{"id":14848,"date":"2021-11-17T23:06:56","date_gmt":"2021-11-17T23:06:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/uncategorized\/2021\/11\/17\/heres-why-marine-expeditionary-units-could-soon-take-a-hit\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T20:21:28","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T20:21:28","slug":"heres-why-marine-expeditionary-units-could-soon-take-a-hit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2021\/11\/17\/heres-why-marine-expeditionary-units-could-soon-take-a-hit\/","title":{"rendered":"Here\u2019s why Marine expeditionary units could soon take a hit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Marine Corps is getting <a href=\"https:\/\/www.marinecorpstimes.com\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2021\/01\/19\/new-in-2021-the-corps-gets-a-new-unit-the-marine-littoral-regiment\/\" target=\"_blank\">smaller<\/a>, that\u2019s no secret.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But a recently released think tank report diving into the Corps\u2019 budget shows exactly which areas will be shrinking and how that might stretch <a href=\"https:\/\/www.marinecorpstimes.com\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2020\/03\/05\/marine-corps-ship-sinking-missile-headed-for-test-fire\/\" target=\"_blank\">demands <\/a>on the force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Center for Strategic and International Studies published its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.csis.org\/analysis\/us-military-forces-fy-2022-marine-corps\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cU.S. Military Forces in FY 2022: Marine Corps\u201d<\/a> on Wednesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The report reflects much of what has been acknowledged publicly since the start of Commandant Gen. David Berger\u2019s tenure in 2019. The Corps has to shift to fight <a href=\"https:\/\/www.marinecorpstimes.com\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2020\/02\/03\/war-with-robots-an-inside-look-at-how-marines-and-robots-will-fight-side-by-side\/\" target=\"_blank\">alongside <\/a>the Navy to be relevant in a great power competition with the Russian and Chinese military, but mostly the Chinese.<\/p>\n\n\n\t<aside class=\"smg-interstitial-link wp-block-smg-interstitial-link\">\n\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2021\/04\/26\/here-are-some-big-changes-that-may-be-coming-to-the-marine-corps\/\" class=\"smg-interstitial-link__inner\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"smg-interstitial-link__media\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" src=\"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Marine-LAV.jpg.jpg?w=300\" class=\"smg-interstitial-link__image wp-post-image\" alt=\"\" \/>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"smg-interstitial-link__content\">\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"smg-interstitial-link__kicker\">Related<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t<h3 class=\"smg-interstitial-link__title\">Here are some big changes that may be coming to the Marine Corps<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p class=\"smg-interstitial-link__excerpt\">They include reservist drone pilots, ditching weapons company and the light armored vehicle&#039;s replacement.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/aside>\n\t\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That has meant shedding assets and personnel such as tanks and military police while beefing up fires from conventional artillery to longer-range rockets. It\u2019s also meant an overhaul of training for the core of the Corps: the infantry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But what\u2019s gotten less attention is Berger\u2019s aims to streamline aviation, taking a hard look at F-35 acquisition and finally getting the service into the drone game at scale. And that means more drone pilots and drones to fight at longer ranges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And those up-and-coming specially trained and experienced infantry? By Marine veteran and CSIS report author Mark Cancian\u2019s estimation, they\u2019re going to be spread thin, which means some of the bread-and-butter work that the Marines have used as a calling card since the Cold War ended \u2015 the Marine Expeditionary Units \u2015 may suffer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cancian notes that flat budget top lines heading into 2022 and beyond have forced Berger to pick equipment instead of people, or at least numbers of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Corps is on a path to shrink the force down to 172,000, which is the level it was before 9\/11. In 2020, the Corps was slightly more than 180,000 active duty Marines and nearly 40,000 in the Marine Corps Reserve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Some of those cuts will come wholesale in unit deactivations. They will have only 22 infantry battalions versus 24 now on paper. The plan is to fully staff those battalions, though \u2015 a kind of unicorn idea for many who\u2019ve served in infantry units over their careers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But the grunts aren\u2019t paying all the dues. The top Marine is reviewing up to 15 percent personnel cuts in headquarters and supporting establishments, Cancian wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Berger hasn\u2019t hidden his hard look at aviation, though details have been sparse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cI am not convinced that we have a clear understanding yet of F-35 capacity requirements for the future force,\u201d Cancian quotes from Berger\u2019s 2020 posture statement remarks to Congress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Eventually, the general wants half of his aviation fleet unmanned, he said in his \u201cUnmanned Campaign Framework,\u201d published in March.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For now, he has also detailed in his Force Design 2030 report that he wants six active component unmanned vehicle squadrons for the future force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That\u2019s double the number currently available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But Marines piloting those existing drones have limited options.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cancian points out that as of now, the Corps only has two armed drones as compared to the Air Forces\u2019 351 armed drones.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Corps did shift away from its large-scale plan to build a drone that would do everything: the Marine Air-Ground Task Force Unmanned Aerial System Expeditionary, or MUX.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The high price tag had some in Congress balking at the expense. Instead, the Corps has shifted to the MQ-9 Reaper drone as its entry point to higher-level drone work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The MQ-9 plan, thus far, hasn\u2019t been fully ironed out, Cancian pointes to planning documents that suggest a \u201cloyal wingman\u201d approach, similar to the Air Force\u2019s method of using drones of that caliber.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The additional three squadrons would be stood up by 2026, according to Marine Corps planning documents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What might affect more Marines and what they do when deployed is the creation of the Marine littoral regiments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Marine littoral regiment is the Corps\u2019 current answer for how to be fighting at scale with China in the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There are three planned in total, they\u2019ll be heavy on fires and lighter on infantry but will still need grunts to do the on-the-ground work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That will draw forces from the MEUs, Cancian argues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And the Marine littoral regiments can\u2019t really be used the way MEUs are today, he writes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe full MLR is too large for routine long-term deployments, deploying just the combat team would leave the rest of the unit incomplete, and deploying a proportional slice would not produce the wide variety of capabilities that forward-deployed Marine units have traditionally had,\u201d Cancian writes. \u201cInstead, the Marine Corps may move to periodic but limited-duration deployments for exercises and engagements with allies and partners.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That\u2019s especially true if the Corps wants to keep running seven MEUs across the globe with all associated personnel and gear, Cancian wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">An option is a tool that the Corps has used increasingly in the past decade: the Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As one of the few deployable units smaller than a MEU, it can be designed for unique tasks, but that size difference comes \u201cat the cost of logistics and firepower,\u201d Cancian notes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A recent report shows exactly which areas will be shrinking and how that might stretch demands on the force.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":33956,"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":69,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[101,12,25,69],"tags":[],"coauthors":[3396],"class_list":["post-14848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-news-roundup","category-news","category-newsletters","category-your-marine-corps"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"MJOOP6B34FHC7KO7TBXWI4DV2Q","arc_canonical_url":"\/news\/your-marine-corps\/2021\/11\/17\/heres-why-marine-expeditionary-units-could-soon-take-a-hit\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.0 (Yoast SEO v28.1) - 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