I dare to say PLAN is the most experience in amphibious operation with retaking Taiwan as their number one objective. You can checkout the amount of amphibious resources and exercise PLAN undertake every year since 30years ago.

Not even USN has that amount of commitment compare to PLAN marines. The ignorant is with you.

http://china-defense.blogspot.sg/2011/01/most-advance-amphibious-armor-vehicle.html

PLAN marine amphibious asset far exceed USMC vintage.

QUOTE
...since the US Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle (EFV) was canceled last week by Defense Secretary Gates for being uber expensive at 22+ million each and with a reliability of 8 hours between breakdowns.

United States seems unable to build anything without costing billions of dollars.