Amphibious ships could be equipped with guns, rockets and drones to take out targets from long distances, Marine Corps Commandant Gen. Robert Neller said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe know we can shoot HIMARS [High Mobility Artillery Rocket System] off the flight deck of a ship,\u201d Neller said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In order to successfully launch operations in the littorals, the Marine Corps needs to increase the fighting capabilities for amphibious ships, he said Wednesday at the Marine Corps League\u2019s annual Modern Day Marine expo in Quantico, Virginia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYou\u2019re going to see precision fire delivered off amphib ships, whether it comes out of tube guns or rockets or delivered from unmanned systems,\u201d Neller said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Marines are already on high alert when amphibious ships transit choke points, such as the Suez Canal, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cYou\u2019re not going to see Marines just sitting down on their bunks reading magazines,\u201d Neller said. \u201cYou\u2019re going to see snipers up on the weather deck. You\u2019re going to see guys up there with Javelins and heavy guns. You\u2019re going to see air defenders up there with air defense systems.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Marine Corps new concept for fighting in the littorals acknowledges that large ships pose \u2018lucrative targets\u2019 to enemy defenses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf the enemy has a capability to shoot my large ship or my destroyer or my carrier from a couple hundred nautical miles away \u2013 or maybe longer \u2013 I\u2019ve got to do something about that,\u201d Neller said. \u201cThat\u2019s why it\u2019s important that all of these ships have the capability to do some sort of strike or denial \u2013 or some way to suppress that capability.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ampibious ships may get new precision-guided weapons systems as the Navy and Marine Corps look to counter advanced coastal defense systems.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":11156,"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":[1187],"class_list":["post-41356","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":"2B2UUN4EU5CMNHEISX6Q7CAUYM","arc_canonical_url":"\/digital-show-dailies\/modern-day-marine\/2017\/09\/21\/himars-on-the-flight-deck-marines-look-to-up-gun-amphibious-ships\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n