U.S. Marine Corps anti-tank missiles trained to destroy enemy armored vehicles are getting a new weapon: one-way attack drones that can hunt and attack targets far beyond the range of their traditional missiles, a top general recently told reporters.
The first Marine units will… loitering ammunition in January, part of the service’s broader retooling of ground forces for large-scale combat in the Pacific and for battlefields increasingly filled with drones and disrupted communications.
The changes underway within the Corps represent a marked shift from the post-September 11 wars, in which Marines were involved in counterterrorism and counterinsurgency operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Corps has already shed its tanks and other heavy equipment, created new units focused on littoral warfare and is prepared to disperse Marines. about remote islands and coastal areas within an opponent’s weapons range.
The new loitering munitions give small naval units their own ability to conduct precision strikes at ranges that previously required strikes from nearby aircraft or artillery.
The Marines who will be the first to receive these weapons are troops whose core mission has long been to attack and destroy tanks and armored vehicles Spear and TOW missiles.
Lt. Gen. Jay Bargeron, the department’s director of strategy, plans and policy, told reporters last week that the service will deploy its Organic Precision Fires-Light system in January. These loitering munitions – explosive attack drones – can fly out, locate a target and strike it.
“What I’m trying to do is bring the precision strike capability to the lowest level,” Bargeron said. “That’s a great example of using advanced technology to increase the lethality of Marines who are already doing that job.”
While the missleman’s job title won’t change, the Corps describes troops with the added role as “precision strike Marines,” a move that reflects how drones are dramatically reshaping ground combat.
But the same technology that gives Marines new offensive capabilities also creates a growing defensive problem. The US military is still looking for reliable ways to do that defeat drones on a large scale, even as the Corps begins to deploy systems intended to help small units detect and destroy individual threats.
“This is really about buying back or making sure that we have the right firepower and endurance in those ground combat units to do things like capture and defend a piece of ground when necessary,” Bargeron said.
The service has already deployed the first 80 sets of an organic system for combating small drones, with 300 more planned this year. The equipment includes a drone detection capability, new electronic warfare systems to help defeat drones, and a new type of ammunition. Marines can shoot drone targets with standard rifles.
Which requires new equipment train moremaking “task saturation” — which gives troops more responsibilities and increases their cognitive load — a complicating factor, Bargeron said.
A new three-day counter-drone course is under development for rifle squads, groups of about a dozen infantry Marines, at the corps’ main combat training center, Twentynine Palms, California, the general said.
That work builds on the service’s offensive and defensive attack drone teams, which are driving the development of drone tactics within the Marines.
The essential ability of the lowest level, the lowest echelon units — teams of anywhere from 10 to 200 Marines — to defend against one-way attack systems “may be one of the biggest holes in our swing,” Bargeron said. “So we are working hard on that.”
