07-18-2023, 02:27 PM
https://www.yahoo.com/news/army-shift-br...01963.html
Pretty inevitable. What the Ukraine war has shown is that indeed a Regimental/Brigade structure does not have the combat power necessary to sustain itself in "modern" (since 1914) war. Regiments and Brigades will still exist, as they always have. They will just not be "separately deployable", i.e. will not contain all the elements needed to operate "alone". This is clearly a reaction to the "Ukraine Experience". Look for the other NATO countries to follow, except they have fewer troops so it will be harder for them to do.
This is a reversion to the previous structure and reflects the fact that fighting less capable opponents could be done with less infrastructure. Of course, our troops got killed by "less capable" opponents, but not because we lacked the combat power to prevail. Pretty much universally, we did prevail. Against a more heavily armed foe that is organized into divisional sized units, that wouldn't be the case. Our units will need, for example, "division sized" artillery barrages to keep from being overrun. Except for the Marines of course. They aren't getting bigger units, they are getting smaller ones. The theory is that they will no longer be used as an "alternate army" (as they certainly were in both Iraq wars) but as a seaborne "Marine Littoral Regiment". I just hope the Joint Chiefs and the politicians are fully aware of what that means. I am not sure even the Marines know what that means, at least not yet.
Pretty inevitable. What the Ukraine war has shown is that indeed a Regimental/Brigade structure does not have the combat power necessary to sustain itself in "modern" (since 1914) war. Regiments and Brigades will still exist, as they always have. They will just not be "separately deployable", i.e. will not contain all the elements needed to operate "alone". This is clearly a reaction to the "Ukraine Experience". Look for the other NATO countries to follow, except they have fewer troops so it will be harder for them to do.
This is a reversion to the previous structure and reflects the fact that fighting less capable opponents could be done with less infrastructure. Of course, our troops got killed by "less capable" opponents, but not because we lacked the combat power to prevail. Pretty much universally, we did prevail. Against a more heavily armed foe that is organized into divisional sized units, that wouldn't be the case. Our units will need, for example, "division sized" artillery barrages to keep from being overrun. Except for the Marines of course. They aren't getting bigger units, they are getting smaller ones. The theory is that they will no longer be used as an "alternate army" (as they certainly were in both Iraq wars) but as a seaborne "Marine Littoral Regiment". I just hope the Joint Chiefs and the politicians are fully aware of what that means. I am not sure even the Marines know what that means, at least not yet.