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While the helicopters\u2019 own range and maneuverability would enhance the munitions\u2019 capability, Lightfoot said, aircraft aren\u2019t always in the air. To ensure Marines operating forward have round-the-clock access to long-range offensive weapons, he said the service would pursue a launcher for use by ground troops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a separate interview on the Force Design update, Scott Lacy, the deputy director of the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory, said the organization is working on this effort with the aviation community. The work includes studying munitions already on the market as well as other experimental capabilities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Force Design annual update noted \u201cother projects include developing a common launcher for the family of ground launched loitering munitions and testing a low-cost, hypersonic booster in a form factor the Marine Corps can logistically support in a contested environment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lacy did not elaborate much on the hypersonic booster, other than to say experimentation is ongoing at the lab.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the same interview, Col. Daniel Wittnam, the director of the Marine Corps Integration Division, described another long-range offensive fires effort in which the service is involved, in conjunction with the Office of the Secretary of Defense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The office provided money for the Corps to experiment using the Maritime Strike Tomahawk \u2014 a derivative of the legacy Tomahawk land-attack missile that the office directed in fiscal 2017 \u2014 as a land-based weapon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Marines will use the Naval Strike Missile as their first ground-based, anti-ship missile but have previously said they intend to pursue other longer-range weapons for the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Wittnam said the 11th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division at Camp Pendleton, California, was standing up a battery to work with the Maritime Strike Tomahawk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The question the Marines have as they consider this and other emerging capabilities is whether the technology is naval and expeditionary, given their focus on littoral operations in the Pacific, the colonel said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He noted the current form factor is not, but he said the experimentation would continue. (The proof-of-concept system would mount the missile launcher on a Joint Light Tactical Vehicle chassis, a setup that already had a tip-over incident due to the center of gravity being off.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lt. Gen. Karsten Heckl, the deputy commandant for combat development and integration, told reporters during the June 2 roundtable that not all the ongoing experiments would be successesful, but the Corps would learn from all of them as it rapidly modernizes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t have the luxury of, (A) test something, (B) get the feedback, (C) let\u2019s make changes. You know, that takes years and years. We have to iterate and, if necessary, fail quickly and learn faster, and then iterate again,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In doing so, Heckl added, \u201cwe have made the fleet more capable. Period. Full stop.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Marines want long-range loitering munitions to launch from their helicopters and from the ground, as part of their Force Design 2030 modernization.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":117624,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":27,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":{"6":{"categories":["news","your-marine-corps","home","middle-column","newsletters","daily-news-roundup"],"primary_category":"daily-news-roundup"},"9":{"categories":["home","newsletters","daily-brief","unmanned","uas"],"primary_category":"uas"}}},"categories":[7,160,49,16,36,27,167],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3354],"class_list":["post-64699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-air","category-daily-news-roundup","category-techwatch","category-naval","category-newsletters","category-unmanned","category-unmanned-systems"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"23RLMXPM4ZCHDFRAYS3Z2WV6GE","arc_canonical_url":"\/unmanned\/2023\/06\/05\/us-marines-are-developing-air-launched-swarming-munitions-for-helos\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n