US and Japan seem to have military exercises
PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency
- Thread starter pugachev_diver
- Start date
It‘s the Marine Littoral Regiment fighting inside the first island chain and their tactics like mobile rocket launchers and drone swarm. It‘s basically envisioned as a counter to China‘s area denial strategy. Marines aim to attack and quickly disperse before Chinese have time to react.
That's nice and all but the Marines are still a very small force and most probably won't dictate who wins the war, theres no chance the Army in the Pacific would be willing to do what the marines are doing. The Navy seems to be the only branch that is actually doing stuff that works, but Trump seems to be crapping all over their plan.
The problem is that the balance of air and naval power within the First Island Chain is tilting towards the PLA, making the survival probability of the Marines increasingly slim.
Their role is becoming more and more akin to being trapped on an isolated island, strike as many air and sea targets as possible within the limited space around the island (and the PLA is well aware of their presence there), and then dying under the hunting of drones. Just like the Japanese army in World War II, without presence at sea or in the air, resupply and evacuation were mostly wishful thinking.
solarz
Brigadier
Attack what, exactly?
Assuming China gains air supremacy otherwise UAVs are not going to be covering those islands.
Oh yeah they will cover and even missiles. Most of those islands are just a kilometer wide. Is just unsurvivable. But I dont see any plans to invade those island mosltly to deter attacks from those islands.
I don't think it's going to be "missiles" either, just one or two missiles. Because a platoon or company of Marines on an island are not particularly useful if their one or two missile launchers are blown to bits...
Please do entertain us what US/ally planes and bases can sustain air supremacy in the 1IC...
Also, before you drown in hopium, the Landing Ship Medium, absolute backbone of the MLR, first of which won't be delivered before 2029.
Even if the Navy manages to roll up enough LSMs (a very big IF), how will they survive until beaching any 1IC island without getting targeted and utterly destroyed by PLA fires. Without air cover they are sitting ducks even for Tomahawk grade missiles.
If you escort them with destroyers or CSGs, that just defeats the purpose as you'd be sacrificing more valuable assets/VLS/strike platforms for USMC's measly few launchers.
This whole banzai strategy is a complete miscalculation and desperate attempt to stay relevant by the USMC in the age of peer naval warfare. They still think going into 1IC is a walk in the park. But instead they will most likely face complete wipeout, like the Japanese had in Southeast Asia during WWII.