Recently, my colleague Greg Maresca wrote an excellent description of life aboard a Navy amphibious ship with one of the two Marine Expeditionary Units (MEUs) currently afloat in the Persian Gulf. My last “float” was in 1978-79 with the predecessor of the 31st MEU now in the Gulf — they were then called Marine Amphibious Units (MAUs). (READ MORE: America’s 9-1-1 Force on Float)
Life aboard ship was exactly as Greg described it. However, being peacetime, we did get some great liberty in places like Hong Kong (then British), Taiwan, the Philippines, and Japan. We practiced and were ready for nearly every foreseeable contingency, ranging from the evacuation of U.S. citizens from trouble spots to humanitarian relief. What we were not ready for was urban warfare. In those days, military doctrine was to bypass cities when possible, even though Marines had fought in Seoul in the Korean War and Hue City. Today’s MEUs are no better prepared for urban warfare than we were. (RELATED: A Marine Corps Hollowed Out)
Marines currently lack tanks, heavy engineers, and school-trained snipers required to wage modern urban battles.
Consequently, when the Trump administration decided to institute a naval blockade of Iran rather than to try to seize Kharg Island, I gave a sigh of relief that the Marine Corps would not have to attempt an amphibious assault. I am aware that many active duty officers were doing the same because they know in their hearts that the Corps is not ready to fight the major urban campaign that it would have to face in Kharg’s heavily industrialized interior. Despite the Pentagon’s crowing about having two Marine Corps Expeditionary Units (MEUs) in waters off Iran, the Marine Corps lacks the basic tools needed to conduct urban combat. Marines currently lack tanks, heavy engineers, and school-trained snipers required to wage modern urban battles.
Up until 2020, the Marines had all three of these assets, and those proved critical in their success in taking Najaf, Fallujah, and Ramadi during the war in Iraq. The 38th commandant transformed the Corps into a defensive missile-firing organization focused against the Chinese in the South China Sea in something called “Force Design.” He needed to come up with the money to buy its missiles and radars. Instead of asking Congress for this new capability, he decided to use internal funds by divesting the Marine Corps of existing assets, including the tanks, heavy engineers, and the sniper school. His rationale was that large amphibious operations were no longer possible due to missiles and armed drones. When appalled senior retired Marines voiced strong objections to this radical move, he assured them that if tanks and heavy engineers were needed, the Army could provide them. He also seemed to believe that improvements in rifle sights could make any Marine rifleman a competent sniper. (RELATED: The Marine Corps Has Gone Off the Rails)
Marines were ready for the post-9/11 urban combat in places like Najaf, Fallujah, and Ramadi because the 30th commandant had directed the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab to concentrate on improving the Corps’ urban combat skills in a series of experiments, exercises, and wargames called Urban Warrior in the late 1990s. Although the Lab developed some new technologies to assist city fighting, it also recognized the need for the tank-engineer-sniper triad in reducing casualties and increasing the lethality of friendly forces.
At the risk of getting too deep in the weeds regarding urban tactics, the combined arms approach worked as follows: Marine infantry would advance on a target building behind the tanks. The highly accurate tank guns would suppress fire from the defenders, while snipers would act in a counter-sniper capacity, watching the flanks and rear. Heavy engineer bulldozers were used to level particularly troublesome structures and clear supply routes of rubble.
All of those are now missing from the Marine Corps inventory.
The importance of tanks and snipers in a combined arms urban operation is graphically illustrated in the PBS documentary The Last 600 Meters, which tells the stories of the battles for the Iraqi cities of Fallujah and Najaf in the words of those who fought them. The role of the heavy engineers was less spotlighted, but they were instrumental in clearing supply lines of rubble and providing clean water to the Marines using their Reverse Osmosis Water Purification Units (ROWPUs).
Augmenting the Marines with tanks and heavy engineering equipment would be much more complicated than the 38th commandant believes. Teaching soldiers to load and offload such assets aboard amphibious ships and landing craft would take months of training. The same holds true in integrating them into Marine Corps infantry units; it would take many weeks at a minimum. To date, none of that has been done. School-trained snipers also proved crucial in Iraq urban combat, as it has for both sides in the Russo-Ukrainian War. During Urban Warrior, units that did not use combined-arms tactics suffered up to 80 percent simulated casualties, whereas units in Fallujah and Ramadi suffered less than 10 percent killed and wounded once Urban Warrior-generated improvements were implemented.
There is no doubt in my mind that if ordered to storm Kharg, the tenacity, skill, and resourcefulness of the young Marine rifleman would prevail, but once landed, the Marines would have to assault inland through urban terrain defended by fanatic Revolutionary Guardsmen. The Marines would win, but it would take longer and with much higher casualties than would be the case if they had the proper tools to do the job. We can only hope that rectifying those deficiencies will be noted in the post-war after-action review.
READ MORE from Gary Anderson:
Barstool Politics: A ‘To Do’ List for the President Before November
Choke Points and the Future of Naval Power
Gary Anderson retired as chief of staff of the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab and has written extensively on amphibious operations and urban warfare.
